Issue 30, December 2017
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Craig Connelly, Leonard Varey, Elena Mogilevski, Christine Sherry, Andrew Myer (L-R)
MESSAGE FROM THE CEO
The journey continues... Since our last newsletter, I was fortunate to travel to the USA with members of the Sidney Myer Fund and The Myer Foundation to undertake a study tour of philanthropic organisations. The opportunity to meet with twenty or so major US Foundations and experienced philanthropists was invaluable. An itinerary that was expertly curated by Christine Sherry, an experienced US philanthropic consultant, was complemented by the collaborative nature with which representatives of The Myer Foundation and Sidney Myer Fund and I undertook each meeting. The purpose of this study tour was to meet with a number of overseas philanthropic practitioners regarded as ‘best practice, forward thinkers’ with a view to exploring the ways in which they approach grantmaking. In particular, I was seeking any new and interesting ideas to bring back to Australia that might inform The Ian Potter Foundation’s philanthropic approach. The trip also afforded me the opportunity to test the Foundation’s current practice against
best practice in US philanthropy as well as the experiences of a broad range of family and non-family foundations, and to contemplate the views of some leading thinkers in the field. My conclusions from this trip include: focusing funding priorities in nominated program areas will correlate with an amplification of impact the not-for-profit sector needs much greater investment in its human capital ‘good’ organisations need operational, multi-year funding for capacity building increasingly, philanthropy has a role to play in influencing government policy and engaging in advocacy to effect positive social change the modern world is faced with a myriad of challenges, and where identified gaps exist, philanthropy can work to close such gaps more US-based philanthropic foundations are focusing their efforts to address inequality and climate change. The Foundation is already acting on many of the above points. Not only have we narrowed our focus in many of our program areas, the Board of Governors recently nominated several key areas of focus for its Major Grants stream over the next four years in the environment and health areas. These include supporting initiatives to mitigate the impact of climate change on the Great Barrier Reef, reduce land based run-off impacting on the Great Barrier Reef, better managing Australia’s fresh water resources in urban and regional areas, improving health services delivery for all Australians and supporting the prevention and treatment of mental health disorders. The average duration of our grants is now approximately 29 months, we no longer award single year grants, we are seeking to provide great organisations with multi-year support for both project funding as well as organisational support, and we continue to quietly advocate for effective change. I am also confident that our future philanthropic approach will start to consider and embrace issues including working to identify and close gaps in areas our Board regards as nationally significant, as well as investigating the establishment of a dedicated program supporting the development of Australia’s not-for-profit human capital. Recently, we have launched a new Knowledge Centre on the Foundation’s website which is a direct result of The Ian Potter Foundation being listed on Glasspockets, a directory of philanthropic foundations aiming for best practice in grantmaking and who are willing to be transparent by sharing their successes, failures and ongoing evaluation of their processes. Looking back over 2017, it has been a busy year at the Foundation. Our team are all looking forward to a break over the holiday period so we can return with renewed energy in 2018. We wish all our grantees and the wider philanthropic sector a very Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year! Craig Connelly
GRANTS ROUND UP
$12.8m awarded to 14 grantees
Tomorrow Today Foundation Board and funders pictured at Tomorrow Today’s annual celebration.
The latest funding round (Round 3, 2017) was the Foundation’s annual 'by invitation' round that concentrates on Major Grants. Five major grants were awarded multi-year funding totalling $9.8m. Each of these successful grants were the result of working with invited organisations over the previous 12 months. The successful major grants reflect the current focus of the Major Grants stream addressing available and affordable housing for the homeless and projects designed to benefit Indigenous Australians. This round also saw select ‘by invitation’ grants made in several other program areas. These grants reflect the Foundation’s focus on both capacity building of existing programs run by organisations with proven track records as well as more project-specific funding for outstanding organisations. Find out more about grantees in this round on our blog or see the complete list in our Grants Database.
Program Areas
New Science Funding Objectives At the recent Board meeting, new funding objectives for the Science program area were approved. The Foundation's Science program aims to strengthen Australia’s research and innovation profile and capacity. The Foundation recognises the profound impact of climate change
and has chosen to direct its Science program funding towards mitigating the effects of climate change and creating a sustainable future for Australia. The central focus of the Science program is support for exceptional and visionary scientific researchers in the fields of environmental science, (including biodiversity, water and/or land management) and renewable energy and storage. The revised objectives are effective immediately. The Science program will be open for applications in March 2018.
Learn more
IN THE NEWS
Wild Play opens
A new children's garden for Sydney After much planning and building, The Ian Potter Children’s Wild Play Garden is now open in Centennial Park, Sydney. Centennial Parklands Trust was one of the recipients of The Ian Potter Foundation's 50th Anniversary Commemorative Grants in 2014 to support its vision to develop a children’s garden in the heart of Sydney, the first in NSW. That vision has truly been realised by The Ian Potter Children’s Wild Play Garden that opened to the public in October this year. Wild Play will undoubtedly improve the lives of all the children and families who visit as well as the wider community through the positive impact it has on this next generation.
