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Waivers for photos and videos uploaded to a follow up form?
We have a community grant program that has a primary focus of youth development and education. In follow up reports, we ask for a short story about how the grant dollars impacted those served by the grantee, as well as an area to upload photos and videos. Obviously, most of these photos and videos are normally of the…
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Grant Acceptance Forms & Best Practices
Hi All, I am reaching out for your best practices when it comes to signing grant acceptance forms. Currently, our Foundation has a grant acceptance form built out in GLM that is assigned as a follow-up form. Below are the questions that we ask regarding authorization to sign/accept. Most often, we find that the person who…
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Unused Capacity Grant Funds
Are there other funders out there that always end up with unused Capacity Grant funds? It's an easy $5,000 with a simple request process. Thoughts on why our nonprofits do not want to take advantage of capacity-building dollars? 🤔
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Marketing Scholarships to Non-traditional Students
Our foundation needs help reaching continuing college and nontraditional students to notify them of scholarship and educational loan opportunities available through our foundation. How are other community foundations marketing to prospective scholarship applicants who are not in high school?
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Scholarships -- Determining Financial Need
Hey everyone! I am building our application with Foundant and using this as an opportunity to re-think some of the questions on our application. Several of our scholarships are based on financial need. Currently, I ask students to list their estimated college expenses, scholarships they have for the upcoming year, and…
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Scholarship Review Process
We have a difficult time recruiting volunteers to sit on the scholarship review committee. At this time, all reviewers score all of the applications (300+). How does anyone split the applications up so each reviewer isn't required to score/read all 300+ applications?
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Class rank as part of evaluation process
One of our local school districts will be eliminating class rank as part of their student data, and their guidance office reached out to me for some input. We don't use class rank as part of our scholarship evaluation, but I know other organizations may, so I told her I would reach out to other scholarship providers. Their…
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Do any of our peer community foundations grant scholarships internationally? If so...
What should we be aware of when establishing a scholarship for international students/universities? Note: This would be an employer scholarship for dependents of international employees. What IRS guidelines are you using to govern your work? Are there particular nuances with the application, selection, or grant process for…
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Text messaging to students
Hello, I am trying to gather best methods to communicate with students. Email seems to be opened sometimes, but we are finding things going to SPAM, or simply not being read. We are thinking that texting may be the best method. I am wanting any process recommendations for texting to students. (Reminders to complete follow…
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Scholarship for study abroad students not getting applicants
We are struggling to get applicants for a scholarship meant for students who will study in a foreign country for one semester or more. The application is fairly simple, so no roadblocks there. And it doesn't seem to matter what time of year I open or close the application. I've reached out to several global studies…
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As a CF, how do you determine who is eligible to receive your annual unrestricted grant dollars?
Our unrestricted Community Endowment has received its first large estate gift. To this point the grant distribution from the Community Endowment has been very small. We would like to learn more about the process to determine grant recipient(s). Does the community foundation have specific areas of interest when granting…
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Is NSPA membership worth it?
Hi! Is anyone a member of the National Scholarship Providers Association (NSPA) and thinks it is worth it as a scholarship provider? If yes, what would you say are the main benefits? If you were a member and cancelled your membership, why did you cancel? Thank you for any feedback you can provide!
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Scholarship Criteria
Good morning, We are in the process of reviewing scholarship fund agreements. We have several scholarships that list criteria like high moral character, worthy citizen, constructive attitude, potential for future success, etc. Our scholarship process is blind (student names are redacted from the application) and we have a…
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Ranked Choice Scholarship Scoring
Our organization utilizes a ranked scoring system for our Lilly Endowment Community Scholarship Program, and we are struggling to translate that system effectively into the evaluation tools in SLM. For this process, our evaluators are evaluating a pool of 10 finalists (one representing each eligible high school in the…
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Gender versus Pronouns??
Good afternoon!! I am new to the Foundant/Compass Community, and am looking forward to getting some great feedback!! Reviewing our scholarship application and wondering if everyone is using the term Gender on their applications or using Pronouns instead? What is best practice? Thank you so much! Kasey
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"Chosen Name" or "Preferred Name" field for scholarship applicants?
