September 21, 2011
hjweinbergfoundation.org

 

Greetings from everyone at the Harry and Jeanette Weinberg Foundation!  

Community-specific Grants Overviews

Picture1.pngThe Foundation has just completed two new reports to communicate focused information regarding annual grants. Community and program area-specific grants overviews now are being highlighted on our website under “Publications” and “Annual Reports”.  The first two of these new presentations are posted on-line:  an overview of selected grants of $50,000 or more to the Jewish community and selected grants approved or paid over the past three fiscal years within the State of Maryland.

Click here (http://hjweinbergfoundation.org/publications/annual-reports/) to review them.   

New Website

The Weinberg Foundation’s new website (www.hjweinbergfoundation.org) is ready for your visit! The Foundation hopes you will explore all of the site’s new interactive features including photo and video content, social media, and dozens of documents which you can download.  Even more important than these improvements, the Foundation seeks to enhance and simplify your navigation of the website’s many resources, especially if you are looking for information about guidelines and the grant process. You will also see that the Weinberg Foundation now has a Facebook, Twitter, and YouTube account.  Please consider “liking, following, and watching” so you can stay updated on the work and activities of the Weinberg Foundation.

Employee Giving Program

Many thanks to all of the grantees who helped to make this year’s Employee Giving Program another tremendous success.  The Employee Giving Program, launched in 2007, involves all Foundation employees in the grantmaking process, allowing each to support a cause of their choice consistent with the mission and grant guidelines of the Foundation. This year, 15 employees presented a check for $10,000 to the following 15 Maryland nonprofits:

  • The ARC of Frederick County
  • Baltimore Urban Debate League, Inc.
  • Community Support Services, Inc.                       
  • Dress For Success Baltimore
  • Fisher House Foundation, Inc.                       
  • Gilchrist Hospice Care
  • Hearing & Speech Agency of Metropolitan Baltimore, Inc.
  • House of Ruth Baltimore, Inc.
  • Kennedy Krieger/PACT: Helping Children with Special Needs, Inc.
  • Maryland Family Network
  • National Academy Foundation High School - Baltimore
  • Parks & People Foundation, Inc.
  • Partners In Care Maryland, Inc.
  • The SEED School of Maryland
  • Vehicles for Change, Inc.

As part of the media coverage of this year’s event, the Chronicle of Philanthropy provided a write up including a photo courtesy of Parks & People Foundation, Inc.  To see the story, just click on this link http://philanthropy.texterity.com/philanthropy/20110922?sub_id=43RZuvQ9dzCy#pg37.  The article on page 37 is headlined “All in a Day’s Work”.

Recent Grants

A small change to the e-News format:  The highlighting of recent grants within each of the Weinberg Foundation’s program areas now will include selected grants administered under the Foundation’s Maryland Small Grants Program.

Basic Human Needs & Health

The Foundation supports programs that meet the basic needs of individuals, families, and communities. These include programs in the areas of homeless services, economic assistance, food security, and health.

Greater Baden Medical Services
Brandywine, MD
$220,000 capital grant to build a new health clinic and administrative offices in Prince George’s County. The presence of this new 21,000 square foot facility, which includes physical, behavioral, and dental health services, means that more uninsured and underinsured people will receive the care they need.  The number of patients is expected to increase from 3,400 at the old site to 5,700 annually.  http://www.gbms.org/

Community Health Integrated Partnership (CHIP) 
Baltimore, MD
$40,000 program grant to launch the Community Health Corps in Maryland. This Americorps program operates in 19 states and the District of Columbia, but until now was not in Maryland.  This program will provide eight community health centers with Corps members who will perform various tasks aimed at increasing access to health care.  CHIP will administer the program by recruiting, training, and placing Corps members and monitoring performance.  http://www.chipmd.org/

Interfaith Works (IW)
Rockville, MD
$30,000 Maryland Small Grant to support one of Montgomery County’s largest nonprofits serving disadvantaged populations, including individuals who are homeless, recent immigrants, and individuals with disabilities. IW is a coalition of 160 congregations which operates a dozen direct service programs reaching more than 35,000 Montgomery County residents annually.  Among the programs operated by IW are an interfaith clothing center, several shelters, supportive housing for homeless older adult women, job training, supported employment, and mentoring for at-risk families. http://www.iworksmc.org/

