youth philanthropy

The Transformational Power of Giving

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By Patti Giglio, PSG Communications, LLC, on behalf of Exponent Philanthropy

Pierceton Woods Academy, a residential home for teenage boys in northeast Indiana, is the type of community based nonprofit you might expect to be the benefactor of philanthropic giving. The academy helps troubled boys by stepping in, temporarily, for their families and offering specialized structure and support.

But the Dekko Foundation didn’t partner with Pierceton Woods as a means of giving to the boys. Its goal was to provide the boys the opportunity to be contributors themselves.

“When young people are empowered to identify and address a community need, they try things and sometimes they succeed and other times they fail,” says Kimberly Schroeder, program officer for the Dekko Foundation. “But, overall they develop a realistic understanding of their community and themselves while gaining important skills such as critical thinking, problem-solving, and decision making.”

Teenagers on a play ground at backyard.

 

The Dekko Foundation has supported the development of philanthropically minded citizens for 20 years. Its successful Youth Pod model matches community nonprofits and adult mentors with a group of 13- to 18-year-olds who are offered $15,000 to address a community need. “Research shows that philanthropy and service to community are learned skills,” says Sharon Smith, the Dekko Foundation’s program director. “We help teens learn to bring about positive community change by doing. In the process we are changing how people think, believe, and act.”

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Prepping Youth to Attend Site Visits: In Their Own Words

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By Nikki Hilgert, Exponent Philanthropy

Involving youth in site visits gives a whole new energy to the process for everyone involved. Plus, nonprofits say that young people often ask the best questions on site visits.

As with any new experience, preparation is key to successful site visits with youth—and conversation about an upcoming site visit is one great way to prepare. Recently, Annie Hernandez of Frieda C. Fox Family Foundation modeled a helpful dialogue about site visits with two teen philanthropists: Sarah Saltzman and Luke Sturtz.

teen-philanthropy-cafe-web-bannerThe dialogue that follows was based on an exercise in our new Teen Philanthropy Café reader Thoughtful Site Visits.

Read more from Annie, Sarah, and Luke in the recent post “5 Ways to Involve Youth in Philanthropy”

What are some personal reasons you may have for visiting a nonprofit? What would you like to learn?

Luke: One reason is to get a feel for who the people are you’re working with. One-on-one interaction adds so much more value than reviewing a proposal on paper.

What are some skills or information you can gain from site visits?

Sarah: Being able to ask thoughtful questions and articulate what you’re curious about is a crucial life skill. Even in casual conversation, it’s important to be able to ask intelligent questions and maintain conversation with new people. I was shaky in this area when starting to go on site visits, and have improved.

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5 Ways to Involve Youth in Philanthropy

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By Nikki Hilgert, Exponent Philanthropy

Today’s young people come to philanthropy via many paths—not only by way of their families’ charitable giving. For example, with a combined decade of experience in philanthropy, teens Sarah Saltzman and Luke Sturtz don’t come from families with foundations or formal giving vehicles. They plugged into philanthropy through school and community.

Sarah grew up volunteering for a nonprofit her grandparents founded, and she attended Youth Philanthropy Connect’s (YPC’s) inaugural conference as a nonprofit representative. YPC is a project of the Frieda C. Fox Family Foundation, and Sarah was later invited to join the foundation’s junior board. Luke has been involved with the Dekko Foundation since 7th grade, serving on two youth grantmaking teams.

Sarah and Luke joined us last month for the webinar “How to Engage Youth in Philanthropy in Meaningful, Fun Ways,” and they shared these tips for engaging the young people in your life or community in philanthropy.

Listen to a recording of the webinar “How to Engage Youth in Philanthropy in Meaningful, Fun Ways”

Listen to other Exponent Philanthropy webinar recordings

1.  Involve youth in the creation.

Sarah points out the “generational feeling of powerlessness in middle and high school youth.” Giving youth ownership within a grantmaking process can change this perspective and help them understand that philanthropy is a way for them to impact the world.

“Our ideas, our brainstorming give us a sense of control over the impact we’re having in the world,” says Sarah about her participation on the Fox Foundation’s junior board, which engages in a collaborative grant cycle each year and receives complete control over the decision-making process from the grant application to recommending where the money will go.

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Millennial Voices in Philanthropy: Alexis Marion

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By Stephen Alexander, Exponent Philanthropy

Join me to explore the values and visions of emerging leaders of a socially minded generation. Below is an excerpt of my recent conversation with Alexis Marion, program assistant and junior board advisor with the Frieda C. Fox Family Foundation in Studio City, CA. In 2013, Alexis participated in Exponent Philanthropy’s inaugural class of Next Gen Fellows.

Alexis Marion

Exponent Philanthropy member Alexis Marion

What are you working on right now?

Currently, I’m serving a dual role as program assistant and junior board advisor. Participation in the junior board starts at age eight. Since its inception, junior board members have received $2,000 per year to make individual grants. In addition, our board approved a special Collaborative Grant of $50,000 for 2014 just for the junior board. I assist them in conducting a regular grant cycle, including due diligence, planning around grant application and review, coordinating meetings, reaching out to potential grantees, and attending site visits. Ultimately, the group reaches an agreement on the grants it would like to award and presents its recommendations to the foundation board.

Our foundation is at an interesting turning point. We recently added new board members and have experienced success with the Youth Philanthropy Connect program since its creation in 2010. As we become introspective and think strategically about the best path forward, I’ve also gotten involved in our strategic planning process.

What are you interested in, both in and beyond philanthropy?

Within philanthropy, I really love our youth philanthropy program. Philosophically, I love it; I love that we engage youth early on.

More generally, impact has been on my mind for a while now. When I attend conferences, I usually gravitate toward sessions on impact. I’ve noticed plenty of conversation about numbers—number of grant dollars, people served, and various achievements. I think the human aspect is missing. Why do we actually do this work? I don’t know how you measure that; is there even a way to think about it that makes sense to foundations?

Diversity is one of my other main interests. The word “diversity” tends puts people off from the get-go. One thing I think about is, “How do we include as many different perspectives as possible?” I know it’s possible and I believe it’s valuable. Perhaps this has something to do with being young and idealistic, but that’s also why I believe it’s so important to get young people involved and engaged.

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