Providing Individuals More Than Money
- Make connections. “let’s say a fellow working on prison reform has a cool working model that can be applied to a totally different issue. We’ll provide funding for airfare and transportation to make a site visit. Then we ask the local fellow to provide some support, maybe food and lodging, to show that they have some interest. We’re seeding innovation in a way that can be replicated.” Grantmakers often connect grantees not just with fellow grantees, but with others in the foundation’s sphere: curators, senior scholars, nonprofit leaders, and so on.
- Time disbursement of funds with care. One funder encouraged grantmakers to be aware of tax and other liabilities to individual grant recipients. (Grantees normally pay income taxes on grant money, with some exceptions for scholarships.) She cites the example of a MacArthur Foundation “genius” award-winner who had to move out of subsidized public housing because the award money surpassed the maximum allowable income for residence.
Takeaways are critical, bite-sized resources either excerpted from our guides or written by Candid Learning for Funders using the guide's research data or themes post-publication. Attribution is given if the takeaway is a quotation.
This takeaway was derived from Grants to Individuals.