Stepping Stones Shelter (SSS)  
Rockville, MD
$15,000 Maryland Small Grant to support this family shelter program. As part of the Montgomery County continuum of homeless services, Stepping Stones serves about 35 families each year with shelter, food, and supportive services.  Last year, 84% of SSS clients moved into stable housing, 65% gained or maintained employment, and 37.5% increased income.  Families stay at SSS for an average of about 60 days while they work on the issues that led them to homelessness and establish a plan to stabilize their lives. http://www.steppingstonesshelter.org/

Education, Children, Youth & Families

The Harry and Jeanette Weinberg Foundation aims to build economic self-sufficiency through child/family development and education, from early childhood through high school graduation, preparing individuals for success in college or the workplace. Funding is intended to address critical issues including youth homelessness, child abuse, and domestic violence.

Urban Teacher Center
Baltimore, MD
$125,000 program grant to support the recruitment, training, and ongoing support of Urban Teacher Center's residents in the Baltimore City schools through a new model of alternative certification for teachers, which includes meeting accountability benchmarks in performance before becoming a teacher.  http://www.urbanteachercenter.org/

Building Educated Leaders for Life (BELL)
Baltimore, MD
$100,000 program grant for after-school and summer academic and social enrichment programming for children from low-income families who attend under resourced schools, particularly children identified as at risk of retention by Baltimore City Public Schools.  BELL aspires to increase children's academic achievements, self-esteem, and life opportunities. http://www.bellnational.org/

Teach for America
Baltimore, MD
$100,000 program grant to provide support to fund the recruitment, selection, training, and ongoing support of corps members who teach prekindergarten through 12th grade in Baltimore City Schools and Baltimore County Public Schools. Teach for America hopes to eliminate educational inequity by enlisting our nation's most promising future leaders in education reform directly in schools. http://www.teachforamerica.org/

New Leaders for New Schools
Baltimore, MD
$75,000 program grant to provide support to the next generation of urban school leaders in Baltimore City.   New Leaders for New Schools aims to ensure high academic achievement for every student by attracting and preparing outstanding principals for urban public schools. http://www.nlns.org/

Historic East Baltimore Community Action Coalition, Inc. (HEBCAC)
Baltimore, MD
$50,000 program grant to enhance HEBCAC’s youth workforce development programs for 16-to-22 year old, low-income Baltimore City residents who are out of school.  Over 300 students each year benefit from interventions in education, mental healthcare, and job skills training. http://www.hebcac.org/

Junior Achievement of Central Maryland, Inc. (JA)
Owings Mills, MD
$50,000 program grant to support the expansion of JA Finance Park, which is a financial literacy, career and college readiness program for low-income middle/high school students and families residing in Baltimore City. http://www.jamaryland.org/

Baltimore School for the Arts (BSA)
Baltimore, MD
$35,000 program grant to support TWIGS, the BSA's free after school arts instruction program for elementary and middle school students with talent and interest.  The TWIGS program offers free classes in music, dance, visual arts, theatre, and stage production to students in the second through eighth grades who reside in the City of Baltimore and who qualify by audition.  http://www.bsfa.org/

Arts Everyday
Baltimore, MD
$25,000 program grant to provide arts integration programming for students in Baltimore City Public Schools.  Arts Everyday aims to strengthen learning by making arts education and cultural experiences an integral part of the education of all Baltimore City Public School students through collaboration among the arts, educational, cultural, and leadership communities. http://www.artseveryday.org/

Tahirih Justice Center
Baltimore, MD
$50,000 Maryland Small Grant to support pro bono direct legal services and holistic social and medical service referrals to low-income immigrant women and girls fleeing gender-based violence.  The organization addresses the acute need for legal services of immigrant and refugee women who have fled to the U.S. to seek protection from gender-based violence. http://www.tahirih.org/

