Co-chaired by the William and Flora Hewlett Foundation and the Ford Foundation, a group of seven funders today announces creation of the Fund for Shared Insight, which is a pool of financial and other resources to make grants to improve philanthropy.
Shared Insight will award one- to three-year grants to nonprofit organizations to encourage and incorporate feedback from the people the social sector seeks to help; understand the connection between feedback and better results; foster more openness between and among foundations and grantees; and share what social-sector organizations learn.
“Shared Insight builds on years of work we and others have done to make philanthropy more effective,” said Shared Insight co-chair, Fay Twersky of Hewlett Foundation. “The Hewlett Foundation is honored to partner with other grantmakers to improve how we in the social sector learn from and share with each other.”
Fund for Shared Insight is a sponsored project of Rockefeller Philanthropy Advisors. In addition to the Hewlett Foundation and the Ford Foundation, initial participating funders include the David and Lucile Packard Foundation, The JPB Foundation, Liquidnet, the Rita Allen Foundation, and the W.K. Kellogg Foundation. Shared Insight welcomes other foundations to join as funding partners.
“We believe foundations don’t have all the answers. We believe many and diverse voices, not just expert voices, give us the perspective needed to make a bigger difference in the lives of people we want to help,” said Shared Insight co-chair, Hilary Pennington of the Ford Foundation. “Through Shared Insight grants, we hope to unearth good ideas from lots of different places.”
Requests for proposals (RFPs) in three different grant categories are available now, with proposals due Oct. 15. Organizations may apply for and receive grants in more than one category. To download the RFPs and learn more about the Fund for Shared Insight, visit www.fundforsharedinsight.org.
