Category Archives: Philanthropic autobiography

The Difference between Tony Stark and My Classmates

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By: Julia Stricklin, BBA 2018

If you’ve been following our class blog, you know that we have finally made it to the most exciting part of our semester! Final decisions have been made, organizations have been notified, and invitations to the check presentation day have been sent. This is also the point in the semester when I look back to the beginning and see how much I’ve learned, grown, and changed. This looking back is what brings me to the title of my post today: The Difference Between Tony Stark and My Classmates.

I will be very honest: before taking this class, the first thing that came to mind when I heard the word ‘philanthropy’ was the scene in The Avengers where Tony Stark declares himself a “genius, billionaire, playboy, philanthropist.” This scene, and an admitted lack of prior knowledge about the field, gave me the idea that philanthropists were people like Tony Stark – wealthy elites that threw huge sums of money at innovative projects. I didn’t see this as a bad thing by any means; it is of course a good thing to give money to worthy causes. But after this class, I see that philanthropy and philanthropists are so much more than what we see in Tony Stark. Our class has taught us to be truly engaged in our work as philanthropists, to put forth every effort to ensure that our money is given well. In that pursuit, we have investigated the particular needs of our community, and taken input from organization directors on how our funds would be best put to use. We have not simply taken an elitist view that we know best how to fix wicked problems because we have college educations, or something of the like. Another striking difference between our class and the Tony Stark philanthropist character is how much money we gave. Sitting next to a sum such as $1 million, our $50,000 may look small. But I’ve learned that doing tremendous amounts of good does not necessarily take a tremendous amount of monetary input. Our class’s largest grant was for $14,000, the rest were under $10,000 each, and a notable number of grants required less than $5,000. My final and favorite difference between Tony Stark and my class is our ability to come together. Ironically, just before Tony Stark labels himself a philanthropist, he says, “I don’t play well with others.” Well, that could not be less true of our class. To achieve the best work possible, we found that we had to collaborate. I can surely say that I could not have been as effective in the grant making process if I had gone it alone as an individual, so I am thankful for my small group I was able to work with. Not only that, but our class could not have granted as effectively if our small groups had not worked together as one larger group. After all, a sharing attitude is the best attitude to have in the pursuit of philanthropy.

As we finish our class, I am pleased to realize that Philanthropy and the Public Good has not produced a graduating group of Tony Stark philanthropists, but rather genuine, engaged, and collaborative doers of good work.

The Plurality of Opportunities

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By Diana Castillo, BA 2017

We have made it! Finishing the first chapter of our briefing book was a roller coaster, yet it was an enriching experience. There were nights of struggles and nights of success, yet through researching our topic and learning more about what philanthropy is aimed to do, we feel more prepared for what is to come.

At this point, we have started learning about individual organizations assigned to us because they work, approximately, in the issues we’ve been researching. We have gone from learning theory to now diving into the more practical things. Pitch day is right around the corner and now we begin the journey of exploring the plurality of opportunities. There are so many great organizations, and each of them has something great to offer. And even though there is a variety of opportunities for what can be done with the resources we have, with time I know that we will be prepared to make wise decisions and truly make an impact in our community.

Pitch day, the day we meet face to face with some of our potential partners, is exciting and nerve-racking at the same time. There is so much knowledge to share and so many things to ask, yet our time is limited. With only 15 minutes for our meetings, it is essential that we manage our time well! In preparing ourselves for this step, we started reading more about how to ask questions and how to build good Grantmaker-Grantee relationships. Some of the articles we have read include: Kierra Johnson’s “Four Dating Tips to Sustain Strong Grantmaker-Grantee Relationships,” Sean Thomas-Breitfield’s “Ask Questions, First to Listen, but Then to Act,” and Elizabeth Cushing’s “Walking a Different Kind of Grantmaker Walk.” All of these articles have great tips and insights about partnering with organizations, yet when reading the Breitfield’s work, the purpose and process of what could happen through pitch day became clear. When meeting with each organization, it is important to go through “the process of asking questions, learning from the answers, and then changing the funding strategy to fit what grantees were saying actually,” instead of basing the funding strategy on what one thinks is necessary (Breitfield). Through research you get to know the opportunities available, yet in asking questions you get the chance of better understanding each organization and its needs. Through the responses to these questions, we will then learn and feel more prepared to be good stewards of the resources we have.

