Sylvia Yee

May 14, 2014
Sylvia Mei-ling Yee is Vice President of Programs at the Evelyn and Walter Haas, Jr. Fund, a family foundation in San Francisco that makes $30 million in grants annually. She played a key role in the selection and development of the Fund’s education equity, nonprofit leadership, gay and lesbian and immigrant rights programs. A community leader committed to social change, Read More

Ambassador Swanee Hunt

May 14, 2014
Ambassador Swanee Hunt is the Eleanor Roosevelt Lecturer in Public Policy, founder of the Women and Public Policy Program, senior fellow at the Center for Public Leadership, and senior advisor at the Carr Center for Human Rights, all at Harvard’s Kennedy School of Government. She is President of Hunt Alternatives Fund, which for more than three decades has advanced innovative Read More

Jason Baron

May 13, 2014
Jason Baron is the creator and portfolio manager for the Socially Innovative Investing (S2I) strategy in the investments group within U.S. Trust. Prior to joining U.S. Trust, Jason served as the group head for the community investing team at Lehman Brothers where he was responsible for the design and implementation of socially responsible and mission-oriented investment products. He began his Read More

James Canales

March 12, 2014
Jim Canales was appointed president and trustee of the Barr Foundation in May 2014. Prior to joining Barr, he spent two decades in a variety of roles at The James Irvine Foundation in California, including president and chief executive officer from 2003 through 2014. Before working in philanthropy, Jim was a high school English teacher in San Francisco after earning Read More
Blog | Featured Article

The Eckerd Family Foundation’s Limited Life Approach

October 15, 2013
In this month’s issue of Family Giving News, we feature an excerpt from the new  Passages Issue Brief chronicling the experiences of the Eckerd Family Foundation, which operated in Tampa, Florida from 1998 to 2012. Organized from its inception as a limited life foundation, the Eckerd Family Foundation took a bold and strategic approach to using its assets to create Read More
Knowledge Center | Impact Story

Igniting the Spark: Greater Worcester Community Foundation

June 20, 2013 | Youth Philanthropy Connect
As a way to support the voice of youth in the community and engage donors, the Great Worcester Community Foundation adopted the Youth for Community Involvement (YCI) Program in 1999. YCI provides an opportunity for youth from schools across the area to build skills in leadership and philanthropy. The foundation set up a youth endowment to support the program and Read More
Blog | Voices from the Field

Can a Small Organization Have a Big Impact?

April 15, 2013 | Emily Tow
I get asked this question often.  How can a small foundation with few staff really catalyze large scale social change?  In fact, how can a foundation of any size play this role?  At The Tow Foundation, we have attempted to play a significant role in juvenile justice reform, an issue that seems like an intractable problem and not easily tackled Read More
Blog | Featured Article

Advocacy and Family Giving: Leveraging Limited Dollars to Maximize Impact

May 15, 2012 | Lisa Ranghelli
The Brindle Foundation in New Mexico is concerned with the well-being of children and youth, and funds in the areas of education, early childhood development, youth development and human services.  Brindle has assets of $14.2 million and annual giving of $579,000 (as of 2010). As the Board and staff of the foundation explored how to make the most difference with Read More
Blog | Featured Article

Finding Common Ground & Valuing Different Views

April 15, 2012 | Jason Born
Dealing with different views is challenging in any family. Beliefs, opinions, and practices can diverge in so many ways. Making collective decisions across generations and branches within family foundations – while taking into account differing politics and religions, different attitudes toward money, and varying comfort levels with how public to be about wealth and foundation gifts – often requires patience, Read More