News/Stats/Studies

The San Francisco-based Koret Foundation has announced a $3 million gift to the Museum of the History of Polish Jews in Warsaw.

The gift was made in concert with a challenge grant from the Taube Foundation for Jewish Life and Culture and includes $1 million in matching funds, boosting the total amount pledged to the museum, which is slated to open in 2013, to $6 million.

The Asia Foundation, a nonprofit international development organization working in Asia, announced a $1 million partnership agreement with the Korean International Cooperation Agency (KOICA). KOICA and the foundation are development partners committed to delivering effective aid in the Asia-Pacific region. The grant agreement will provide $500,000 to the foundation for its programs to improve the business environment in lagging regions in Sri Lanka while $500,000 will be managed by KOICA to provide direct assistance in the form of technical assistance and study tours to Korea.

The Bay Citizen agreed Tuesday to merge with Berkeley's Center for Investigative Reporting, creating what executives call the largest nonprofit journalism organization in the country.

The expanded CIR — pending routine approval from the attorney general — will comprise three brands: the Bay Citizen, for Bay Area news and investigations; California Watch, for statewide issues; and CIR, for issues of national and international significance.

The fourth annual "State of the Plate" constituency survey of more than 1,360 congregations revealed that 51 percent of churches saw giving increase in 2011, up from 43 percent in 2010 and 36 percent in 2009.

To whet your appetite, NTEN and M+R Strategic Services have released an infographic preview of their 2012 eNonprofits Benchmarks Study, which will be unveiled in full at the Nonprofit Technology Conference.

Development Guild/DDI, a management consulting firm serving regional, national and global nonprofits in education, health and science, the arts, and human service, announced that it has opened a New York City office and that Sean O’Connor has joined the firm as a senior vice president. A seasoned nonprofit professional with nearly two decades of experience, O’Connor will collaborate with boards and executive leaders on organizational strategy, fundraising and talent management.

The Geneva, Switzerland-based magazine The Global Journal has just published its “first ranking of its kind” list of the “Top 100 Best NGOs.” It’s an unusual compilation in that the editors of this magazine acknowledge that they eschew quantitative metrics for a series of qualitative measures, which are as follows: innovation, effectiveness, impact, efficiency and value for money, sustainability, strategic and financial management, and peer review.

The Wikimedia Foundation came in at No. 1.

Forty-three percent of nonprofits expect to add new workers this year, but as the economy improves, charities also anticipate that they will face turnover as workers get better job offers elsewhere and more older employees decide to retire after putting off such ideas during the downturn, according to a new study.

The findings show a better picture than last year, when only one-third of nonprofits predicted they would add staff members.

The study was conducted by Nonprofit HR Solutions, a human-resources consulting firm, and the Improve Group, a consultancy that works with charities and other organizations.

The Foundation for Florida Virtual School (FLVS) accepted a generous $14,000 donation on March 22 from Everest University Online, an online career college, in support of the Laptop for Learners Program.

The Laptop for Learners program, which provides FLVS students in need with a loaner laptop, was re-launched in November 2011. Currently more than 35 students are being assisted through the program.

In recent years, the number of U.S. charitable foundations awarding grants for water, sanitation and hygiene (WASH) projects around the world has more than tripled. A new research brief by the Foundation Center, Foundation Funding for Water, Sanitation, and Hygiene, finds that between 2003 and 2010 this growth in the number of active funders was accompanied by a nearly five-fold increase in the number of organizations receiving these grants, to the tune of $144 million in 2009-2010.