In the quest of understanding philanthropy’s purpose, I have gained so much experience and knowledge. Graduation is in May and, just like in this class, I have a plurality of opportunities available. After four years in Waco, I have fallen in love with the community and have decided to stay for the next few years. I am excited to use what I have learned here and take that wherever God takes me. I am thankful for this class and for the chance of working with a great team. This semester is not over yet, and the plurality of opportunities continue.

Discovering our purpose

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CJ Lemanski, BBA 2020

The past few weeks in Philanthropy have definitely been busy. Today is actually the deadline for chapter 1 of the Briefing Book. The Briefing Book contains personal writing on how philanthropy should work, and also dives deep into some of the issues that my group is focusing on. For me the past few weeks and the overall course has really been incredible; I have learned so much. Before this class all I really knew about philanthropy was that normally a check went from one party to another. Obviously there is way more to it then that, and that is what I feel like I have been learning a ton about recently. That the process of how that money is exchanged is extremely important and should not be taken lightly. The process is very in depth and is deceptively tedious. That when it comes to giving it should be taken very seriously and should be strategic. One of my classmates shared a story during group discussion of a village in Africa where a group was donating mosquito nets to prevent malaria.  There was a big issue because there was a man in that village who made a living by selling mosquito nets to the villagers, and this put him out of business. This is great example of people trying to do really solid work, yet due to lack of effort and research it actually hurt the lives of others. That is why giving has to be done extremely thoroughly.

Also, there is so much amazing work going on in our world that has the ability to do a lot of good, so with that it really takes time and focus to decide where to give to make the biggest difference possible. Also something that really has struck me is how giving is about so much more than just money. The whole idea of philanthropy includes time, presence, energy, and resources. It is not just about money. For giving to be successful it should give all these things in equal parts. Being present and investing time into philanthropy is very important. Building relationships is absolutely essential in successfully giving. Sometimes people do not necessarily need money, sometimes they just need a friend, someone to do life with. Sometimes this is harder than just giving money or writing a check. Being relational in philanthropy may sometimes involve leaving the comfortable world you live in and going somewhere uncomfortable, which is definitely hard for people. We also have been learning that Philanthropy should aim to empower people and should not just be a one and done fix.

I am really excited for the future as we shift out of the learning side of things and start deciding what organizations we want to give to.

Giving to Create Givers

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By: Mark Richards, BBA 2019

This week we returned to the classroom, fresh off a few weeks of meeting as groups to research and discuss our issue areas of interest. We are continuing to craft our philosophy of philanthropy, and we have also begun considering some of the logistical processes that grantmaking entails.

In our discussion on Tuesday, we referred to Richard Gunderman’s book We Make a Life by What We Give, in which he describes four models of giving. The first, egoistic giving, is giving that is based in self-interest. This could involve, for example, a person who donates money to demonstrate his or her success. Despite causing change, this method is the least desirable of the four because of its selfish motive. The second model is compassionate giving, which seeks simply to meet immediate needs. This method, though quite accessible for many people because it does not require great wealth or expertise, carries risks. One risk is that a consistent flow of gifts will cause the recipient to become dependent on those gifts and apathetic toward his or her own progress and achievement. Gunderman’s third model is scientific giving, which was a historical response to compassionate giving that focused more on eliminating the root causes of needs rather than merely meeting the needs themselves. This model can be summarized by the maxim “Give a man a fish, feed him for a day. Teach a man to fish, feed him for a lifetime.” Scientific giving is markedly better than compassionate giving, but it unfortunately widens the gap between givers and receivers, because tackling the roots of an issue often requires much greater resources than the average individual can offer. This leaves many people to wonder if their comparatively small contributions could actually make a difference. The final model of giving is liberal giving. It aims to alleviate needs and eliminate their causes, but above all else it aims to make receivers into givers. These four models can each be effective, but Gunderman argues that this final model of liberal giving is the most ideal.

We have discussed principles similar to the ones behind liberal giving on several occasions in class, and those conversations have greatly informed my understanding of philanthropy. At the start of this class, I understood philanthropy as donating money in order to relieve needs or abate their causes. I didn’t realize that, more importantly than (and in tandem with) those goals, philanthropy should aim to create givers from receivers. A person’s joy in giving to and sharing with others ought to appear so attractive to the receiver that the receiver then strives to obtain that joy. Thus, as Gunderman puts it, philanthropy will make us into “people who concern ourselves more with what we can share with others than with what others can give to us” (29). I had never considered philanthropy in this way before. As we progress this semester, I intend to remind myself of this idea so that I regularly consider how I can inspire others to be better sharers through my philanthropy.

