Resource Library
Browse helpful resources for funders, including evidence-based reports, profiles of funders making change, case studies, and blog series.
CEP’s Three Year Study on the Impact of MacKenzie Scott’s Large, Unrestricted Gifts
See Report 1 See Report 2 See Report 3 MacKenzie Scott shocked the philanthropic and nonprofit worlds with the announcement that she had given $1.7 billion to 116 nonprofit organizations in July 2020, at a time when many nonprofits were reeling from the impacts of and...
Before and After 2020: How the COVID-19 Pandemic Changed Nonprofit Experiences with Funders
Data from funders who solicited grantee feedback both before and after 2020 reveal a greater degree of change than what was typical prior to the COVID-19 pandemic, suggesting that 2020 was a watershed year for grantmakers. Based on analysis of data collected from 61...
Overlooked (Part One) – Foundation Support for Asian American and Pacific Islander Leaders and Communities
Across four research studies the Center for Effective Philanthropy (CEP) has conducted in the past two years, we’ve noticed two concerning trends emerge for Asian American and Pacific Islander (AAPI) and Native American nonprofit leaders and communities (trends that...
Overlooked (Part Two) – Foundation Support for Native American Leaders and Communities
Across four research studies the Center for Effective Philanthropy (CEP) has conducted in the past two years, we’ve noticed two concerning trends emerge for Asian American and Pacific Islander (AAPI) and Native American nonprofit leaders and communities (trends that...
Foundations Respond to Crisis Series
This series of reports examines the extent to which staffed foundations have changed their practices to meet the compounded crises of 2020.
FOUNDATIONS RESPOND TO CRISIS: Lasting Change?
Calls for changes in foundation practice have come for decades from philanthropic and nonprofit leaders and others in the sector. The ways in which foundations responded to these calls at the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic in early 2020 have been well-documented and...
Persevering Through Crisis: The State of Nonprofits
As the COVID-19 pandemic spread in the United States in 2020, many nonprofit organizations grappled with its devastating impacts on public health and the global economy—and the ways in which it deepened longstanding disparities along racial, ethnic, socioeconomic, and...
FOUNDATIONS RESPOND TO CRISIS: Toward Equity? – The Second in a Series of Three Reports
The disproportionate public health and economic impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic on certain communities, along with nationwide protests against police violence and racial injustice, have intensified the calls for foundations to focus on equity and reckon with...
FOUNDATIONS RESPOND TO CRISIS: Towards Greater Flexibility and Responsiveness? – The Final in a Series of Three Reports
Nonprofits and funders alike have long called on foundations to be more flexible and responsive, to provide more unrestricted funding, to reduce what they ask of grantees, and to build more trusting relationships. In 2020, these calls for change only intensified in a...
FOUNDATIONS RESPOND TO CRISIS: A Moment of Transformation? – The First in a Series of Three Reports
How are foundations responding to 2020’s unprecedented challenges? What high-level changes in practice are they making — and will these changes be for the long term? CEP turned to foundation leaders for answers to these pressing questions. As Foundations Respond to...
Funder Support During the COVID-19 Pandemic
Based on a nationally representative survey of nonprofit leaders in May 2020, Funder Support During the COVID-19 Pandemic sheds light on which organizations face the toughest challenges, what is most needed from funders, and what differences in experience are emerging...