Hello! My organization is considering adding a "chosen name" or "preferred name" field to our scholarship applications after we discovered the need for such a field during our recent scholarship cycle. Do other organizations use a field like this in their applications? If so, could you please share the language that you…
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Funding for religious organizations
I am interested in gathering sample language about foundation support for religious organizations. Our guidelines currently indicate that we will not make grants to organizations that engage in proselytizing as part of their mission or programs, but we feel that we need better clarification on that. I would appreciate any…
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GED & Gap Year Questions in SLM Application
Hi all. Just winding up our first year using SLM. Looking back we need to do a better job building the application to represent GED and/or gap year/not currently enrolled students. Curious what info. others gather and how they ask. Thanks in advance for any input.
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3rd Party Grant Management Fee
One of our partners (the city where we are located) has asked us about managing one of their grant programs. Now that we have GLM (just went live last month) this is a much easier concept and I’m wondering if anyone has any experience doing that in their city? Does anyone have experience in charging a fee for service, by…
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Staff on Selection Committees
We are having a conversation about including staff members on our scholarship selection committee to review applications and make recipient selections. Are there other community foundations out there that do this? What are the benefits and challenges? Are there any best practice guidelines about this?
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Using third party to obtain financial information
Currently on our UA application we ask students to provide their financial information, as reported on their last tax form, either as a dependent reporting their parents information, or as an independent reporting their own financial information. We have been considering using the third party option to have parents…
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How long is your scholarship application open?
For years, our organization's annual scholarship application has opened on January 15 and closed two months later on March 15. We're considering moving up the deadline and having the application open for a shorter period of time, possibly 6 weeks. What are the open & close dates for your scholarship program? What factors…
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EFC to SAI Changes
Hello, Can anyone provide on information transition process from EFC to SAI changes. My organization typically uses EFC chart, as well as institutional aid to determine unmet need. Does somebody have an example or template for estimated conversions for SAI.. They have developed and/or plan to implement? Thank you, Kaylin
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What does programming mean to your CF?
Hello! Our CF is making some strategic plans and have recently decided we were going to do more programming. I have been tasked with figuring out what a "program" is for our organization. In the past we have run a scholarship cycle, grant cycle, and a couple initiatives as our programs. However, we would really like to…
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managing the number of applications per quarter
I am a new grants administrator for a small community foundation. The foundation currently accepts applications quarterly, but the number of applications received varies a lot and some quarters, the Grants Committee (3 board members and the foundation ED) complains that there are too many to review. They would like 15 - 20…
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Scholarship rubric scales for activities, community service, and work
We are working to update our evaluation questions for our selection committees as they review scholarship applications. We are trying to create a scale to measure the quality of students' extra-curricular activities, community service, and work. We want to offer clear guidance to evaluators for why they should give…
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Grants Distributions Forms: How to Set Up for Irregular Distributions?
We're considering using the follow up process to build a form for distribution requests, but distributions vary from grant to grant, and can be very irregular. Has anyone found an especially creative or useful way to make the follow up forms work for grant distributions better than grantees simply emailing the info to us…
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Fund Advisor Content for Portal - Grant Request Header and Footer
Hello, Would anyone mind sharing their content in the Fund Advisor Portal Content -Grant Request Header and Footer? I have an issue with advisors sometimes not seeing their unsubmitted grant requests, due to a lengthy Header. Thank you! Sally Hermann St. Croix Valley Foundation
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Demographics by Candid
Hi everyone, We’re working on content related to the Demographics by Candid integration in GLM and would love your input. Have you implemented/are you planning to implement the integration? If so, what are your goals? If not, what’s driving your decision? Thank you in advance for your thoughts! Jennifer
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Grant letter for Annual Grants for Donor Designated Funds
Hello, Would anyone be willing to share their letter they use for annual distributions from donor designated funds? Thank you! Sally Hermann St. Croix Valley Foundation