Gratitude Before Generosity

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By Gracie Kim, BBA 2018

The first or second day of class, Professor Hogue told our class to get out a piece of paper and think about the ways in which we have personally been the beneficiary of philanthropy and someone else’s generosity.

Words flowed out from my pen as I began to write and write and write … names of specific people, organizations, professors, scholarships, the sacrifice of my parents, people who made it possible for me to engage in rich and cultivating experiences, the church, mentorships, discipleship, prayer… just to name a few vague categories. It wasn’t until I filled my once blank un-lined piece of paper top to bottom with scribbles that I realized that who I am, what I know, and where I am is truly all because of the sacrifice, generosity, and/or kindness of someone else. Someone else that believed my life could or might “amount to something” (Gunderman, 9).

Now that is humbling. Because I truly know if it weren’t for these people, experiences, and communities, the Gracie I know today, with hopeful and ambitious dreams, would not exist. In a sense, our communities and environments shape us incomparably, as much as we want to believe that we are the only influential ones that shape ourselves and control and create our own “destinies.”

And I think this is one of the very “things” that awaken me to give as I become simultaneously more aware of my own blessings and brokenness. Giving inspires the thought that perhaps it isn’t all about us. We forget that we are all on the same team, that we are all human! We are much more interconnected than we think and we are to “recognize, accept, and celebrate the full extent of our interdependence” (Gunderman, 65). When we begin to recognize that our friends and our enemies, our neighbors and our children are each our own brothers and sisters; when we start to own that our world is in fact, our world, and our city is our city, giving and sharing seems like a more natural response, a right response, and even a logical response. The sweetness in philanthropy lies in that it “invites us to look beyond the distinctions of giver and receiver, and to see one another as sharers, parts cooperating for the benefit of a larger whole” (Gunderman, 12).

The more I am learning throughout this course, the more convinced I am that philanthropy and giving is something we both contribute to and partake in. In addition, the more I learn, the more I realize how increasingly complex it is to give well even with good intentions.

Nonetheless, I love that we started this course this way because as stated by Professor Hogue, “generosity is downstream” and “gratitude always comes before generosity.”

I am so grateful that there is much to be grateful for.

“only when we are woven into a larger tapestry that our full beauty and strength emerge” (Gunderman, 66).

Is this the end?

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Ashley Alston, BBA 2018

Our last day in Philanthropy Lab has come and gone, and I can’t help but feel nostalgic. I remember walking into this class at the beginning of the semester unsure what to expect.  Throughout this semester, we have researched various issues we are passionate about, interviewed with non-profit organizations, and lastly come to a conclusion on which organization to fund.  Now we are at the end, and next week each group is presenting their grants. 

My view of nonprofits and my knowledge of grant giving has changed dramatically. In our final class today we talked about different aspects this process has taught us.  For me, I have learned how to mindfully give in order to make the most sustainable impact, and how even a small gift can go a long way.

At the beginning of the semester, each organization we interviewed had a different kind of project they needed funding for.  One in particular we decided to fund was the World Hunger Relief.  The grant the Philanthropy Lab is giving is $4,000 to help renovate the Veggie Van.  Through this simple renovation, the Veggie Van can further combat food insecurity in other areas of Waco by allowing more food deserts to have access to fresh produce. Though $4,000 does not seem like much when compared to other grants given, this seemingly small amount is going to help bring about a bigger difference.  I am excited to see what the impact of this grant, as well as all of the others, has made in few years on the Waco community. Each group has made evaluation questions for the organization to answer in two years.  One particular question we are going to ask is to describe the effect this grant has had on the organization, and the amount of people that have been reached. This will help us be able to clearly see where change is happening.

Before taking this class, I never understood the complexities of the decision-making process. This semester I realized there is a lot more that goes into the act of giving than I originally thought.  My group’s motto during the grant giving process was to build a community up to bring it together.  We continued to remind ourselves of this statement as we set goals and were deciding which organizations to further pursue.  As I work with nonprofits in the future, I am going to remember this motto and the significance behind it.  I do not want to give just to give; when I give, whether that be money, service, or time, I am going to look for organizations whose goal is to bring the community together to make a difference.  I believe in doing this, those in poverty will be empowered and given the confidence they need to help themselves change their circumstances.

Is this the end?  No, this class is more than just a semester.  Looking back, I have been taught a tremendous amount. I hope to carry this knowledge with me as I serve in the future.

How We Give

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Paul Kiekhaefer, BBA 2017

Entering into this semester, my interest in the Philanthropy Lab centered primarily around the prospect of being able to meet with local organizations, learn about their missions, and finally give them funding to help them accomplish their goals. While that experience will be valuable, the time spent these first few weeks pondering the overarching themes that are guiding philanthropy has been an effective primer for us to make decisions later.

