Grantmaking Process

About Our Foundation’s Grantmaking Process

The John & Janice Wyatt Foundation provides grants to create, enhance or scale specific programming needs aligned with the mission and vision of the grantee organization.

Grants will be committed to public educational institutions and high-impact non-profits working within the targeted geographic service areas.

The Foundation will:

    •  Actively engage the community to assess the educational environment, drawing upon interviews with key stakeholders to better understand the community’s landscape regarding PK-12 education with a focus on disadvantaged youth

    • Seek partners across the entire education spectrum to best leverage available resources

    • Invest funding into targeted programs with grantee partners

    •  Ensure grants are directly linked to creating equity in the educational system, leveling the playing field, and improving outcomes for children and youth

    • Compile a robust and comprehensive collection of baseline data gathered from multiple approved sources

    •  Collaboratively develop measurable outputs, outcomes, and impacts using standardized indicators and metrics

    • Measure and evaluate progress

    • Make adjustments, as necessary, to best achieve the desired results

The goal of these activities is to provide the Foundation with a better understanding of the current programs active within our localities; who is leading these programs; what has been working within the school system with parents, student performance, and mentorship/networking; what has not been working well and why; and lastly, any current initiatives that are underway. Once the Foundation has a broader view of the challenges that exist, that then shapes the direction we take with our investment of capital.

Grantmaking Guidelines

We do not take unsolicited funding requests.

The grantmaking strategy of the Foundation is to leverage existing programming efforts, or to cultivate and grow better integrated supports with identified partners, with our eye towards creating successes in more broadly derived collective impacts. Thus, the reason we do not take unsolicited funding requests.

Our goal is to work within the system to:

  • Identify key partners

  • Develop a shared vision for creating positive change

  • Establish a method for measuring this change over time through agreed-upon metrics, with known baselines and planned targets

  • Actively work by, with, and through our partners to execute the plan

  • Constantly review, assess, and learn to help inform future decisions and action steps

John & Janice Wyatt Foundation