The Grant Allocation Process

The Grant Allocation meeting for the Jewish Teen Foundation was one of the most highly anticipated and important meetings of the year. At this final meeting, all of the board members, including myself, made the very difficult decision of which organizations we were going to support and at what financial commitment level. This whole process was stressful and had many board members anxious to ensure that their favorite organization received a grant.

First, my fellow board members and I shared our experiences from the site visits. These visits gave us a better understanding of how our grant would make a difference in each organization. Going on the site visits gave each of us first-hand knowledge of how each of the organizations work to help the at-risk youth populations of San Diego or Israel.

Next, we evaluated each organization and eliminated some of them. This was the hardest part. In order to eliminate organizations, we looked at their mission statements and compared them to ours to ensure that the mission statements aligned. We discussed our experiences during speed-dating and their grant applications to further evaluate the various organizations. In order to create a diverse portfolio of organizations, we discussed the merits of each organization and reviewed the demographic of at-risk youth each served. We eliminated organizations that were very similar to another to ensure the desired diverse portfolio of grant recipients was created.

Once we made the tough decision to eliminate a few organizations, we began the ultimate decision-making process: deciding the amount each organization would receive on May 15th at the Check Presentation Ceremony. We started with the organizations that we most strongly wanted to invest in by allocating the full $5,000 grant to them. Then we worked our way down to the organizations that either asked for a specific grant amount that was less than the full $5,000 or would benefit more from a smaller grant. Throughout these discussions, it was important to remember that, true to our mission statement, we were investing in these organizations. This meant that it was vital to keep in mind not just which organizations we felt the strongest about, but which organizations would do the best job of furthering our mission. These decisions were very difficult because everyone in the room had different opinions on each organization and felt strongly about the respective impacts on the at-risk youth community. In order to please everyone on the board, we had to come to a consensus. Rather than voting, each board member had to explain to and convince the others why we should support an organization and at what level. Ultimately, we all felt comfortable with the organizations we chose to support and the financial investment we were making in each—the goal of consensus.

In order to make the most significant impact on at-risk youth in San Diego and Israel, we had to find a balancing point between the number of organizations that we were going to invest in and the level of support for each organization. We could give larger grants to fewer organizations or we could invest in more organizations but at a smaller grant level for each. We implemented Robert’s Rules of Order to propose and determine which organizations should be receiving what amount. After many hours and much consideration, we, as a board, came to a consensus on how many organizations and at what levels the Jewish Teen Foundation of 2015-2016 would be investing in this year.

Throughout this whole process, we have all learned how important it is to speak out about what we believe in. However, it is also very important to be able to listen and respect what others are saying. I have learned some very valuable life skills that I most likely would not have encountered until much later in life if it were not for the Jewish Teen Foundation.