In the past, when I would hear a phrase like “donate to charity,” I generally lumped all giving into one category. However, giving can be generally divided into two types: expressive and instrumental. When engaging in expressive giving, people donate to something as a token of gratitude or for a personal reason. For example, if as a high schooler one was positively impacted by a mentorship program like Big Brothers, Big Sisters, one would be giving expressively in donating to that same organization as an adult. To the donor, expressive giving focuses primarily on self and has goals related to a feeling of self-actualization. In contrast, instrumental giving involves less emotion but has a more utilitarian approach in attempting to alleviate a specific need. Funding a food pantry, refurbishing a school, or building a homeless shelter would generally be classified as instrumental giving. In contrast to expressive giving’s self-focus, instrumental giving is concerned with the broader needs of society as a whole.

Learning about the difference between types of giving has altered how I view philanthropy and philanthropists. Coming from the business school and being an economics student, I have an inclination to solve the most efficient outcomes. To borrow a finance term, evaluating the return on investment (ROI) is a concept which has shaped many of my actions including giving. Naturally, instrumental giving would appear to be the much more practical and useful of the two types of giving (one could even say superior). Expressive giving seemed akin to the economic concept of deadweight loss in that it aimed to solve less tangible needs, like focusing on personal fulfillment rather than measurable issues like food insecurity or inadequate healthcare. To me previously, it was fairly clear-cut that because instrumental giving is geared toward the most basic needs on Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs, it was the better of the two.

This class has changed my view. The first day of class, we were posed the question: “What is your philanthropic autobiography?” In other words, how have I been affected by philanthropy as both a giver and a recipient? I realized quickly that a lot of my personal journey in finding self-actualization and development as an adult was the result of expressive giving. Due to the extensive generosity of mentors and friends, I have been able to experience personal growth. In addition to my personal experiences, much of my college education has been bankrolled by the expressive giving of donors. It would be foolish to discount expressive giving altogether.

As we are continuing to examine how we want to go about our own philanthropy experiment, I have come to the conclusion that it is imperative to blend both expressive and instrumental giving. Pure expressive giving may not be the most effective and pure instrumental giving would lack personal involvement and emotion. It is crucial to combine the two in order to be effectual on multiple levels.

Why We Move

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By: Lucy Bray, BBA 2017

After the first week of classes in Philanthropy & the Public Good, I had concluded that there is something enormously unsettling about a foray into philanthropy and public service.

When I initially registered for the course, I was so eager to begin the grant-making journey, and I was so excited to delve into its process. Feedback from students who had taken the course previously had ignited my imagination, and I began to look around at the Waco community and wonder how the class would enable me to be involved in it. In the midst of my zeal and enthusiasm, I had not yet stopped to consider how personal the grant-making journey necessarily would be, but the first day of class alone challenged me to reflect on a higher level. I quickly realized that the most successful philanthropy is personally meaningful for the philanthropist, and that this course would require putting my heart on the line alongside the oversized check I hope to grant. After several weeks in the class, I have become convinced that the good my classmates and I intend to do is enhanced by the degree to which we commit to it personally.

When the class began, I was reminded that before my classmates and I could begin printing those oversized checks, we would need to answer what qualified us to print them in the first place. This required a deliberate, careful review of our personally-held values. Most college students do not reflect introspectively on their values on a regular basis. The pace of college life encourages and demands us to act quickly and decisively, leaving little chance for us to move forward with confidence as to why we move in the first place. We are challenged to succeed personally, professionally, academically, and socially, and we have learned to tailor our progress and meet expectations to create apparent evidence of those successes. That is perhaps one way to survive the rigor of university life, but it is no way to serve our fellow man.

Upon examination, my classmates and I have discovered that our values, along with a general and shared sense of altruism, were what had inspired us to join the class in the first place, and what would guarantee the best possible outcomes in our grant-making decisions. Each of us brought different values to the table, and all of us had a unique perspective regarding what characteristics our philanthropy should encompass. We discovered strength in the diversity of our thoughts and beliefs, and a unifying sense of purpose that would carry us onward.

As we begin the practical aspects of the course, deliberating between issues we would like to address and avenues in which to address them, I am happy to say that we are all so excited to move forward. We know now why we move. We are strongly convicted in our personal values and motivations, and we rejoice that they demand a deep, personal, and emotional commitment to our work. We have discovered the passion we have for service and stewardship, and we have begun to challenge each other to achieve the best expression of our altruism. We feel more confident that we are guided by our best principles, and perhaps more sure of why we are qualified to discern ways in which we can benefit our community.

