III. Philanthropy is...Grantmaking

The distribution of a grant to an organization or an initiative is only the middle of the grantmaking process. Long before came the gift that made the grant possible. Then came the goals of the granting organization, which resulted in grant guidelines and applications. The submitted applications are reviewed and analyzed, the community need is assessed, a site visit is conducted. The Board debates. The grant is made. But the grantmaking is not complete. The project itself follows, with ongoing assistance and observation, and ultimately, evaluation of the results. Successes and failures are equally informative. Input is sought, changes are made. The process begins again.

An Interview with Program staff. 

(Left to right): Ron Thorpe, Vice President for Program; Mel Bell, David Karoff, and Barbara Wong, Program Officers

What is strategic grantmaking and how is it helping Rhode Island?
Ron Thorpe: If you take all of our grants and look at them as a group, you see that we’re trying to have an impact in the community, rather than spread the dollars out to every conceivable possibility. We can see a measurable or at least observable difference over time.

Mel Bell: It’s a step beyond reactive grantmaking. It’s a planned approach to get to the root causes of problems. By doing this we have a better chance of moving beyond the problem.

What is a grant supposed to do?
RT: A grant is like a quantum bundle of energy, like an atom. If it succeeds, if it does what it’s supposed to do, it takes an electron and it moves it quantitatively up to that next level so that the atom is functioning in a different way. A grant can generate new energy to help an organization do something, at least differently, and we hope better.

Barbara Wong: A grant provides resources to an idea. It’s a financial resource, but it also represents tools for an organization to really move forward to solve a problem.

Why should donors trust the Foundation’s judgment for worthy recipients of grants?
David Karoff: We listen to a lot of issues in context that the average person frequently doesn’t get to hear.

MB: I think, too, we have a more hands-on aspect to the work we do. In many respects, it’s not about something we’ve read, it’s that we’re out in the community and involved.

What trends are developing within the Foundation’s grantmaking?
BW: We added the arts. As we reflected on our past five years of grantmaking and our efforts to be more strategic about that grantmaking, we saw that the arts had a very strong place in all three existing focus areas [Children & Families, Economic/Community Development, and Education].

RT: One trend that is remarkable to me is partnerships with government. The idea that private funds would be co-mingled with public tax dollars just was not part of the philanthropic landscape until very recently. Partnerships also have been key, and this Foundation had been partially responsible for encouraging people to think in a partnering way.
Another trend, one that we’re just beginning to develop, are Program Related Investments (PRIs). The Foundation has a certain amount of assets and we can either invest that money in a corporation in stocks and bonds or invest it directly in something like a DownCity or a Neighbor-hood Health Program of Rhode Island. Foundations have learned that little pots of money can’t make the same difference that big pots of money can sometimes make, and PRIs enable us to have this bigger impact on a project.

How would you like to see the Foundation perceived in the community?
MB: I’d like to see the Foundation perceived as a place that all Rhode Islanders can come, get a fair hearing, and receive some support.

DK: I’d like to see the Foundation perceived as an intelligent risk-taker.

RT: I think there’s a benefit to having a place that’s perceived as being not without passion, but objective — safe ground on which to test new ideas. Our agenda is pretty pure. We want to make Rhode Island the best place that it can be.