Family Junction, Inc.
Cumberland, MD
$15,000 Maryland Small Grant to support parenting skills-training programs for parents of children ages birth to adolescence residing in Allegany County.  The organization promotes positive parenting to ensure nurturing family experiences for children. http://www.thefamilyjunction.org/

Greater Baltimore Tennis Patrons Association, Inc.
Baltimore, MD
$15,000 Maryland Small Grant to support after-school and summer programs through tennis, academic support, and nutrition education for low-income Baltimore City youth.  The organization aspires and assists low-income children to stay in school, graduate, pursue higher education, and improve their health. http://www.tennispatrons.org/

General Community Support

For the Weinberg Foundation, “General Community Support” is a category that includes:

  • Modest grants in the Jewish community to support Jewish communities in need as well as to support selective Jewish organizations that preserve or advance the security of Israel.
  • Community development grants for the renovation or construction of affordable housing as well as funding neighborhood revitalization and community improvement projects in low-income areas.
  • Grants are also provided to organizations that distribute funds to many of the Foundation’s priority program areas. For example: The Associated Jewish Community Federation of Baltimore, Catholic Charities, Associated Black Charities, United Way, and the Baltimore Community Foundation have received Foundation support.

Since June, the Weinberg Foundation has approved several General Community Support grants, including:

Fisher House Foundation
Bethesda, MD
$250,000 capital grant to support the construction of a new Fisher House (one of three) at the Naval Medical Center. The Fisher House Foundation provides housing to families of active duty military and veterans receiving critical care at military medical centers. http://www.fisherhouse.org/

Jewish Family Services of Lackawanna County (Pennsylvania)
Scranton, PA
$90,000 capital grant to provide support for renovation of the Jewish Family Services of Lackawanna County’s office space which will provide space for both administrative and client services purposes. 
http://jfsoflackawanna.org/

The Maryland Zoo
Baltimore, MD
$45,000 operating grant ($15,000/year for three years) to provide support for the Zoo’s outreach efforts to elementary schools in Baltimore City during the school year. The ZOOmobile will travel to more than 50 different elementary schools each year to provide hands-on educational programming.  http://www.marylandzoo.org/

American Jewish Committee
New York, NY
$25,000 operating grant to advance Israel’s efforts for security and peace; to support and strengthen Jewish communities worldwide; to combat anti-Semitism and all forms of hatred; and to promote pluralism and facilitate intergroup understanding. http://www.ajc.org/

The Israel Project
Washington, D.C./Jerusalem
$25,000 capital grant for space renovations and purchase of major equipment to support program expansion. The Israel Project is a nonprofit educational organization that provides factual information about Israel and the Middle East to the press, public officials and the public-at-large.  http://www.theisraelproject.org/site/c.ewJXKcOUJlIaG/b.7711637/k.BEA8/Home.htm

Middle East Media & Research Institute (MEMRI)
Washington, D.C.
$25,000 operating grant to bridge the gap between the Middle East and the West by informing and educating journalists, government leaders, academia, and the general public, and thereby generating awareness of issues in the Middle East.  http://www.memri.org/

Older Adults

One of two national funding programs, this is the Weinberg Foundation’s largest area of grantmaking, based on four principles:

  1. Serve the poorest - All grants must target populations well below the area median income level. Populations at even lower incomes are further prioritized.
  2. Serve the frailest - In addition to low income, frailty makes older adults extremely vulnerable. The Foundation prioritizes proposals that help older adults with the highest levels of functional need.
  3. Address the most basic needs - The Foundation prioritizes support for organizations or programs addressing the most basic needs. This includes food, housing, and income security, as well as long term care. Basic needs also include supports for activities of daily living and initiatives to maintain functional status by delaying the onset of disability.
  4. Build the field - The Foundation looks for how an individual grant might help to “build the field” of supports and services for poor older adults. Building the field might be indicated by strong collaborations at the community level, the ability to leverage or strengthen other resources, testing of a new model for replicability, or the promotion of systems of care. Sharing information also builds the field. The key to this principle is this question, “What can the project, either service delivery or capital, teach the larger field of aging?”