 

Beginnings

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By: Savannah Newman, BBA 2017

These first few weeks of class time in Philanthropy and the Public Good have been centered around defining what philanthropy means introspectively for each of us as individuals as well as what it means to our class as a whole. We have just been placed in the groups we will be working with for the semester, so much of what has been done so far has been laying the foundation of what we will be working on this semester.

What I have discovered about myself through these first couple weeks have been uncovering the motivations for giving back and wanting take this class in the first place. On the surface the class appealed to me because it came so highly recommended, it would be a nice break from economics and math, and I knew that it would attract other high-achieving, intriguing students that I would be able to work with. However, what these first few weeks of class has caused me to do is really reflect on what makes up my value system and what aspects of who I am drew me to this class.

There was an exercise that we completed in the second week where we first wrote down the most important values that shape our own life, then recall events that had stirred strong emotional responses, and finally describe the people who most inspire us. Reflecting on what truly matters to me helped me to adequately articulate what it is I hope to accomplish not just this semester but throughout my life. I discovered not only the reasons I had taken this class, but also the underlying motivations for my path in life. I realized the importance I place on education based off of the influence of my grandmother; I discovered my desire to empower, work with, and learn from the people I am serving based conversations with women on my mission trip to Trinidad and Tobago; I connected my upbringing in Waco to my desire to contribute to the wonderful initiatives taking place and this class. Though these events and people have always been a part of my life, I had never sat down and physically written down the connections of my values to them.

I hope to keep these ideas at the forefront of my time in this class as we move from the more philosophical reasoning to the tangible and more concrete aspects of the class. I understand that these values, both my own and the ones we have discussed as a class, are the foundation of what we are to build upon this semester. They are what we should keep in mind as we dive into the finite questions of our giving. They are what we should return to when the hard questions come and there are seemingly no answers.

Already, I see the impacts of this class on how I view the world around me and how I relate to my surrounding environment and community. I am excited about the journey ahead and the person that I will become in the process.

 

 

Philanthropic Calling

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By Ryan Snitzer, BBA 2018

For the newest students in Dr. Hogue’s Philanthropy and the Public Good class this semester, there are a variety of mixed emotions as we embark on this adventure together. We are all blessed by the opportunity to not only better understand philanthropy, but to serve others and hopefully do good works. We are nervous about the overwhelming task of best deciding how to strategically divide monetary resources to non-profit organizations in the Waco community. Most of all, I believe we are excited to come together to be part of the bigger picture in God’s philanthropic mission.

Based on the first few class sessions’ discussions, it’s evident that we all have unique academic backgrounds and experiences that will contribute to our central mission. We have begun to realize that our experience in this class and our decisions on how to allocate the generous donations will be entirely different from previous semesters. Not only is that okay, but it’s honestly one of the best aspects of this program! The need to give well and do good is universal as we live in a broken world. However, there is not one single need in our community or world that deserves our sole attention above all others.

As we continue to seek a better understanding of philanthropy and narrow our focus in these first few weeks, I believe the right answers on which organizations to select will ultimately come to light according to God’s plan. There are so many fantastic philanthropic efforts that are taking place in Waco and can do great things with the resources this program has been blessed with. We can rejoice in knowing that the giving doesn’t stop there. The donations made for this program allow us students to grow towards our individual philanthropic calling, betters Waco-area organizations financially, and allows them to do even greater good in this community. That’s the true beauty of this program.

Hearing other student’s perspectives has already allowed me to reconsider my own personal definition of philanthropy and recognize other opportunities to help others in our community. Since coming to Baylor, I’ve gotten involved with my fraternity’s philanthropy, The Ability Experience, which focuses on disability awareness. Never before had I felt a real connection to the people and causes I was serving. It’s amazing how so often the times when you think you’re helping someone; they in fact make an even greater impact on you.

Our philanthropic calling is for every single one of us to determine. For us in this course, we are all striving to find it as we aim to be the hands and feet of God’s mission. In Ephesians 2:10 we are reminded, “For we are God’s handiwork, created in Christ Jesus to do good works, which God prepared in advance for us to do.” I fully believe God has a special plan for Baylor University, the Waco community, and this program.

 

Ryan is a Sophomore Business Fellows student with majors in Finance, Entrepreneurship, and Professional Selling. He wants to eventually go into private equity and has co-founded a new business in Waco called Campus Crates, which provides self-storage over the summer for college students.