Geraldine R. Dodge Foundation

In addition to the Foundation Center’s new “Focus on the Economic Crisis” section of their website, the Council on Foundations (CoF) has launched a new website, Economic Xchange, which is a forum for grantmakers and nonprofits to exchange ideas, share stories, and discuss how the current economy affects them as well as the field of philanthropy. While you’re there, check out CoF’s inaugural issue of Thought > Action > Impact, their “e-journal of philanthropic ideas.”

The Foundation Center has launched a new “Focus on the Economic Crisis” section on their website, which provides an array of interesting and useful articles, podcasts, blog posts and other tools for helping nonprofits and foundations navigate the challenging economy.

This interactive “Mapshot,” for example, gives an interesting snapshot of the most recent foundation giving and program related investments, state by state, related to the recession; click on the states to get specific information. You can sign up for their grant RSS feed here to get the most current data.

And for commentary on the philanthropic world, the Foundation Center’s blog, “Philantopic” is here.

It has often been noted that those of us who work at foundations never tell a bad joke, let alone hear direct criticism of our work or our methods. In an effort to provide foundations with constructive feedback on their strengths and weaknesses, The Center for Effective Philanthropy (CEP) has surveyed grantees of several hundred foundations and reported back to those foundations on how they are perceived relative to their peers on a wide range of measures. The Trustees of the Dodge Foundation commissioned a Grantee Perception Report last spring, and two representatives from CEP presented the findings to them at their Trustee Retreat in September.

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