Foundation Annual Reports

HEINZ ENDOWMENTS
30 Dominion Tower
625 Liberty Avenue
Pittsburgh, Pa. 15222
(412) 281-5777
http://www.heinz.org

Period covered: Year ending December 31, 2002.

Purpose and areas of support: The Heinz Endowments comprise two foundations, both of which were endowed through the family fortune of Henry J. Heinz, the founder of Pittsburgh’s H.J. Heinz Company. The Howard Heinz Endowment was established in 1941 through the will of Mr. Heinz’s son Howard, and the Vira I. Heinz Endowment was established in 1986 through the will of Vira Ingham Heinz, the wife of Mr. Heinz’s son Clifford. The two foundations are jointly administered and neither is affiliated with the H.J. Heinz Company or with the Heinz Company Foundation.

Although the funds’ grant making is concentrated in southwestern Pennsylvania, they do make some awards elsewhere in Pennsylvania and on a national basis. The funds share three broad organizational goals: encouraging residents of metropolitan Pittsburgh to view the region as an outstanding place to live and work, making the region a center of high-quality learning and educational opportunities, and ensuring that diversity and inclusiveness are prominent regional characteristics.

The endowments also share five program areas, through which they jointly approved grants totaling $70.3-million in 2002: the arts and culture, which received $19.3-million; economic opportunity, $16.9-million; the environment, $13.1-million; children, youths, and families, $11.8-million; and education, $9.2-million.

The arts and culture program focuses on expanding regional arts education and participation, augmenting the “creative capital” of artists and cultural institutions, and advancing the cultural aspects of Pittsburgh as part of community-revitalization and other efforts. For example, the Pittsburgh Ballet Theatre received $50,000 to develop a planned-giving program for four local cultural groups.

Economic-opportunity grants seek to spur regional growth and job creation, to revamp the ways in which regional institutions invest in the employment skills of residents, and to promote high-quality job-creation and training activities for low-income people.

The environment program has three goals: promoting sustainable urban design; advancing efforts to preserve the region’s resources, conserve energy, and reduce waste; and supporting projects to safeguard local watersheds and ecosystems. Grants included $400,000 to the Community Foundation of Greater Johnstown to preserve and restore watersheds in western Pennsylvania.

Also that year, the endowments joined with the Benedum, McCune, and Richard King Mellon Foundations to buy a 177-acre parcel of blighted land for conversion to a mixed-use community.

The children, youths, and families program seeks to improve the education and development of young children throughout Pennsylvania, to increase extracurricular educational activities for adolescents, and to promote parental responsibility and the active involvement of parents and other family members in their children’s education. Allocations included $250,000 to the University of Pittsburgh to expand a program that helps noncustodial fathers become better parents.

Application procedure: Potential applicants should review carefully the guidelines for the specific grant-making program from which they anticipate seeking support. Applicants should first submit a concise letter of inquiry; those that meet the endowments’ basic grant-making criteria will be asked to submit a formal application. More-detailed information is available on the endowments’ Web site.

Key officials: Maxwell King, president; Jack E. Kime, chief financial officer; Grant Oliphant, associate director of the Heinz Endowments; Douglas L. Root, communications officer; Stephanie Y. Wilson, evaluation officer; Teresa Heinz, chairman, the Howard Heinz Endowment; James M. Walton, chairman, the Vira I. Heinz Endowment.

Program directors: Joseph F. Dominic, education; Caren E. Glotfelty, environment; Brian M. Kelley, economic opportunity; Margaret M. Petruska, children, youths, and families; Janet L. Sarbaugh, arts and culture.

MINNEAPOLIS FOUNDATION
800 IDS Center, 80 South Eighth Street
Minneapolis, Minn. 55406
(612) 672-3878
http://www.minneapolisfoundation.org

Period covered: Year ending March 31, 2003.

Purpose and areas of support: Created in 1915, this community foundation makes grants primarily to benefit residents of metropolitan Minneapolis and St. Paul, and also supports some projects elsewhere in Minnesota. Donors established 46 new funds and trusts at the foundation during its 2002-3 fiscal year, and the foundation comprises more than 700 unrestricted, designated-beneficiary, donor-advised, scholarship, and other types of funds.

Grant seekers may apply for funds through two mechanisms: Community Grants, which provide support through the unrestricted funds of the foundation and its partners, and Connections Grants, which provide support through project-specific funds designated by individual donors to the foundation.

Discretionary grants totaling $6,776,320 were allocated through the Community Grants program, which emphasizes four issues: the health and well-being of children, youths, and families, which received $3,558,320; educational achievement, $1,451,500; affordable housing, $1,160,000; and economic opportunities, $606,500. Within those areas, the foundation is increasingly emphasizing “efforts to improve systems and policies that address poverty, underachievement, and injustice.”

The foundation’s children, youths, and families program also makes grants to benefit senior citizens, disabled individuals, and other vulnerable people. Allocations included $75,000 to the Farmers’ Legal Action Group, in St. Paul, for legal efforts on behalf of family farmers in Minnesota, and $30,000 to the StreetWorks Collaborative, in Minneapolis, to coordinate its street-based outreach services for runaway and homeless youths.

