Chairman’s Letter - Wallace's Report '09: Appraising a Decade

Contents

• Chairman’s Letter
• President’s Essay
• Vision, Mission And Approach
• Ten Years In Review
• Public Outreach
• Workplace
• New Publications And Multimedia Resources From Wallace
• Financial Overview
• Program Expenditures And Commitments
• Funding Guidelines & Restrictions
• About Our Founders
• Directors And Staff

Click here to download the full report:
 Wallace's Report '09: Appraising a Decade

TWO CRITICAL DECISIONS

A decade ago, The Wallace Foundation made two critical decisions – about how we would work and about what we would work on. This report assesses the results.

We reorganized internally, to bring a combination of field knowledge, research and communications expertise to bear in forming strategy. We based this on our experience that catalyzing beneficial change requires not only money – but also new ideas, along with evidence of what works and does not, shared with those who can help make a difference.

We also sharpened our work, moving from dozens of relatively small initiatives to three ambitious goals: strengthening school leadership; helping cities improve out-of-school time opportunities; and building appreciation and demand for the arts. This allowed us to do fewer things more intensively, with more substantial investments over a longer period.

We think these decisions, though difficult, have proved to be good ones.

Because of them, over the past decade we and our grantee partners have: drawn greater attention to school leadership and identified what can be done to improve it; demonstrated how cities can expand and improve after-school opportunities; and helped develop new ways to introduce more people to the arts.

During the past 10 years, our work increasingly emphasized helping children, especially those who are disadvantaged. This will be our aim moving forward.

We have also spent a great deal of time trying to identify metrics to assess how well we are producing social benefits. These metrics are tough to develop and can be ambiguous. But they are absolutely necessary. The surest way to do better is to measure and analyze results.

This report is a summary of those results and reflections on what they mean. We share it with the hope that in the decade to come we and our partners can build on the progress we have made – and do even more for the children we seek to serve.

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