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Peer Learning: Grant Committees
What is the structure of your evaluating body – do you have one core committee or multiple committees (fund, sector, or program dependent, for example)? What steps has your organization taken to diversify committees and to incorporate participatory grantmaking? How are community members considered for your committee…
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Scholarship letters of recommendation
Will your organization or has your organization eliminated letters of recommendation from your scholarship applications? (Unless it's part of the scholarship fund agreement, of course). I'd be interested to know your organization's thoughts about that. Thank you! Lee O'Neil (she/her/hers) Community Foundation of Fayette…
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Independent Grantee Survey Providers
Hi! I work for a 3M family foundation in Boston, MA. We are looking to conduct an independent survey of grantees to get feedback on our grantmaking and process. We are aware of CEP but wanted to know if there are other providers doing this work. We are considering CEP so would like to hear references and testimonials about…
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Financial Need Scholarships - How to score
Hi! We have a portfolio of 47 scholarships we oversee, and half of them have criteria where the student must demonstrate financial need. We ask them for their household income, number of household dependents, what other financial aid they are receiving, and if there are any extenuating circumstances to their financial…
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Connecting Donors with Funding Opportunities & Community Needs
We are a state-wide community foundation and are frequently contacted by organizations and municipalities throughout the state who have funding needs and have questions about what opportunities our CF offers. In some cases, our community funds or grant programs can meet these needs, but many times we don't have a program…
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Follow-up asking for transcript and financials
We send a follow-up at the end of each semester asking for transcripts and financials before we send out subsequent scholarship payments. After you make the final payment, do you still ask for financials and transcripts at the end of that semester? I was wondering what the point would be because the money is already spent…
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USWBSI Grant Admin Position Opening
Posting on behalf of the U.S. Wheat & Barley Scab Initiative (USWBSI). They are looking for a grant admin. Remote OK! Here is the link: https://hr.myu.umn.edu/jobs/ext/345894 Please reach out to Michelle Bjerkness if you have any questions Michelle Bjerkness Director of Operations U.S. Wheat & Barley Scab…
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Scholarship Applications
Does anyone know if there is a requirement to obtain the date of birth, gender and citizenship for a scholarship applicant? Our current scholarship applications ask for this information, but I couldn't find anything online that says it's required. Thanks in Advance! Jennifer Brambley
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First Pass Evaluation
Does anyone have a good resource for evaluation questions for a first pass evaluation? Looking to simplify process with a few simple questions that allow us to rank recommendations before taking a deeper dive in the review process through the 2nd evaluation.
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How Are You Building Relationships in the Time of COVID?
During our 2/2/2022 Coffee Talk, funders shared how they are building relationships in this time of COVID. We heard from funders how they are sharing donor stories, taking walking meetings, setting up team art groups and many other creative ways to re-energize and stay connected in our hybrid and remote environments. We'd…
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School and Student Name withheld in Fund statements
I'm curious to know if any of your donors have given you feedback about the new format for scholarship fund statements, now that the statements don't give any student information. In previous years, our scholarship fund statements indicated the name of the college or university. When we switched to CSuite, we were only…
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Would your grant recipients be interested in learning more about Foundant’s newest solution?
Do your grant recipients struggle with their technology, connecting data, and collaborating across their organization? We are excited to announce the launch of Foundant’s newest solution, NonprofitCore, designed specifically for the unique needs of nonprofit charitable organizations, NonprofitCore enables nonprofits to…
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Congratulations to the January Top 10!
Congratulations to @JulieKlipp, @HaileyCarmerLaMaster, @AshleyButler, @BorisKievsky, @DeirdreMcLoughlin, @SusanSchroeder, @SofiaRomeo, @AaronKennerk, @MimiKim, and @JeannineBogaard! As a thank you for your contributions to our Compass community this past month, you will be entered into a random drawing for a surprise. The…
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Making applications inclusive for individuals who are visually impaired
How are you making sure that your grant/scholarship applications are inclusive of the visually impaired? Do you create another version of the online application that is accessible to assistive technology such as a screen reader?
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Can you answer an unanswered question?
