Media Advisory
For Immediate Release:
May 26, 2010
Contact: Courtney Bourns 202-898-0218; bourns@geofunders.org

On Thursday, May 27, President Barack Obama and First Lady Michelle Obama will be involved in events at the White House to discuss the federal government’s role in helping expand effective community-based solutions. Specifically they will highlight the Social Innovation Fund, a $50 million fund administered by the Corporation for National and Community Service that will be awarded this summer to a series of grantmaker intermediaries with experience and expertise helping high performing nonprofits grow.

The White House Announcement will make mention of an independent coalition of more than 20 grantmakers underwriting Scaling What Works, a nearly $5 million, three-year project of Grantmakers for Effective Organizations that will extend the reach, learning and impact of the Social Innovation Fund and other philanthropic efforts to bring effective nonprofits to scale. 

Representatives from institutions funding Scaling What Works along with Kathleen P. Enright, president and CEO of Grantmakers for Effective Organizations and members of the GEO board of directors will attend the events at the White House.

Kathleen P. Enright, president and CEO of Grantmakers for Effective Organizations, issued the following statement about the White House Announcement regarding the Social Innovation Fund and GEO’s initiative Scaling What Works.

“The economic crisis reveals that even strong nonprofits with compelling evidence of their results struggle for capital. The Social Innovation Fund has galvanized greater focus and attention on several critically important challenges facing our sector, particularly the lack of growth capital flowing to high-performing nonprofits; the need to more intentionally build evidence of what works; and the importance of collaborative action when it comes to resolving our society’s most pressing problems.

“The more than 20 funders of Scaling What Works believe that GEO’s work to build the capacity and appetite of other grantmakers in scaling result-driven programs will help us all discover new strategies for using limited resources to make faster progress on the social challenges confronting communities across the country.” 

“By helping grantmakers better understand how to partner with successful nonprofits in gathering data about their results and then prepare for growth, we’re not only strengthening the facts on the ground but also the context in which high-performing organizations do their work. As such, Scaling What Works holds the potential to contribute to the overall capacity and effectiveness of hundreds of grantmakers and thousands of nonprofits far beyond those directly involved in the Social Innovation Fund.”

“GEO and the coalition of grantmakers supporting this project are singled-minded in our focus on what matters most: the extent to which this set of investments supports healthier communities, expanded economic opportunities for low-income people, and kids who are better prepared for school, work and life.”

“For the past decade, GEO has challenged philanthropy to become more effective partners with their grantees and communities. Now we and our philanthropic partners have a unique opportunity to leverage our collective resources with government to make a lasting and meaningful difference in our communities.”

About Scaling What Works

An independent coalition of more than 20 grantmakers has made investments that will extend the reach, learning and impact of the Social Innovation Fund and other philanthropic efforts to bring effective nonprofit programs to scale.

Scaling What Works, a nearly $5 million, three-year project of Grantmakers for Effective Organizations, will leverage what grantmakers are learning about how to best expand solutions to society’s most pressing problems. By clarifying what’s working on the ground, this project will ensure that public and private resources, including SIF dollars, can more effectively flow to the highest performing nonprofits.

Through this project, GEO will:

• Serve as an ongoing convener, liaison and information broker between the field of philanthropy and the public agencies involved with the Social Innovation Fund, with the hope of building effective partnerships between philanthropy and the public sector that can speed the pace at which community solutions scale.
• Expand the number of donors nationally who are prepared to support the evidence base, capacity and growth of promising nonprofit organizations, regardless of whether these nonprofits receive funding from the SIF.
• Support collaborative learning and action among the network of grantmaking intermediaries funded by the Social Innovation Fund so they can most effectively invest public and private resources, and so the lessons they learn are translated for the broader field.

Project Supporters

The Annie E. Casey Foundation
The Atlantic Philanthropies
The Bank of America Charitable Foundation
Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation
Blue Ridge Foundation New York
Carnegie Corporation of New York
Charles Stewart Mott Foundation
The David and Lucile Packard Foundation
The Duke Endowment
The Edna McConnell Clark Foundation
Ford Foundation
George Kaiser Family Foundation
The John S. and James L. Knight Foundation
The Joyce Foundation
The Kresge Foundation
Lumina Foundation for Education
New Profit Inc.
Robert Wood Johnson Foundation
SeaChange Capital Partners
Surdna Foundation
W.K. Kellogg Foundation

About GEO
Grantmakers for Effective Organizations is a coalition of more than 350 grantmakers committed to building strong and effective nonprofit organizations. Understanding that grantmakers are successful only to the extent that their grantees achieve meaningful results, GEO promotes strategies and practices that contribute to grantee success. More information about GEO and a host of resources and links for grantmakers are available at www.geofunders.org.

About the Social Innovation Fund
Passing with bipartisan support, the Edward M. Kennedy Serve America Act authorized $50 million for the creation of the Social Innovation Fund. Administered by the Corporation for National and Community Service, the fund focuses on reducing poverty and inequity by increasing economic opportunity, preparing America’s youth for success in school, work, citizenship and other aspects of their lives and promoting healthy lifestyles and reducing the risk factors that can lead to illness. Grantmaking institutions, acting as intermediaries, will match the fund one-to-one and then re-grant the dollars to innovative nonprofits ready for growth. These sub-grantees will also be required to match funds on a one-to-one basis. All told, the program will represent $200 million of investment.