JANUARY 1994
VOLUME 1, ISSUE 5 / $5.00
PhilanthroDvJoumal
Filling the void
Funders
target AIDS
services
Private funding for HIV/AIDS pro
grams is growing in North
Carolina, but some say the
focus of that funding sho^dd be
broadened to include support of
education and prevention, as
well as residential housing and
other services.
By Katherine Noble
Dollars for AIDS have been
increasing, but activists say not
enough of that money is targeted at
prevention. Since 1984, when a mere
five foundations in the U.S. made
Look for AIDS, page 11
Going out on its own
Wellcome Fund poised for $400 million gift
A huge gift from its British sis
ter will mean big changes for
the Burroughs Wellcome Fund
near Research Triangle Park.
The Fund is reexamining its
mission and carefully planning
how to become one of the
biggest U.S. foundations.
By Todd Cohen
At the age of 38, the Burroughs
Wellcome Fund is leaving the nest.
Thanks to a $400 million gift from
its British sister, the Wellcome Trust,
the Fund in four years is expected to
rank among the 50 or 60 biggest U.S.
foundations.
To prepare for the changes that
the huge cash infusion will bring, the
Fund has been examining its mission
and figuring out how to handle its
growth. It has decided to separate
itself from its Research Triangle
Park parent, pharmaceutical giant
Burroughs Wellcome Co.
The Fund is expanding its grant
making and revising its investment
practices. It is reworking and
expanding its board and staff. And it
is searching for a scientist to serve
as its president — a newly-created
position.
“We realize we’re going to have
major challenges,” says Martha
Peck, the Fund’s executive director.
“But we’ve embraced change enthu
siastically. With a positive attitude, I
think, it’s easier to translate obsta
cles into opportunities.”
While the scale on which the
Fund soon will operate is much larg
er than many nonprofits, the lessons
the organization is learning may be
instructive even to small nonprofits.
The Fund
has operated
as the corpo
rate founda
tion of Bur
roughs Well
come Co.,
which devel
oped the AIDS
drug AZT. For
the past de
cade, the com
pany’s annual
contribution to
the fund typically has ranged from
$3 million to $6 million, although
because contributions hinge on
annual sales and profits, tou^ years
have meant httle or no contributions.
Annual grants by the Fund, which
supports people engaged in biomed-
icd research, totaled $7.8 milUon in
the fiscal year ending Aug. 31, 1993.
W
f j e realize we're going to
hove major challenges. With a posi
tive attitude ... it's easier to translate
obstacles into opportunities.
MARTHA PECK
Executive Director
Because federal tax law requires
that foundations each year give away
at least 5 percent of their assets, the
Fund’s annual giving is expected to
surge to $22 million after it receives
the final $80 million installment of
the Wellcome Trust gift in 1997.
Look for WELLCOME, page 21
A winning team
Western N.C.
Smart Start effort
spans turf lines
A seven-county regional Smart
Start project for children in
Western North Carolina is seen
as a model for partnerships that
cross geographic and organiza
tional boundaries. For those
involved in the area Smart Start
team, the Region A initiative
has by turns been exciting and
exhausting.
By Barbara Solow
I A / hen Sheila Hoyle
I /I / thinks about the
I / I / Smart Start team
» she helped organize
for communities west of Asheville,
the image that comes to mind is of an
overworked fax machine, churning
out meeting notices to hundreds of
volunteers.
Her vision makes sense once she
explains that the Region A Smart
Start initiative for children covers
seven counties covering 3,500 square
miles - an area bigger than the state
of Rhode Island.
Since Region A was chosen in
September to be one of 12 state-fund
ed early childhood education pilot
projects, participants have found
themselves swept up in a whirlwind
of meetings, training workshops and
strategy sessions.
Hoyle, who is executive director
of the Southwestern Child
Development Commission - the
umbrella group for Western N.C.
Smart Start - estimates she logs
more than 300 miles on her car each
week, driving to meetings with
regional Smart Start leaders and
state officials in Ralei^.
Smart Start is Gov. Jim Hunt’s
program for bringing public- and pri
vate-sector forces together to devel
op ways to improve education, health
care and other services for children
from birth to five years old.
The program is being adminis
tered by the nonprofit N.C.
PartnersMp for Children, which will
raise money and coordinate activi
ties for locd nonprofit Partnerships
carrying out
programs in
Tar Heel com
munities.
When
asked to de
scribe their
vision for the
seven-county
Smart Start
effort, mem
bers of the
CL *1 Lj I Region A
Sheila Hoyle tealn cite an
unusual combination of challenges
and opportunities.
Instructor Tonia Biddix conducts an art class at a childcare center in Webster run by the
Southwestern Child Development Commission. The commission is the umbrella group
for the mountain region's Smart Start effort to improve early childhood education.
Photo by John Fletcher Jr.
On the down side of the ledger are
the geographic distances their pro
grams must cover and the intensity of
the needs they must meet. Poverty
rates among parents with children
are higher in all seven Region A
counties than statewide averages.
On the up side is a long history of
collaboration among public and pri
vate agencies in mountain communi
ties.
“Having a seven-county effort is
no different from working in a large
city and having each borough repre
sented,” says Hoyle, whose agency
runs 36 child development programs
west of Asheville.
“You just have to make sure that
everyone’s needs are part of the
vision.”
In developing a vision for seven
western counties and the Qualla
Indian reservation.
Smart Start support
ers drew on a num
ber of successful
partnership models.
Among them was
a project called Our
Children Today and
Tomorrow, spear
headed two years ago
by Hoyle’s agency
and the Region A
Child and Youth
Planning Council.
The project, which pulled togeth
er foundations, state and local gov
ernments, social service agencies
and citizens, produced a detailed
report about the reach and effective
ness of services for children.
“The two years that led up to
Smart Start put us in a wonderful
A two-
year-old
program in
Buncombe
County
puts kids
first.
Page 21
position because we knew what our
needs were ,” says Marsha Crites, a
senior associate in Sylva for the
Raleigh-based North Carolina
Community Foundation - the organi
zation responsible for convening the
region’s initial Smart Start meetings.
“In the early days, there were a
couple of counties that were not sure
they wanted to be part of a coalition.
Part of our responsibility was to
work with them to show them it was
in their interest.”
The early meetings drew parents,
daycare providers, teachers, admin
istrators and business owners -
many of whom had been working
toward the same goals hut had never
met.
From those sessions, a core
group emerged that produced the
Look for WESTERN, page 5
NONPROFITS
Careers 22
Connections 3
Fund Raising 14
Grants and Gifts 16
In January 17
Job Opportunities 20
Opinion 10
People 16
R.S.V.R 17
Professional Services...!9
Technology 3
FOUNDATIONS
Rex Hospital
gears for change
As it nears its 100th birth
day, the Raleigh hospital is
preparing to form a part
nership with physicians that
will manage the delivery of
health care.
• Page 4
Babcock Foundation
curtails grant-making
The Winston-Salem
foundation is making
fewer grants this year so it
can spend most of its time
studying its long-term
strategy.
• Page 6
Volunteers boost
History Museum
The state's new
$23.9 million
Museum of History
owes much to the work
of a 14,000-member
volunteer group.
• Page 8
CORPORATE GIVING I
On the job
in high school
In a handful of
communities, local
industries are teaming
with high schools to com
bine practical training
with practical education.
• Page 12