Help a fellow Compass member and support our Compass community by responding to an unanswered question! Bookmark this link: community.foundant.com/discussions/unanswered OR Find Unanswered Questions under your Quick Links: If you answer a question, request the Solution Finder, Rule Breaker or Game Changer badges for 10…
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Hello Everyone!
Hi All! My name is Abby Elliott, and I am new here at Foundant as a Client Services Intern. I have heard such positive things from friends that work at Foundant which is the reason behind me applying to the company. I grew up in Billings, MT, but my folks now live in a small town up north called Chester. I am attending MSU…
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Opportunity: Full-Time Operations & Office Manager for CF of Central Wisconsin
Courtesy post for @JenRiggenbach! The Operations and Office Manager is a full-time position. The goal of the Operations and Office manager is to ensure smooth operations and seamless customer services to internal and external constituents. They are responsible for the overall office management and administration, including…
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Grant Types
We are currently working on refreshing our current list of grant types in order to best categorize what our donors are interested in. For example, we split education out further into private, public, and collegiate and added categories for social justice, racial equity, and women's advocacy. The team here brought up the…
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Good interview questions
Hello, We are hiring a new staff member who will lead our Foundant expansion. We are not getting any applicants who have direct CRM experience. I'm looking for good interview questions that would help us learn if someone has transferable skills.
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Introduction - Gavin Patton
Hi, My name is Gavin Patton and I will be joining the Foundant team as a Client Services intern. I am super excited to be joining Foundant and helping clients. Some things about myself: I love to swim competitively and have been doing so for 11 years. I love many kinds of foods, but I would say my absolute favorite is…
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Bequest Best Practices
Hi there! I am hoping to learn more about bequest practices from other community foundations. I am curious as to what internal forms/process are used by other foundations? Is there anything others have found to be particularly useful in navigating planned giving, particularly if there is no signed fund agreement? Are…
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Donor Advised Evaluations (2)
The OCCF is in the process of finalizing our first SLM scholarship process. We usually have the scholarship committee score applications and bring those scores to DAF committees for the selection process. How do you easily share the scores with the DAF's? Or do you find another process works better? Thanks for your help!…
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Looking for more grant seekers
Hi everyone! Our Foundation is looking for more grant seekers. A) Do you have some great charities in the arts, education, or community development areas looking for additional funding this year? Could you send them my way? B) What's the most effective way you've found to alert those in need to your Foundations? TIA!
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Vote on idea to inactivate Grant Types & help with 2022 data clean up
It's 2022 and my org is now 3 years into using the GLM and CSuite - lots of learning since we started. We would like to mark some grant types we had at the beginning as "inactive" as they no longer are doing the trick, but they are attached to historical grants, which we would like to keep. If you are in a similar…
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Struggling with Attendance
Good afternoon Compass family! Looking to revamp some of our questions on our application and struggling with one question/answer in particular.... how to ask about excess absences or tardies that show on an applicant's high school transcript?? I would really appreciate to hear how you ask this question on your…
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2021 Compass Recap!
Thank you all for a great year and your contributions to our community. Seeing you use this space to help one another by answering questions and sharing resources is inspiring. I can't wait to see what 2022 brings. Let's keep the conversation going, and keep maximizing our impact on the philanthropic community! -Kara,…
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Scholarship Payments and Policies
Dear colleagues, Weld Community Foundation is in the process of reviewing our Scholarship Policy, specifically regarding payments to cover cost of attendance versus qualified education expenses and also whether to allow institutions to provide refunds to the student. If your foundation's scholarship policy specifically…
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Newsletter New Look (and best practices)
New year, new look - share your thoughts on our redesigned newsletters! Does your organization send out a newsletter? Share your best practices!
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Impacts on Scholarship When a Student Withdraws Mid-Semester
Does your community foundation have a policy addressing how scholarship funds are handled if a student withdraws prior to the completion of a semester? We have a situation where a student withdrew with 3 weeks remaining in the semester. Do you request the college/university return those funds (or a portion of funds)? Do…
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Greetings from Lucas Rosas!
Hello everyone! My name is Lucas and I just joined the team as a Client Services Intern! I heard about foundant at a job fair at MSU Bozeman, and knew right away that this opportunity was for me. I am originally from Chile but came to Bozeman to pursue a degree in business/finance. During my free time I enjoy sports such…