measuring what matters The Foellinger Foundation 2004 Annual Report
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The Foellinger Foundation 2004 Annual Report
how do you measure...? The challenge is a big one: How do you evaluate the effectiveness of nonprofit work? Can you weigh renewed hope? Can you measure a broadened mind? Can you calculate the value of an improved life? Each day, organizations that receive Foellinger Foundation grants reach out to Allen County children and their families, continually striving to make lives better. Some organizations do this by touching hundreds of people in a single day, while others focus on making deeper contact with only a few. Some provide physical comfort and support, while others offer more intangible services. All of these organizations work to make a difference. Our challenge to grantees is to assess how well they’re doing – not by trying to measure the wattage of a smile or the tonnage of an enriched mind, but by seeking tangible processes for evaluating the impact they have on the people they reach.
“It allows you to think through your entire process to see if you’re really meeting a need.”
Kent Castleman Cornerstone Youth Center
It is the Foundation’s hope that, by working to measure what they do, the organizations that serve Allen County children and their families can monitor their performance and enhance their effectiveness. 2
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The Foellinger Foundation 2004 Annual Report
how do you measure stewardship? The Foellinger Foundation doesn’t advocate measurement for measurement’s sake, nor is it seeking a way to play watchdog over its grantees. The
Foundation
must,
however,
ensure that the funds it puts into the community are used as effectively as
“We are entrusted with dollars not only from the Foundation, but from individuals and companies and the state and the county, and if we can’t show them that we can do our job, then those dollars should be given to somebody else.” Mark Terrell Lifeline Youth & Family Services
possible. Having been entrusted with an organization created nearly 50 years ago, the Foundation’s board members have dedicated themselves to being good stewards of the organization and its resources. Last year, the Foellinger Foundation distributed more than $6.9 million in grants to Allen County nonprofit organizations. Only through good stewardship will the Foundation be able to provide this kind of support to its community for another half-century, and beyond. The Foellinger Foundation focuses 85 percent of its grantmaking on Allen County children and their families, especially those with the greatest economic need and the least opportunity, and directs the remaining 15 percent to community organizations whose programs benefit the people of Allen County but do not specifically fit the Foundation’s strategic intent.
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The Foellinger Foundation 2004 Annual Report
how do you measure impact? Traditionally, nonprofit organizations have assessed their impact by counting activities – how many people they serve, for example, or how often they offer services. But advances in evaluation practices are helping nonprofits begin to measure impact in realistic and meaningful ways.
“Now we are much more geared to understand that quantity isn’t everything, and that quality is much, much more important.” Susie Peirce WFWA PBS 39
Organizations are learning to identify realistic outcomes and monitor progress in achieving them. Will an organization ever be able to capture fully the impact of a child’s artistic expression, a family’s sense of security, or a teenager’s academic success? No, but evaluation practices will help nonprofits visualize the chain of events that lead to outcomes and keep their organizations focused. By beginning to measure outcomes and outputs, Foellinger Foundation grantees learn to improve their efforts and increase their impact. The Foellinger Foundation recognizes that its impact on the community is indirect – rather than operating programs that make a difference, it provides resources to those organizations that do. As a result, the Foundation is committed to helping those organizations work as effectively and efficiently as possible.
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The Foellinger Foundation 2004 Annual Report
how do you measure empathy? Evaluation is a complex field filled with terms like “logic model” and “measurement framework” – terms that, at first glance, can seem foreign to the world of nonprofit work. Understanding
that
most
nonprofit
professionals aren’t trained in evaluation methods and practices and therefore might find them daunting, the Foellinger Foundation offers training and technical support to nonprofits going through the evaluation process. In addition, the Foundation helps grantees recognize that evaluation requires organizational growth and that even the best-conceived plans require constant review and occasional adjustment. By providing technical support, information and guidance throughout the evaluation process, the Foellinger Foundation hopes to help grantees emerge from it better equipped to evaluate their progress and achieve their goals. The Foellinger Foundation continually strives to identify, pursue and redefine its own measurable objectives. Through that process, it anticipates becoming increasingly effective in its grantmaking.
“They helped us through the whole process by being there every step of the way.”
Annette Dufor Euell A. Wilson Center Inc.
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The Foellinger Foundation 2004 Annual Report
how do you measure encouragement? The act of making a difference is not a singular event. It’s a process encompassing a series of efforts, challenges, successes and failures. In expecting grantees to assess their effectiveness, the Foellinger Foundation isn’t asking them to conjure up arbitrary goals or generate big, explosive victories. Instead, it is encouraging them to learn from the process, identifying realistic
“They’re challenging us to be a better organization.”
Elizabeth Monnier Fort Wayne Dance Collective
goals consistent with their capabilities, measuring their progress toward those goals and constantly seeking ways to improve. By challenging organizations to learn through
evaluation,
the
Foellinger
Foundation hopes to help them pursue continued
improvement,
avoid
the
appeal of singular achievements and continue to do what they do so well – improve lives. The Foellinger Foundation believes in leveraging the strengths that exist in our community. By providing resources to organizations that serve the children and families of Allen County, the Foundation believes it can help build a better future for the community at large.
