Grants

When Microsoft co-founder Paul Allen pledged this summer to give away most of his fortune, he singled out brain science and biology as among the likely beneficiaries.

Now, the Mercer Island billionaire is following up with $9.4 million in grants to seven research teams, including two at the University of Washington.

The projects include efforts to build tiny microscopes that can peer into the living brain and to identify the neurons that control anxiety and aggression.

In just one day, 42,596 donors logged on to GiveMN.org during the second annual Give to the Max Day on Nov. 16. This was 4,000 more donors than in last year’s successful giving day. Minnesota nonprofit organizations were given $10,041,021 in 24 hours, reflecting donations as well as matching grants and prizes that were awarded. GiveMN has helped raise $27 million for nonprofit organizations across the state since launching in November 2009.

As the Iraq and Afghanistan wars drag on, a growing number of grant makers around the country, like the Wolslager Foundation, are paying closer attention to the vast and escalating needs of service members, veterans, and their families.

But experts working to shape and expand grant making to help service members and their families say the philanthropic response has been too small, slow, and piecemeal. They say reluctance to get involved with military causes and ignorance of the immense needs are among the reasons too few grant makers are getting involved.

The Bristol-Myers Squibb Foundation announced Together on Diabetes^®: Communities Uniting to Meet America’s Diabetes Challenge, a 5-year, $100 million initiative to help patients living with type 2 diabetes better manage their disease beyond the doors of their doctor’s office – in their homes and communities – and for the course of their disease.

The Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation is giving $50 million to the Smithsonian Institution, the national museum announced late Wednesday.

The money will go principally to the Youth Access Endowment, a new entitly created by the Smithsonian. Gates is giving $30 million of the gift to "reach underserved students" in the United States. The endowment targets students in grades K-12, and will create a series of interactive Web sites and online conferences.

Health care organizations in California, Illinois, Indiana and Pennsylvania were awarded $1.6 million to support their efforts to eliminate racial and ethnic health care disparities in communities across the United States. The funding provided by the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation's Finding Answers: Disparities Research for Change expands the program’s grant portfolio to include projects evaluating interventions in a variety of different settings.

Here are nine key things funders want and expect from fundraisers during the grant proposal application process.

Toronto Community Foundation head discusses the organizations unique business model and being named "Outstanding Foundation" by the AFP Greater Toronto.

The John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation, in Chicago, has announced the 23 recipients of its 2010 MacArthur Fellowships. Commonly referred to as the "genius awards," the fellowships single out individuals from disparate disciplines who show creativity, originality, and the promise for continued innovative work.

welve women and 11 men won this year's awards; they range in age from 30 to 72. Each fellow receives $500,000 over five years, bestowed with no strings attached. Of the group announced today, 16 fellows work at academic institutions or other nonprofit organizations.

Common Ground National, one of the nation’s largest providers of supportive housing, announced it has been awarded a $200,000 grant from the Bank of America Charitable Foundation for its 100,000 Homes Campaign, a three year effort to house 100,000 long term and vulnerable homeless by July of 2013. This is among the largest grants received to date for the 100,000 Homes Campaign, which works with communities across the nation to organize local volunteer survey teams who administer public health surveys to identify the homeless with the most serious health needs.