EXPLORING THE UNITED STATES AFTER THE 9/11 TERRORIST ATTACKS - Phạm Việt Long

FUND CENTER - Phạm Việt Long - 6

Receiving us at the Fund Center was a man with a bony build, wearing glasses, and looking lively. That's senior librarian Bruc-Gum. Quickly getting to work, he turned on his computer, went online, and directed us to the Center's website that was displayed on the large screen in front of us. This website provides a detailed introduction to the Center, its activities and the funds that support the arts. The Foundation Center is an independent national service organization founded by foundations in 1956. According to FORD Foundation documents, it is the leading organization in the United States for institutional funding and is dedicated to serving the grant seekers, funders, researchers, policy makers, the media and the public. The mission of the Foundation Center is to support and promote the philanthropy of organizations through the foundation, increase public understanding of the field, and help grant seekers succeed. To do this, the Center collects, organizes and disseminates information about sponsorship activities in the US; Conduct and support research on development trends in this field; provides education and training on the grant-seeking process, and provides public access to information and services through the Center's Web site, through publications, through 5 libraries or learning centers collection, and through a nationwide network of collaborative collections. One of the Center's missions is to provide information and professional references to the public at the Art Center's 5 libraries with more than 200 other organizations across the country.

Right next to the room where we sat listening to the presentation was a library of the Center. The reading room of this library is equipped with about two dozen computers with internet connection. We see that every machine has someone to look up information. Like the Center's four other libraries, this reading room is open free of charge, allowing readers to access a unique collection of documents about philanthropic activities. Highly qualified librarians are available to help users learn about grant research through the Center's publications and other print and electronic resources, including application forms. grant applications, books and periodicals on charitable and non-profit grant management, foundation annual reports and reports on corporate sponsorship, websites and other focused documents into charity activities.

The Foundation Center offers free or at-cost basic training programs on grant research, introductions to donors and their grants, and related topics in all 5 Center offices as well as other locations, including: Foundations for Fundraising, a free weekly resource on the grant research process for nonprofit organizations; Free corporate sponsorship programs, how to effectively use online information sources, how to quickly look up information, how to write sponsorship letters, search for sponsorship for individuals, list of sponsors, movies about fundraising. etc.

The Foundation Center publishes the Foundations Yearbook - a classic reference for grant-seekers, now available on CD-ROM, online and in print, along with some 50 yearbooks, guides and other reports.

The ability to convey information of the website controlled by the center really impressed me. Updated and expanded daily, the Foundation Center website (http://www.fdncenter.org) highlights and analyzes the latest funding trends, providing a list of top donors , information on Center-sponsored training programs and workshops, providing easy access to a range of online fundraising resources, including: Charity News - an information service weekly with articles related to charity; The center's online yearbook - a searchable database of the 10,000 Largest Funds in America; network with hundreds of donor and other nonprofit organizations' websites.

The Foundation Center also provides an online virtual library (http://www.fdncenter.org/onlib/) that anyone can access with just a computer connected to the internet. Applications on this virtual library include: Instantly answer questions by E-mail, Foundation Finder (a free search tool with basic information on 50,000 US donors), courses short course on writing grant letters, introduction to the grant-seeking process, Online resources on the nonprofit sector (a bibliographic database of 18,000 citations, with many abstracts) , and The Online Bookshelf (an abridged version of the Center's key monographs on fundraising and nonprofit management).