ERIC ED537195: Working Together to Achieve Greater Impact: The Donors' Education Collaborative of New York City. Principles for Effective Education Grantmaking. Case in Brief Number 3

2012·0.16 MB·English

by  ERIC

Case in Brief No.3
PRINCIPLESFOREFFECTIVEEDUCATIONGRANTMAKING
Working Together to Achieve Greater Impact:
The Donors’ Education Collaborative
of New York City
PRINCIPLESFOR EFFECTIVE EDUCATION GRANTMAKING
Discipline Knowledge Resources Effective Engaged Leverage, Persistence Innovation
&Focus Linkedto Grantees Partners Influence& &Constant
Results Collaboration Learning
Since the mid-1990s, constituency
The Donors’Education Collaborative of
building and advocacy for better New York (DEC) began with a scene more
typical of politics than philanthropy:five
public education havegrown steadily
foundation presidents in a room,trying to
in New York City. “Working Together
figure out what to do for a city that had
to Achieve Greater Impact” explores fallen on hard times in the early 1990s.
how that growth was fueled by the
They investigated specific topics—such as
Donors’Education Collaborativeof the public hospital system and school gover-
New York, which pools its members’ nance reform—and sought advice from some
of the city’s most well-informed voices.
financial resources and expertise to
What the group of five eventually settled on
advanceshared grantmaking goals.
in late 1994 was morein the natureof a gen-
eral mandate than a specific plan:The foun-
The case study illustrates the
dations would work together for five years,
importance——and challenges——of the
pooling funds to support a common set of
sixth ofGrantmakersfor Education’s grantees,with the goal of increasing public
eight Principles for Effective supportfor New York City’s public schools.
Education Grantmaking: leverage, Atthe time,many of the city’s schools
influence and collaboration. were plainly failing,the system had suffered
aseries of devastating budget cuts and a
successionof chancellors had done little to
improve the situation.Responses to these
problems from parents and other traditional
education constituencies had been scattered
and ineffective.>
For a funder wanting to make a difference chantment with funding “model programs”
in such an environment,a collaborative to improve school organization or class-
effort with other foundations offered few room practice,at least for New York City.
disadvantages and some very real advan- “High turnover of chancellors was the
tages.Working together would mean learn- reality,”recalled Janice Petrovich,a program
director at the Ford Foundation,“so you
Working together would give grantmakers
couldn’t count on them to make change.
achance to put their heads together, We felt that everything had been tried.
share intelligence and perhaps arrive at People were disappointed with their
grantees and with the schools.”
more carefully considered decisions.
T
ing to cooperate in a complex and highly
ospur real improvements in the school
politicized arena,yet it would also give
system,DEC members settled on the
grantmakers a chance to put their heads
strategy of creating a broader constituency
together,share intelligence and perhaps
for better schools—or,more immediately,
arrive at more carefully considered deci-
anumber of constituencies,organized
sions.They would be able to pool their
around specific objectives and school-
financial and human resources,including
or neighborhood-level needs,that might
their credibilitywith political leaders,the
eventually merge into a wider force.
press,the business community,nonprofits
and other foundations. Their strategy reflected two complementary
theories about how philanthropy could
I
make a difference:(1) a pooled grantmak-
nthe spring of 1995,DEC members—
ing approachcould advance social change
including the original fivefoundations plus
in an area that had long resisted reform
others who expressed interest—began to
efforts because it would engage a range
puzzle through the actual operations and
of foundations,make available a large pool
strategyofthe collaborative.They returned
of funds,and leverage members’interests,
often to a fewkeyprinciples to guide
influence and knowledge;and (2) sustain-
their choices:collaboration,flexibility and
able,systemwide reformcould be achieved
participation.Hoping to attract and hold
by combining policy-change strategies
as many participants as possible,they set
with efforts to build permanent,broad-
the minimum annual contribution to the
based constituencies that would advocate
pooled fund at $25,000,low enough to
for and monitor those strategies.
attract smaller foundations but high enough
to require genuine commitment.They After making initial planning grants in late
debated the pros and consof a weighted 1995 to nine organizations,DEC chose
voting system,eventually deciding on a four community organizing and advocacy
simple formula of one vote per foundation. projects in June 1996 to receive substantial
supportover an initial four-year period
DEC members began refining their
(three remain active grantees of DEC):
grantmaking strategy to improve the city’s
schools.They were united in their disen-
Lessons learned
• The Equity Reform Project,through
which two lead partners and three
This case study——the full text of which is
other organizations proposed to build a
available at www.edfunders.org——suggests four
constituency for school finance reform
