Grant Evaluation

No matter how different foundations can be, they all share the need to know what works, and especially, what works well. The better that foundations can demonstrate how their grants are making a difference, the more value they will bring to their communities. To know what works, foundations must evaluate their grants. Evaluation helps the foundation assess the quality or impact of funded programs, plan and implement new programs, make future grant decisions, and demonstrate accountability to the public trust.

Building Community Capacity for Participation in Evaluation

External Resource

From Grantmakers for Effective Organizations (GEO), what does it mean to truly and authentically engage a community in evaluation? Grantmakers working on place-based grantmaking already have the incentive and drive to support in-depth evaluation, to understand the impact of the initiative, and to…

Sample Post-Grant Self-Evaluation

Sample Document

This sample post-grant evaluation can be customized to your foundation and provided to your grantees to submit at the conclusion of their grant.

Knowing How and When to Monitor, Assess, and Evaluate Grants

Fundamentals

A family foundation's legal responsibilities for monitoring, assessing, or evaluating the grants it makes to organizations with 501(c)(3) tax exempt status are minimal. The IRS requires little in the way of detailed reporting on the outcome of specific grants—except for grants to organizations that…

Getting Started with Evaluation

Fundamentals

As different as foundations can be from one another, they all share the need to know what works and, especially, what works well. The more foundations can show how their grants are making a difference, the more value they can bring to their communities. To know what works, foundations must…