Giving children the opportunity to explore nature is extremely important for their physical, intellectual and emotional development. Gardens like Wild Play encourage children’s innate curiosity and eagerness to explore, all the while learning about the natural world. If we wish future generations to appreciate our natural environment, we must ensure all children have places to really experience nature. Wild Play is one of these places. The Ian Potter Foundation congratulates all who devised, designed and built this wonderful wild place in the heart of Sydney.
See more
ANNUAL REPORT 2016-17
Strategy + Impact
The past year has been one of continual improvement of our grantmaking processes, including formalising our approach to Major Grants, revising funding objectives in several program areas and streamlining our funding rounds. The annual report details these improvements, showcases our grantees projects and provides a detailed analysis of how our grantmaking has changed over time.
The Ian Potter Foundation Annual Grants Report 2016-17 has been published and is now available online.
Read the report
SECTOR ENGAGEMENT
Knowledge Centre
The Ian Potter Foundation is joining the ranks of the Gates, Ford and Getty Foundations to become the first non-US foundation included in Glasspockets. What is Glasspockets? 'Glasspockets is a Foundation Center initiative that champions philanthropic transparency in an online world. Launched in 2010, but with roots dating back to the Center’s founding in 1956, Glasspockets provides the data, resources, examples, and steps foundations need to understand the value of transparency, be more open in their own communications, and help shed more light on how private organizations are serving the public good'. (About Glasspockets, glasspockets.org) Glasspockets director, Janet Camarena, is excited about our addition, stating, 'I hope that your participation inspires other global participants.' To be included in the Glasspockets directory of philanthropic foundations, The Ian Potter Foundation had to demonstrate how we disseminate our mission statement, methods of contact, finances, processes and learnings. There are 25 elements that comprise the 'Who Has Glass Pockets?' assessment, there is no score associated with how many elements a foundation has achieved. The point of the assessment is for each foundation to have a road map to guide an internal discussion about what level of transparency makes sense for the foundation. Essentially it is a window into our internal and external communications strategy. In the process, we have received valuable feedback and in response created a Knowledge
Centre on our website which brings together the learnings, analysis and insights on our grantmaking. The Ian Potter Foundation Knowledge Centre contains our Annual Reports, Case Studies and Grants Database and now also includes: An Introduction to The Ian Potter Foundation: links to last year's webinar and presentations for potential grantseekers Grantee Learnings: general and program-area specific learnings from our grantees perspective Giving Insight: a collection of blog posts discussing evaluation, outcomes measurement, grantmaking strategy and NFP sector-specific issues Our Learnings: the Foundation's learnings as a philanthropic The Ian Potter Foundation Evaluation Pool (TIPFEP): an annually updated list of evaluators and their area of specialisation. This Knowledge Centre will continue to evolve as further resources are developed. On balance, it was a very fruitful exercise, both enabling us to increase the transparency of our operations via our website as well as set an international trend. The Foundation encourages other Australian Foundations to consider participating.
Visit our Knowledge Centre
GRANTEE NEWS
Two in a HundrED The Foundation is delighted to see two of its Education grantees – Hands On Learning and Smiling Mind – listed in the HundrED top innovations in K12 education for 2017.
HundrED's mission is to help all young people flourish by seeking and sharing inspiring innovations in K12 education. The HundrED team select 100 Global inspiring education innovations annually and share them with the world for free. Their first collection was released in October 2017. The criteria for HundrED innovations are: Innovativeness: Does it bring something new, within the context? Impact: Does it show demonstrable evidence of impact and has it been running for at least one year? Scalability: Can it be used, or is it already being used, in other areas or countries around the world? To learn more about these innovators please read the Hands on Learning case study on our website or about the grant to Smiling Mind featured in the Foundation's latest annual report (p. 19). Congratulations to Hands on Learning and Smiling Mind for this international recognition of their innovative projects.
Learn more about HundrED
Staff News
Staff News
This year, the staff of the Foundation were invited to enter the annual The Big Issue Australia and Justice Connect Homeless Law street soccer face-off with other philanthropics (Myer Family Company, Shine On Foundation) and law firms (Allens, Corrs Chambers Westgarth, Herbert Smith Freehills, and MinterEllison)
This year the staff of the Foundation decided to participate in the Movember fundraising campaign to raise awareness of men's health issues with a focus on mental health.
Fair Play
as well as Justice Connect.
Movember
Our three male staff members took the pledge to grow moustaches for the month with a fundraising target of $10,000.
This saw the birth of the Potterheads who
We are pleased to announce The
played three tense games in blistering heat at the North Melbourne Community Centre in November.
Seahorse Gang raised $10,323.
Watch the movie Lead goal scorer was Alberto 'the foot' Furlan who delivered four goals for the team. However, it was the sportmanship shown by the whole team – Alberto, Lauren, Ella, Nicole and Leo – that won the Potterheads the Fair Play trophy. The Potterheads will be back in good form next year.
Office hours
Christmas break The Ian Potter Foundation will close for Christmas and New Year from noon on Friday 22 December. The office will reopen 9am on Thursday 4 January 2018. We wish all our grantees a happy and safe Christmas and New Year.
We produce this quarterly e-newsletter to keep our friends and associates up to date with all the news and recent grants made by The Ian Potter Foundation.
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