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Archive for November, 2009
From The Chronicle: Food Charities Get Attention From Congress
Nov 20th
Charity and foundation leaders Thursday urged Congress to take action to help the nonprofit organizations that are on the front lines of the mounting demand for food aid as the economic recession cuts a wide swath, reports The Chronicle’s Government and Politics Watch column.
From The Chronicle: Americans and Holiday Giving Plans
Nov 20th
A new poll suggests that many Americans plan to cut back spending so they can maintain or increase their charitable contributions during the holiday season, reports Prospecting, The Chronicle’s fund-raising column.
Give and Take: Are Trustees Ready to Handle Financial Challenges?
Nov 20th
A nonprofit lawyer worries that boards are unprepared to handle the demands of today’s economy, notes Give and Take in its daily digest of the best blog posts about the nonprofit world.
Plus:
- Continuing debate over Goldman Sachs’s philanthropy
- A beacon for charities that want to create social-media guidelines for workers
People: Community Foundation of South Jersey Names New Executive Director
Nov 20th
Among the latest appointments and other personnel changes in the nonprofit world: Sidney R. Hargro has been named the new executive director of the Community Foundation of South Jersey, The Chronicle of Philanthropy reports. Subscribers have access to a list of all the new appointments the newspaper has posted in the past week.
Correction: Investment Advice From President of Tufts
Nov 20th
Thursday’s Philanthropy Today misstated the views of Lawrence Bacow, president of Tufts University. He said colleges should look to reduce the level of risk in their investments by putting less money into hedge funds and private equity. Also, the item included an incorrect figure for the decline in value for the Tufts endowment. The fund dropped by 25 percent for the year that ended June 30.
Take-Away Points from Colloquy: “Challenges of Developing New Theory in Nonprofit and Voluntary Action Studies”
Nov 19th
Guest Blog post from Taylor Peyton Roberts, University of San Diego.
Chair: Margaret Harris
Presenters:Jeff Brudney, Bob Donmoyer, Angela Eikenberry, Paul Kabalo, Lucas Meijs, Laurie Paarlberg, Jo Anne Schneider, Nidhi Srinivas
Although this session was so rich with discussion that it would be impossible for me to do it justice in a blog, the meeting was such a thought-provoking treat that I have been inspired to collectively summarize some key highlights:
• In nonprofit research, borrowing from theories of other disciplines requires accurately interpreting the languages of those disciplines.
• There is great value in adopting a pluralist view in the field, as opposed to a positivist view.
• Leave open the possibility for interpretation. Meaning is constructed.
• Include qualitative studies in your lit reviews, not just quantitative studies.
• The nonprofit sector may lack evidence-based practice for four reasons:
• Three challenges to nonprofit theory are:
• For practitioners, theory must be used as a tool for thought.
• We should create theory that addresses practical problems. Two possible approaches could be:
Chair: Margaret Harris
Presenters:Jeff Brudney, Bob Donmoyer, Angela Eikenberry, Paul Kabalo, Lucas Meijs, Laurie Paarlberg, Jo Anne Schneider, Nidhi Srinivas
Although this session was so rich with discussion that it would be impossible for me to do it justice in a blog, the meeting was such a thought-provoking treat that I have been inspired to collectively summarize some key highlights:
• In nonprofit research, borrowing from theories of other disciplines requires accurately interpreting the languages of those disciplines.
• There is great value in adopting a pluralist view in the field, as opposed to a positivist view.
• Leave open the possibility for interpretation. Meaning is constructed.
• Include qualitative studies in your lit reviews, not just quantitative studies.
• The nonprofit sector may lack evidence-based practice for four reasons:
- much atheoretical work exists,
- many studies are disconnected geographically,
- qualitative studies (i.e., those that examine process) are lacking, and
- academic work needs to be more accessible to practitioners.
• Three challenges to nonprofit theory are:
- disciplinary chauvinism,
- the gap between nonprofit theory and practice
- the failure for US scholars to pay attention to work from other countries.
• For practitioners, theory must be used as a tool for thought.
• We should create theory that addresses practical problems. Two possible approaches could be:
- the use of thick descriptions (anthropology),
- relying more on logical reasoning and case-studies (law).
2009 ARNOVA-Goers: Meet Your Wordle.
Nov 19th
Guest Blog post from Taylor Peyton Roberts, University of San Diego.
If you haven’t already spent enough time perusing ARNOVA’s 38th Annual Conference Program today, here’s a colorful twist on the program’s content.
For those of you who are not familiar with Wordle, it is an online application that allows users to transform text into word cloud graphics. In the final product, the most frequently-appearing words are largest in size.
I couldn’t resist the temptation to discover the Wordle-flavor of ARNOVA’s detailed conference program this year. Check out the snazzy result!
If you haven’t already spent enough time perusing ARNOVA’s 38th Annual Conference Program today, here’s a colorful twist on the program’s content.
For those of you who are not familiar with Wordle, it is an online application that allows users to transform text into word cloud graphics. In the final product, the most frequently-appearing words are largest in size.
I couldn’t resist the temptation to discover the Wordle-flavor of ARNOVA’s detailed conference program this year. Check out the snazzy result!
Tufts President Criticizes Top Schools’ Investment Strategies
Nov 19th
Saying he believes there is a “pretty high correlation” between the size of U.S. college endowments and the riskiness of their financial strategies, Tufts University’s president, Lawrence Bacow, told Bloomberg that higher education institutions should look to reduce their stakes in alternative investments such as hedge funds and private equity.
Such risky investments sent assets at Harvard, Yale, Stanford, and other well-endowed institutions plummeting in the past year, leading to disruptive cost cuts at schools where endowments covered as much as 49 percent of operating budgets.
Mr. Bacow said Tufts’s endowment, which lost 25 percent of its value in the year ending June 30, will contribute only 10 percent of the schools operating costs this year and that there “are investments we will not make” in the wake of the financial crisis.
Downturn Taking Toll on Silicon Valley Giving
Nov 19th
The economic downturn has taken a significant bite out of giving by Silicon Valley’s wealthy technology moguls, The Wall Street Journal reports.
Grants from donor-advised funds managed by the Silicon Valley Community Foundation, whose clients include Yahoo’s former chief executive, Tim Koogle, and E*Trade’s co-founder, Bernie Newcomb, totaled $46.2-million in the first eight months of the year. That’s a significant decrease from 2008 ($168-million for the year) and 2007 ($117.7-million). Assets in the foundation’s funds have declined from $997.5-million at the end of 2007 to the current $721.1-million.
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