Impact Stories

By J. Belle Osvath, CFP® CSLP® AIF®, Financial Advisor

Your charitable clients may be taking their charitable giving budgets more seriously this year, given the stock market’s challenges, rising interest rates, economic concerns, and anticipated cash crunches.

As you advise your clients in early 2023, consider sharing with them these seven guidelines to build a budget for charitable donations that can help your clients continue to support favorite causes and remain fiscally cautious.

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The Micron Opportunity Fund is the result of a collaboration between the Community Foundation and Micron Technology, Inc, to strengthen STEM learning through efforts to build knowledge systems, and capacity in Northern Virginia by ensuring underserved students have access to high-quality STEM learning experiences. 

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The Loudoun Impact Fund is a giving circle of engaged Loudoun County donors managed in partnership by the Community Foundation for Loudoun and Northern Fauquier Counties and the Community Foundation for Northern Virginia. The Fund invests strategically in Loudoun County to promote education, the arts, the environment, and to support the needs of Loudoun families, children and youth. The Community Foundation for Northern Virginia made a grant to the Community Foundation for Loudoun and Northern Fauquier Counties for $29,500, which makes up part of the $112,000 total grant that the Community Foundation for Loudoun and Northern Fauquier Counties is awarding.

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Healthy Kids Grants have traditionally been awarded in the spring and summer for public schools in Northern Virginia that use the funding for a program that promotes nutrition and physical activity. In 2022, the Community Foundation added a grant cycle focused on support for schools offering their students mental health care programming. This is especially pertinent, as rates of youth seeking mental health care treatment have increased, accelerating a pre-pandemic trend. Stay tuned for more about The Shape of Youth Mental Health report, which will be discussed at a Insight Region event on February 1, 2023.

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The Community Foundation for Northern Virginia's Business Women's Giving Circle recently announced the winners of its annual grants cycle. A total of $50,000 has been awarded to three local nonprofit organizations that provide STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering, Math), Leadership, Entrepreneurship, and Mentorship programs to girls and young women in Northern Virginia in 2022. To date, BWGC has awarded more than $465,000 in grants that have impacted the lives of over 3,250 young people.

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Sustainability Matters and the Community Foundation have not known each other for very long- a couple of years ago, the Shenandoah-based organization attended a First Tuesdays conversation, an informal half an hour chat that nonprofits can have with members of the Community Foundation staff about development goals, communications, or just for networking with a public sector partner.

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Today, our largest annual discretionary grant application process opens with funding available through our Community Investment Funds (CIF), Environment Fund, and Ross-Roberts Fund for the Arts. As the Community Foundation works with intentionality to ensure funding is available and accessible to all nonprofits across our region, our team has updated the CIF process this year to provide general operating support, with the flexibility to use that funding where it is most needed.

Learn more about the updates and priority focus areas in the following webinar presented by Sari Raskin, VP of Grants and Community Leadership, and Jennifer Cochran, Manager of Grants and Scholarships.

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Rarely has a grant from our Community Foundation made such an immediate impact on the financial wellbeing of families and children as the grant we awarded in the spring of 2022 to United Community.

It began with our Community Foundation applying for and winning a $50,000 grant from a national cohort of funders looking to help community foundations across America help their local residents take advantage of the newly expanded 2021 Child Tax Credit. We matched this award with charitable assets we developed over the years from our Community Investment Funds, then gave $95,000 to United Community. UC then leveraged their deep community roots, hired tax preparation services, and connected 99 households along the Route 1 corridor to those services. As a result, thousands of dollars in income tax refunds poured into the coffers of families that needed it the most. It was an example of “Community Wealth Building” at its very best.

We were so pleased and excited about the outcome of the grant that we created this video story to share with you:

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In 2022, the Community Foundation for Northern Virginia invested time, resources and strategic investments to support access to mental health for Northern Virginia's diverse community.  Its Mental Health grantee, SafeSpot Children's Advocacy Center, provides child abuse victims and their families with a safe environment and support services as they navigate the aftermath of recovery and investigation.

Here is a story from SafeSpot, with a very powerful tale about the impact of this support for children in our region.  If you or someone you know is experiencing child abuse, please contact Virginia's Child Protective Services at 804-786-8536 for help and resources.

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In 2022, the Community Foundation for Northern Virginia launched a new Permanent Fund to support those with Intellectual and Developmental Disabilities.  Grants are awarded each year through the Community Investment Funds cycle, supporting the most critical needs throughout our region.

Here is a story from its very first grantee, A Farm Less Ordinary. See how this fund is already making an impact in our region.

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