Predictive Philanthropy: Driving Data Towards Collective Action

Rapidly growing community needs and opportunities outpace the progress of programs and services, heightening the urgency to find ways to bring more people, money and other resources together in concert.  As such, Tides is launching predictive philanthropy, a process for driving collaborative, data-based funding decisions focused on the development of local leadership and assets.  Through this initiative, Tides seeks to connect efforts that have typically been slow to react and done in isolation and connect people through...

Giving ‘til It Heals – Won’t You Be A High Impact Contributor?

It is clear that the challenges facing poor communities at home and abroad are formidable, but the strategies for success are within reach. Tides has long recognized a visionary approach to philanthropy. What is often missing is an intimate understanding of the motivations of donors and the means to turn philanthropic intention to strategic and sustainable community support. This year alone Tides has already launched two impact focused initiatives – Civic Participation Fund and (Ad)venture Philanthropy. Our goal is to...

Documenting Disaster and Renewal

On April 20, 2010, the day BP’s oil rig exploded in the Gulf of Mexico, the Mississippi Gulf Coast community of Turkey Creek -- which I had been making a documentary about for almost a decade -- happened to appear on the front page of USA Today. The headline read "For Them, Earth Day Was Late In Coming," and the article described how this community settled by emancipated slaves had built alliances with environmental advocates to protect the fragile ecology and rich culture of a place threatened by urban sprawl, industrial...

Engaging in Process over Product with Software for Social Change

Last Thursday, April 5th, Tides awarded its sixth annual Antonio Pizzigati Prize for Software in the Public Interest at the awards luncheon of the 2012 National Non-Profit Technology Conference in San Francisco. The latest winner was Nathan Freitas, the team leader of a Brooklyn-based project that’s protecting the mobile communications security of human rights activists all across the world. Below are his reflections:

In the last week, I experienced two completely opposite reactions, from two different partner...

To the Contrary with Bonnie Erbe

PBS’ To the Contrary with Bonnie Erbe' is the only woman-owned news analysis program on national and international TV.  The program brings thoughtful, intelligent analysis to a multi-platform audience (TV, WiFi, Web, Twitter) and covers issues not covered in depth by any other show on TV.  The program’s purview is all issues affecting women, families, communities of color and the LGBT community.  To the Contrary is a refuge from the high-decibel arguments on cable news as well as from the very slow discussions one normally...

Dispatches from the Field | Silicon Valley, Meet Silicon Savannah

Part 1 of a 3-part series.

For the past week, I have participated on a learning journey in Kenya organized by London-based Leaders’ Quest on behalf of the Rockefeller Foundation. Twenty leaders from around the world joined the Quest to explore opportunities for impact investing in Africa. Participants include such diverse individuals as the domestic investment manager of China’s sovereign wealth fund, the Chairman of UK-based Sustainability, the CFO of the Rockefeller Foundation, the CEO of Bangalore-based Rural...

Announcing the Civic Participation Fund

Tides is thrilled to announce the opening of it’s newest grant-making vehicle, the Civic Participation Fund, which we launch today in response to shrinking resources and growing concerns about Americans’ rightful access to their ballots in 2012.

Civic-engagement efforts -- those mission-drive efforts that register, educate and protect voters across the country every year -- are chronically underfunded. This year that dynamic is compounded by a super PAC arms race, a protracted primary season and a philanthropic sector...