Examples of grants made within Older Adults since June include:

Menorah Campus, Inc.
Amherst, NY
$300,000 capital grant for the construction of a new, 30,000 square foot, Town Square for Aging in Metropolitan Buffalo. This facility is expected to serve more than 1,000 low-income, often frail, older adults each week offering a comprehensive set of services by 22 co-located agencies including counseling, home maintenance/repair, financial counseling, nursing, pharmacy, and food pantry.

Hearth, Inc.
Boston, MA
$167,000 capital grant to complete the construction of a new 59-unit, service-enriched, permanent, affordable residence for very low-income, formerly homeless or homeless, at-risk older adults in the Olmstead Green neighborhood of Boston.  Hearth at Olmstead Green is a model of independent housing with services that will allow older adults to continue to live in community as long as possible. 
Each unit will have a private bath and kitchen.  The building will feature extensive common areas and a variety of services including assistance with activities of daily living (ADL’s) and care coordination to promote the residents’ overall health and wellness.

Civic Works
Baltimore, MD
$150,000 program grant to adapt, revise, and expand the Neighborhoods for All Ages project (NFAA) which enhances the ability of low-income older adult homeowners in the Belair-Edison and Coldstream-Homestead-Montebello neighborhoods of Baltimore to live safely in their homes as vital, active participants in their communities. During the next two years, at least 240 older adults will receive a wide variety of services including home repair, shuttle service to local grocery stores, and in-home and telephone clinical social work intervention for a variety of mental health and family issues.

Jewish Community Services
Baltimore, MD
$125,000 program grant to support service coordination for the residents of the Harry and Jeanette Weinberg Village, a community of 500 independent low-income older adults.  The Service Coordination program communicates and facilitates care to the Weinberg Village residents.

Family and Informal Caregiver Initiative Update

Picture1.jpgThe Harry and Jeanette Weinberg Family and Informal Caregiver Initiative Evaluation Advisory Committee met in June to review the evaluation tools and data submitted to date by the 14 participating projects.  As the Initiative enters its last 18 months, all involved are redoubling their efforts to ensure that the data collected from each of the projects is valid and gives a clear picture of the work being done.  Dr. Debra Sheets, Initiative Evaluator, has collected data from nearly 1,500 family or informal caregivers, out of thousands served, and is busy analyzing the data for significant impacts of the many services and supports provided. 

Two symposia on the Initiative will be presented by seven of the local project evaluators at the Gerontological Society of America Scientific Meeting to be held November 18 to 22 in Boston.  The Initiative will also be featured during a session at the annual Grantmakers In Aging (GIA) Conference to be held in the Washington area October 26 to 28.  Also at the GIA Conference, Michael Marcus, Program Director for Older Adults, will moderate the opening plenary which will explore the important and growing area of interest, Affordable Housing with Services. 

Workforce Development

The Weinberg Foundation is committed to helping people to help themselves by obtaining and keeping employment, preferably on a career track. The Foundation funds programs which provide the “life-tools” for clients to lift themselves from poverty into solid self-support. Workforce Development is the Weinberg Foundation’s other program area which funds direct service providers nationwide and in Israel.

FareStart
Seattle, WA
$75,000 program grant to provide two types of support: (1) to build a capacity of Catalyst Kitchens, a national effort led by FareStart, which provides food-service-based job training to individuals facing barriers to employment; and (2) to support local food-service efforts developing in Baltimore. This grant includes $25,000 to directly support work in Baltimore for organizations that are in the process of developing and strengthening food-service programs.

Mahut
Haifa, Israel
$30,000 program grant to support an employment training and placement program for low-income and marginalized women over the age of 40 who reside in the Greater Haifa area.  The Advancing Employment for Women over 40 project aims at educating, training, and providing placement services for economically-marginalized women.  The program provides these women with the skills and tools they need to find and keep employment, mobilize themselves in the employment market and become economically independent.

