Foundations as Match Makers

When a large national or regional foundation puts out a call for proposals only a small minority of applicants will be awarded grants, but the foundation’s impact will often extend well beyond the work of those grantees.  Frequently the application process itself will spur conversations among community groups about potential collaborations, with the grant opportunity serving as a catalyst to bring these groups together.

For example, a national foundation recently designed a grant program to fund youth advocacy projects aimed at addressing the obesity problem through public policy strategies.  Specifically, this foundation hopes to learn more about how best to effectively engage youth from communities with high rates of obesity in policy advocacy.  The call for proposals invited applications from partnerships between academic researchers and community groups. 

This alone would assure that new alliances would be explored across the country even though very few would ultimately be funded.  And then, during the proposal development process as these new partnerships sharpen their focus and put together the programs they hope to get funded, they will inevitably expand to include other groups in their communities.  Local policy makers will be consulted to help gauge the feasibility of projects.  It is not uncommon for efforts like these to take on a life of their own such that the grant itself becomes much more a means to an end rather than the ultimate goal. 

In this sense, the foundation has advanced its mission without writing a check, and in many more places than it planned to fund.  By the time the funding decision is made and a small handful of applicants get the good news, there likely will be many more projects at various stages of development around the country which might never have gotten off the ground had the foundation not put out its call for proposals.