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The Foellinger Foundation 2004 Annual Report
how do you measure growth? Program evaluation isn’t an end in itself. Nor is it simply a means for measuring the impact organizations have on the people they serve. At the Foellinger Foundation, we see evaluation as a means for growth. Measuring what we do helps us learn and grow as individuals and as organizations. Achieving objectives and then pushing ourselves to aim even higher allows us to extend our vision and our reach. Gauging our effectiveness teaches us to make better use of our resources. As humans, we strive constantly to improve ourselves so we will be better equipped to help the people around us. Similarly, the Foellinger Foundation encourages nonprofits to strive to measure what they do and then work to use what they learn through that process to improve their organizations and, ultimately, to increase their ability to make a difference.
“As long as you’re with the Foellinger Foundation, I think your potential of growth is always going to be there. They keep you on your toes.”
Brian White Allen County Education Partnership
The Foellinger Foundation is an organization devoted to learning. Through its own evaluation process and through programs for nonprofit staff and board members, it seeks to give individuals and organizations opportunities to strengthen and grow.
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The Foellinger Foundation 2004 Annual Report
The Foellinger Foundation 2004 Annual Report
how do you measure success? In sports, goal lines provide clear
years ago. Striving to focus our grant-
While the phrase “measurable results”
we assure nonprofit organizations that,
thousands of real Allen County people
objectives and scoreboards report how
making and operate more efficiently, we
might be relatively new to the nonprofit
while we are indeed seeking measurable
whose lives are indeed changed by the
we’re doing. In the business world, goals
decided that 85 percent of the grants paid
world, the expectation that grant recipi-
results, we know those results can be
work of our grantees. And behind the
might come in the form of sales quotas,
annually would support organizations,
ents should be held accountable for mak-
moving targets and understand that
grant applications and mission state-
while annual audit reports track profit or
programs and projects serving Allen
ing progress and achieving results dates
changing circumstances and program
ments are Allen County people who are
loss. In everyday life, scales show how a
County children and their families,
back to the days when Helene Foellinger
evolution might require that objectives be
dedicated to serving their neighbors.
diet is going, and odometers tell us how
especially
first
adjusted mid-stream.
far we’ve traveled.
economic need and least opportunity.
those
with
the
greatest
distributing
Foundation
Without the benefit of scoreboards, time-
support to Allen County organizations. Then as now, in requiring results, the
Evaluation is a process, not an event. It
keepers or goal lines to tell them how they’re
doing,
our
community’s
For nonprofit organizations, however,
More specifically, in the area of early
Foundation wasn’t asking grantees to be
pushes
progress can be harder to gauge. How do
childhood development, we chose to
perfect, but it did expect ongoing
examine their work and their missions in
nonprofit organizations constantly strive
you measure the consequences of a com-
emphasize
program improvement.
order to make sure they are in alignment.
to increase the consequences of the
munity’s compassion? Or the effects of
readiness, quality child care and child
It drives them to learn more about them-
community’s compassion, the effects of
an agency’s program that improves
care worker training. In the area of youth
In recent years, we have made changes
selves and their work; it helps them
their program services and the impact of
clients’ lives? Or the indirect impact of a
development,
mentoring,
to our grant application process to
evolve, grow and, we expect, do what
our Foundation’s support.
foundation’s grantmaking that supports
out-of-school opportunities and youth
increase the emphasis on measurement
they do better.
agency services?
worker training our priorities. In the area
and evaluation. In addition to asking
of family development, we chose to put
applicants for basic information about
Why do we require this evaluation effort
The truth is, you usually don’t even try
family services and family resource
their organizations and the objectives
by our grant applicants? In part, because
because you can’t even define “appropri-
centers, parent enrichment, family literacy
they’d like us to fund and asking them to
we are the stewards of a nearly 50-year-
ate results.” Like the potential of a child,
and intergenerational opportunities at the
explain how the objectives align with
old organization. As such, we are
Barbara A. Burt
the dreams of a teenager or the love in a
top of the list.
their missions and ours, we ask them to
accountable to the vision that inspired
Chairman
describe how they will measure their
Helene Foellinger and her mother, Esther,
education
we
made
and
school
family, the impact of one person helping
14
began
nonprofit
organizations
to
By any measure, they do us proud.
another cannot be weighed, counted or
We designated the remaining 15 percent
outcomes. Then, to put a finer point on
to create the Foellinger Foundation, and
calculated.
of annual grant payments for general
outcome measurement, we ask that they
we are responsible for assuring that the
community interests. This allows us to
submit planning tools known as logic
funds they provided for community
Cheryl K. Taylor
This is the challenge facing nonprofit
provide resources for programs that,
models and measurement frameworks.
betterment
President
organizations
foundations,
while they don’t fall into our three pri-
including the Foellinger Foundation, that
mary areas of focus, do improve the qual-
Those last two items form the core of the
commit resources to them.
ity of life in Allen County.
evaluation process, but they also often
Also we believe that this process of
present the biggest challenge to grant
setting goals and measuring progress
and
the
are
used
as
effectively
as possible.
When your objective is improving and
In addition to giving the Foundation a
applicants, because they require appli-
makes organizations better and success
enhancing lives, how do you evaluate
sharper focus, this strategic planning
cants to explain how they would measure
more likely.
your effectiveness? How do you measure
process helped to underscore the impor-
program impact. Recognizing that this
your ability to make a difference? In part
tance of our work to strengthen nonprof-
requirement
and
What we must never forget, of course, is
to better answer these questions, the
it organizations and also validated our
difficult, we offer technical support and
that behind the numbers, logic models
Foellinger Foundation went through an
ongoing belief in the importance of
training to organizations. Furthermore,
and
in-depth strategic planning process four
appropriate evaluation. 15
can
be
daunting
measurement
frameworks
are