This edition of Donor Intent Watch includes updates on current disputes at Middlebury College in Vermont, Valparaiso University in Indiana, a new (and unusual) donor intent controversy at the University of California-San Diego and discouraging news about the continued violation of Albert Barnes’s intent for his remarkable art collection.
U.S. women’s economic progress is often measured by female representation in leadership and board positions. By that metric, women are making strides in corporate America. According to new data from SpencerStuart, the percentage of S&P 500 board female directors grew from 30% in 2021 to about 32% in 2022. This a positive update to our 2022 True Diversity paper, “Improving Board Diversity: Lessons from Sweden and Norway,” in which we reported that women represented “30% of all S&P 500 directors — the most ever.”
This month’s wildfires in Maui, Hawaii, are the deadliest in the United States in more than a century, according to the National Fire Protection Association. Catastrophic winds from Hurricane Dora, passing hundreds of miles south of the islands, blew wildfires across highways with winds as high as 81 mph.
The Roundtable recently sat down with Pano Kanelos, founding president of the University of Austin (UATX), and Chad Thevenot, the university’s vice president of advancement. The conversation centered around the university’s mission to create a higher education system that values and promotes freedom of speech and civil discourse at a time when universities are increasingly accused of censorship on campuses.
The recent Supreme Court affirmative action decision may have closed a chapter in American higher education but opened the door to a new set of questions about the constitutionality and viability of race-conscious efforts in academia and beyond.
Philanthropy Roundtable recently sat down with Denisha Allen (Merriweather), founder of Black Minds Matter, a “national movement to celebrate Black minds, support excellence and promote the development of high-quality school options for Black students.” Allen, an American Federation for Children senior fellow, is a champion for school choice and a Florida tax-credit scholarship recipient. Through Black Minds Matter, she hopes to help provide access to an excellent education for every Black student.
The U.S. Supreme Court’s recent ruling against race-based admission policies at Harvard and University of North Carolina ends affirmative action in higher education as we know it. In the cases Students for Fair Admissions, Inc. (“SFFA”) v. University of North Carolina and SFFA v. President and Fellows of Harvard College, the Court ruled that such race-based affirmative action in higher education violates the 14th Amendment’s Equal Protection Clause and Title VI of the Civil Rights Act of 1964.
On Thursday, July 20, the U.S. Senate Judiciary Committee assembled for an executive business meeting to discuss S. 359, Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse’s (D-RI) “Supreme Court Ethics, Recusal and Transparency Act of 2023.” While the bill is largely presented as an attempt to make the Supreme Court more transparent, a particularly dangerous provision would require nonprofits that file a federal amicus brief to disclose their major donors, encroaching upon the First Amendment rights of nonprofit organizations and their donors.
In a Newsmax column posted on August 7, 2023, Philanthropy Roundtable Adjunct Senior Fellow Patrice Onwuka, also a spokesperson for the Roundtable’s True Diversity campaign, argues the “demise” of diversity, equity and inclusion jobs indicates the “free market is moving past emotional hiring and rejecting aimless race-centric programming that spiked overhead costs but destroyed workplace unity.” Onwuka also says organizations should instead embrace diversity efforts that value individuality over traits like race and gender alone.
In light of the recent U.S. Supreme Court ruling that struck down the use of race-based preferences in college admissions, new questions have arisen about philanthropy’s use of similar practices from workplace policies to funding strategies. Many in the philanthropic sector have been strong proponents of diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) practices and have encouraged grantees to apply a racial equity lens in their work. However, some wonder to what end? What has this laser-focus on DEI accomplished for organizations that, in some cases, have been applying it for several years?
As Americans review the findings of the most recent Giving USA annual report, we hope to provide further context to this data, published by the Giving USA Foundation and researched and written by the Indiana University Lilly Family School of Philanthropy. I recently sat down with David P. King, the Karen Lake Buttrey director of the Lake Institute on Faith & Giving, as well as an associate professor of philanthropic studies at the Indiana University Lilly Family School of Philanthropy.
A couple years ago, I wrote a blog for Philanthropy Roundtable explaining how trust-based philanthropy has become a “‘must-have’ topic for conference sessions, webinars, podcasts and articles in popular philanthropy journals.” While there is value in many of the grantmaking practices recommended by advocates of trust-based philanthropy, its proponents claim these practices are insufficient, especially “‘if funders aren’t simultaneously applying a racial equity lens to their work.’”