BioTechnical Institute of Maryland, Inc. (BTI)
Baltimore, MD
$100,000 Maryland Small Grant over two years to support a tuition-free training program for motivated participants who come from disadvantaged neighborhoods within Baltimore. The laboratory based training is designed to help individuals develop skills that would help them achieve career-oriented full-time employment in the biomedical industry. Most of the individuals that participate in the program have not had an opportunity to pursue and complete an advanced degree.   http://www.biotechmd.org/

The Credit Union Foundation of MD and DC, Inc.
Glenelg, MD
$22,000 Maryland Small Grant to support the Bilingual Teller Training & Employment Program which provides paid career training and career placement for bilingual, unemployed and under-employed populations in Maryland.  The main goal of the program is to recruit qualified low-income, bilingual participants, provide an eight-week training job preparation session, and place the successful graduates into pre-committed, permanent positions within the nonprofit financial services industry.  http://www.cufound.org/

Harry and Jeanette Weinberg Fellows Graduate!

The Harry and Jeanette Weinberg Fellows, a leadership and training program for executive directors of nonprofits in Maryland that serve low-income clients, will celebrate its 8th graduation this Thursday,  September 22. The 2011 class of 15 distinguished Weinberg Fellows has completed a year-long professional development program designed to enhance leadership skills and promote collaboration among the region’s nonprofits.  Congratulations to the 2011 class:

  • Randall T. Acosta, Boys and Girls Clubs of Harford County
  • Elizabeth Briscoe, Action in Maturity, Inc.
  • Sandra Brown, Mid Shore Pro Bono
  • John Dumas, Service Coordination, Inc.
  • Michael Dyer, Epilepsy Association of the Eastern Shore
  • Misty Fae, Conflict Resolution Center of Baltimore County
  • David A. Greenberg, The League for People with Disabilities
  • Gayle E. Headen, Union Baptist – Harvey Johnson Head Start
  • Amy John, Baltimore Educational Scholarship Trust
  • Latavia D. Little, Treatment Resources for Youth, Inc.
  • Claudia Nagle, Diakonia, Inc.
  • Elissa Malter Schwartz, Jewish Coalition Against Domestic Abuse
  • Jessica Smith-Harper, Village of Hope, Inc.
  • Kathleen Westcoat, Baltimore HealthCare Access, Inc.
  • Madeline Yates, Maryland Campus Compact

Weinberg Fellows Update

Beginning in the fall of 2011, the Foundation will be reviewing the outcomes of the previous eight years of the program.  This will assist the Foundation’s leadership in determining how to move the program forward.  As a result, the Weinberg Foundation is not recruiting a new Weinberg Fellows Class at this time.  If you have any questions, please contact Marci Hunn, Program Director for Workforce Development and Liaison for the Weinberg Fellows Program, at mhunn@hjweinberg.org or 410-654-8500 x261.

Weinberg Foundation Appoints New Vice-President of Finance

CREATOR: gd-jpeg v1.0 (using IJG JPEG v62), quality = 100 The Foundation recently appointed John F. Lingenfelter, CFA as Vice-President of Finance.  The newly created position is based in the Foundation’s Owings Mills, Maryland office. The Vice-President of Finance, who reports to the President and works closely with all five Foundation Trustees, is responsible for monitoring and reporting on the Foundation’s financial investments. Prior to joining the Weinberg Foundation, Lingenfelter was Vice-President of Finance at Morgan Stanley in Baltimore.  He was also a financial consultant for Collingwood Advisors, LLC and Vice-President, Corporate Trust Services for Wells Fargo Bank. A Maryland native, Lingenfelter earned his master’s degree, with a concentration in finance, from Loyola University, The Sellinger School of Business, and his bachelor’s degree in business administration from Towson University.

Hold the Date

You are invited to this year’s Weinberg Foundation Annual Community Gathering!  Here are the specifics for this year’s event:

Tuesday, November 15
Beth El Congregation, 8101 Park Heights Avenue, Baltimore
Reception:  4-4:30 p.m.
Program:  4:30-6:00 p.m.

If you are interested in attending, please RSVP to Yvonne Sporrer at ysporrer@hjweinberg.org or call Yvonne at (410) 654-8500, ext. 213.  We look forward to seeing you there!