important lessons for grantmakers seeking to
in the state;
increase their impact:
• The Parent Organizing Consortium,
•Pooled resources can bring more significant
which sought to coordinate and strength- resources to bear on a problem——and
en the work of a disparate collection of therefore promise a greater likelihood of
neighborhood-based parent organizing success:By aggregating funds from large and
groups in the city; small donors into one grantmaking vehicle,
New York-based grantmakers leveraged their
• Transforming Education for New York’s
investments and accomplished much more
Newest,which brought together the
than they could have alone.
New York Immigration Coalition and
•Collaboration pools notonly grantmaking
Advocates for Children to spearhead
dollars but also grantmakers’ wisdom and
acampaign to improve educational
knowledge:Byworking in tandem, founda-
services to the growing population of
tions can enrich and inform each other’s work.
immigrant students;and
DEC members adjusted their own education
• The Metro Industrial Areas Foundation, strategiesin NewYork City and elsewhere
which agreed to work with the Public based on lessons learned from DEC’s grant-
Education Association to build a citywide making results.
parent coalition to press for specific •As with all grantmaking, persistence and
education policy changes. adaptability are key practices for effective-
ness:The current phase of DEC’s work,
D
after many refinements to its original strategy,
EC engaged the Chapin Hall Center
appearstobe yielding the mostsignificant
for Children to conduct an evaluation of
return on its long-term investment in
its work,which was published in 2004.
improving NewYork Citypublic schools.
At the end of DEC’s initial grantmaking
phase,three of the four projects could •Collaboration with other funders can yield
adistinctive, opportunistic grantmaking
showclear ways they had strengthened
strategy that is broadly owned and different
local constituencies for school improvement
from what a foundation might do on its own:
and garnered newcredibility for community
Tomakeadifference in the difficult political
organizing and advocacy groups.By 2006,
environment of New York City in the mid-
DEC members could point to specific
1990s,DEC settled on the unconventional
breakthrough successes by their grantees,
strategy ofre-energizing neighborhood
including the adoption of new school
activists and unifying them into a citywide
district regulations that secured parents’
constituency for better schools——a strategy
right to information in their home lan- and setofgrantees that some DEC members
guages and expansion of a promising model would not have funded independently.
for improving teaching quality.(While the
fourth project,the Metro Industrial Areas
Foundation,experienced some early success,
its policy development goals never gelled As the grantees learned to balance
into a parent-organizing agenda,and the community organizing and policy develop-
project was discontinued.) ment,DEC member foundations also
developed a more nuanced understanding
The truth is, we started talking each other’s
of connections between the approaches.
language. Our relationships grew rich.
Lori Bezahler,president of the Edward
W.Hazen Foundation,said,“I was always
Moreover,according to both Chapin Hall
one of the people out there stressing the
and DEC members,the collaborative
importance of community organizing.
and its grantees had learned to work more
Others did the same with policy develop-
strategically with school system and city
ment.But the truth is,we started talking
officials and to deploy their collective
each other’s language.Our relationships
influence to leverage change.The impact of
grew rich.”
DEC has not been limited to its grantees,
nor have DEC members’investments S
been limited to grants to the collaborative. ince its founding in 1995,27 founda-
Some members have leveraged DEC grants tions and donors have become involved as
with their own additional grants to cultivate members of the DEC,some for the entire
related projects,such as litigation,that durationand others for shorter periods.
DEC does not fund.Some have seen The collaborative is scheduled to operate
their own local and national grantmaking at least through 2007,by which time its
strategies evolve to reflect lessons learned grantmaking investments will total nearly
from their DEC experience. $10 million.
Drawn from the experience and wisdom of our members, GFE’s Principles for Effective
Education Grantmaking are designed to help strengthen philanthropy’s capacity to improve
educational outcomesfor all students. Our series of accompanying case studies is designed
tohelp donors,leadersand program staff reflect more deeply on what the principles mean
for their own grantmaking, how to integrate them into their efforts and how to improve
the results of their grants in education.
This Case in Brief provides a synopsis of an in-depth case study and the lessons it suggests
for other education funders. We encourage you to review and consider the full text of
the case study; free copies of it and others are available online at www.edfunders.orgor
by calling 503.595.2100. In addition, the case studies in this series are being taught at many
of GFE’s programs, and also can be taught in individualized settings by special arrangement.
720SWWashington,Suite 605, Portland, OR 97205 503.595.2100 www.edfunders.org