Educational-achievement grants support activities to ensure high-quality education for all children in Minnesota and to strengthen public-school systems. As part of its work in this field, in 2001 the foundation created Destination 2010, a 10-year program that involves numerous community partners in working with the St. Paul and Minneapolis public schools to boost student achievement and provide scholarships.

Grants to expand low-cost housing and economic opportunities included $200,000 over two years to the Minnesota Housing Partnership, in St. Paul, to promote affordable housing for low- and moderate-income people throughout the state, and $90,000 to the Neighborhood Development Center, also in St. Paul, for lending, support, and training programs for inner-city and minority entrepreneurs.

In response to looming state budget cuts, the foundation created “Deleted for Budgetary Reasons,” a public-education campaign that used a Web site, print advertising, and other means of dissemination. It was designed to engage Minnesotans in public dialogues about ways to counter the budget deficit without eliminating public-safety and support services for disadvantaged residents.

Application procedure: Potential applicants should consult the foundation’s recently revised grant-making guidelines, entitled “Broader Reach,” which are available on the foundation’s Web site or may be obtained by calling (612) 672-3861. The foundation also conducts periodic informational meetings for grant seekers.

Key officials: Emmett D. Carson, president and chief executive officer; Stuart Appelbaum, vice president, development; Desiree Heller, vice president, philanthropic consulting services; Bruce Hutchins, vice president, finance and administration; Karen Kelley-Ariwoola, vice president, community philanthropy; Christelle Langer, vice president, marketing and communications; Marigrace Deters, associate vice president, community philanthropy; Eric Anderson, Valerie Lee, Lisa Simer, and Joanne Walz, community-philanthropy officers; Patti Marsh Cagle, grants administrator; Richard D. McFarland, chair of the Board of Trustees.

SPENCER FOUNDATION
875 North Michigan Avenue, Suite 3930
Chicago, Ill. 60611-1803
(312) 337-7000
http://www.spencer.org

Period covered: Year ending March 31, 2003.

Purpose and areas of support: In 1962, Lyle M. Spencer created this foundation in order to “investigate ways in which education, broadly conceived, can be improved around the world.” In 1938, while a 27-year-old graduate student in sociology at the University of Chicago, Mr. Spencer had founded Science Research Associates (SRA), which subsequently became a leading publisher of educational tests, curricular materials, and guidance programs.

The foundation received substantial funds following Mr. Spencer’s death in 1968, and began making grants in 1972.

The foundation maintains four primary grant-making interests: supporting research projects that focus on education, assisting educational researchers at critical points in their careers, investigating the relationship of research to practice in the field of education, and financing research efforts designed to improve education in Chicago.

The foundation currently operates two programs that accept proposals. The Major Research Grants Program provides grants ranging from more than $35,000 to approximately $400,000. The Small Research Grants Program provides grants of up to $35,000 for research projects lasting two years or less.

The Major Research Grants Program supports research projects that range from mid-sized studies that can be completed in one year by a single individual, to more-complex, collaborative studies that span several years. In general, principal investigators applying to this program must be affiliated with a college or university, a research facility, a school district, or a cultural institution.

During its fiscal year 2003, the foundation awarded 13 grants totaling $4,014,450 through the program that were gleaned from the nearly 400 preliminary inquiries it received. Supported projects included studies on the commercialization of higher education and on the implications of evolving educational opportunities in rural areas of Pakistan.

The foundation made 45 grants totaling $1,470,460 through the Small Research Grants Program. Applicants are typically current employees working in kindergarten through 12th grade settings or Ph.D.’s affiliated with a college, university, school, or cultural institution.

Established in 1987, the foundation’s Dissertation Fellowship Program annually provides support to approximately 30 advanced doctoral students working on educational issues. In addition, the foundation supports three fellowship programs that it does not directly administer: the American Educational Research Association/Spencer Pre-Dissertation Fellowship Program, the National Academy of Education/Spencer Postdoctoral Fellowship Program, and the Spencer Fellows at the Center for Advanced Study in the Behavioral Sciences.

Lastly, the foundation operates three “institutional initiatives” designed to help prepare early-career scholars: the Research Training Grant Program, the Russian Training and Fellowship Program, and the Discipline-Based Scholarship in Education Program.

In 2003, Michael S. McPherson, former president of Macalester College, in St. Paul, became the foundation’s fifth president. He succeeded Ellen Condliffe Lagemann, who left to become dean of Harvard University’s Graduate School of Education.

Application procedure: Potential applicants to any of the foundation’s programs should visit the foundation’s Web site for the most up-to-date information on funding priorities, applicant eligibility, grant-making restrictions, and application procedures.

Key officials: Michael S. McPherson, president; Paul D. Goren, vice president; Mary J. Cahillane, treasurer; Maria H. Carlos, controller; Lauren Jones Young, director of institutional initiatives; Margaret Jay Braatz, Susan L. Dauber, and Mark E. Rigdon, senior program officers; Derek C. Bok, chair of the Board of Directors.