MacArthur Foundation believes that foundations are private trusts operated for the public good. Consequently, we believe we have a responsibility to make public, in a timely and accessible manner, information about the operation of the Foundation and knowledge derived through our activities.
MacArthur regularly seeks external evaluations of its grantmaking strategies. Summaries of those external reviews are posted below in the evaluations section.
We welcome your questions and comments. Please send them to Arthur Sussman who is the Foundation officer responsible for evaluations.
In 2002, MacArthur launched a national initiative to improve education for urban youth through a strategy of district-level reform in what was intended to be three to four mid-sized school districts. The hope was that, over the course of eight to ten years, Foundation resources would support systematic change that would result in improved student outcomes. A national team of experts would work with a local school district to design and implement a plan for reform that included a core set of elements in ways that reflected the district's own priorities, culture and climate for reform. Despite initial successes, the Learning Partnership and the first school district selected struggled to execute the design. The Foundation asked Joan Talbert (PDF) at the Center for Research on the Context of Teaching, at Stanford University, to prepare an assessment, using the observations, site surveys, focus groups and interviews that it conducted in its role as project documenter.
MacArthur’s seven-year, $50 million Science, Technology and Security Initiative was launched in 2003 to develop and maintain a cadre of scientists and other technical experts able to provide independent, authoritative advice on international security policy issues to policymakers and the public. The Initiative focuses, in particular, on institutionalizing the presence of such expertise at selected universities in the U.S. and abroad. Consistent with the Foundation’s aim of reducing the dangers from weapons-related technologies, the centers are pursuing security policy research agendas involving nuclear and biological technologies, nanotechnologies, cyber-security and space technologies. In early 2007, the Foundation initiated an independent external mid-term review of the Initiative, led by George Lopez (PDF) and David Hart (PDF), to assess overall progress in achieving the Initiative’s aims, and to identify the need for any mid-course corrections.
The Foundation commissioned an evaluation of the progress of the New Communities Program, in conjunction with its review of a request for renewal of support for the Chicago office of the Local Initiatives Support Corporation (LISC). Through the New Communities Program, and related activities in public safety, economic development and economic security, the Foundation seeks to revitalize 16 Chicago neighborhoods. LISC/Chicago leverages the Foundation’s funds with other loan and grant resources, including substantial public funding, and works with local organizations to develop and carry out plans for improving the quality of community life and connecting residents to the economic mainstream. The evaluation was conducted by Thomas R. Dewar (PDF) and Michael Bennett.
MacArthur’s support of Nigerian higher education is based on the belief that robust universities and intellectual freedom are essential to developing and sustaining healthy, economically vibrant, democratic societies. In 2000 MacArthur began an initiative intended to strengthen higher education in Nigeria through support for the University of Ibadan, Ahmadu Bello University, Bayero University Kano and the University of Port Harcourt. The Foundation also invests in select systemic interventions in Nigerian higher education that help to bring to scale elements of the revitalization efforts underway at the four focus universities. In the last quarter of 2005, the Foundation commissioned Jeffrey Fine (PDF) to carry out an independent assessment of the Nigerian university program. The assessment examined the impact of MacArthur grantmaking at the project, university and systemic levels.
Craft Papers
Beginning in 2003, under the leadership of Kennette Benedict (who was Director of the Foundation's International Peace and Security Program and Philanthropic Advisor to the President), the staff of the MacArthur Foundation engaged in a series of discussions about the Foundation and the craft of grantmaking. These discussions were greatly aided by a series of papers drafted by Ms. Benedict. The papers in turn evolved as result of staff discussion and then conversation with the MacArthur Board of Directors. In making these discussion papers publicly available we do so with the hope that they will be of assistance to other donors. For MacArthur, these papers, and most importantly the discussions around each of them, helped us to clarify our thinking and, hopefully, become better at what we do.
Another way in which the Foundation shares what it has learned is through MacArthur Advisory Services. MacArthur staff will provide advice to other foundations, corporate donors and individual donors who wish to make gifts in fields in which we work. Staff are experienced in making grants around the world and can help identify effective organizations which can make good use of additional grants as well as provide guidance on the legal and financial aspects of international grantmaking.
Phone: (312) 726-8000