All posts in Special Initiatives

We’re excited to share our video summary of the 2012 year! Many thanks to everyone involved in making this happen – both the video and the accomplishments of the past year!

To view the list of 2012 grant recipients by program area, click here.
To view the video in our YouTube channel, click here.

Just in case you missed this announcement on our home page, we’re excited to share news of our next iteration!

On a related note, we’ll continue sharing news here on the mkf.org site until our changeover officially happens on May 15th.

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Dear Community:

For the past year, we’ve been keeping you abreast of an ongoing strategic shift here at the Kapor Foundation. We’re very excited to announce that we’ve arrived. As of May 15, 2013, the Kapor Foundation will have a new public face, the Kapor Center for Social Impact. Through a shared vision, set of values, and program activities, we’ll work more closely with Kapor Capital, our sibling venture capital microfirm focused on seed-stage tech startups.

The Kapor Center’s working mission is to “relentlessly pursue  creative strategies that will leverage tech for positive social impact in underrepresented communities, primarily focusing on closing academic, political, health, and economic gaps.” This mission represents our deep belief in the power of information technology as a tool to accelerate social good, and fully aligns with the Kapors’ longtime involvement in the tech industry, stemming back to their days at Lotus Development Corporation in the early 1980s.

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I’m excited to share that the Foundation, along with the Level Playing Field Institute (our sister organization), are looking for an astute social entrepreneur to help us launch and move our Smashing Bias Program and Prize to the next level! Please see the job description here at RecruiterBox.com. We’re looking to hire sooner rather than later, so please feel free to spread the word to your networks and let us know of your interest!

We are very pleased to share highlights of the past year with you! Thanks for helping us make this work happen!

Please note that of the $4.4 million distributed last year:
$2.2 million provided core support for the Level Playing Field Institute;
$1.3 million supported civic engagement & green economy work;
$500,000 supported college access and retention; and
$400,000 supported capacity building & research.

The time has come to get out there and vote!

It’s been a crazy two years since the historic presidential election of President Obama.  Since then, we’ve seen the passage of national health care reform,  the rise of the tea party movement, and the economic crisis strike across the country.  We’ve also seen negative campaign ads, local critical mass, and all kinds of parties to make sure we make it out on election day.  And now the time has come.  A number of our key partner organizations are at the forefront of local and national civic engagement efforts including the Ella Baker Center for Human Rights, San Francisco Rising, Oakland Rising, and Voto Latino.  Below are some voter resources, including two voter guides from the League of Women Voters & The Ballot as well as organizational voter guides from the Ella Baker Center and Oakland Rising

League of Women Voters

The Ballot

Ella Baker Center for Human Rights Voter Guide

Oakland Rising

The Kapor Foundation is pleased to announce a five year renewable gift of $250,000 to U.C. Berkeley’s College of Letters and Science to support the launch of the Berkeley Science Network (BSN).

BSN aims to strengthen the pipeline of students of color in the science disciplines where African Americans, Latinos, Native Americans and Pacific Islanders are most severely underrepresented in academia and industry – mathematics, physical science and computer science.

BSN will create a vibrant academic and social network across generations of scientists of color – from aspiring high school students to undergraduates, graduate students, post-doctoral students, and faculty – by providing formal mentoring, networking, professional development activities and opportunities needed to advance in science.

BSN also will establish an additional connection between the University of California, Berkeley and the Summer Math and Science Honors (SMASH) Academy, a program of the Level Playing Field Institute. SMASH is a three-year summer math and science enrichment program for high achieving, low-income high-school students of color from the Bay Area to excel in science, technology, engineering or mathematics (STEM).  Through the network, SMASH scholars will benefit first hand from the experiential knowledge of Berkeley undergraduates and graduate students who have carved a similar path for themselves.

BSN will directly address one of the most critical domestic labor issues of our day, the development of highly-skilled, “home grown” talent in the sciences, while also creating a critical mass and community for students who are often isolated in their academic pursuits. We look forward to seeing the Berkeley Science Network launch and evolve over the next several years!

New Profit, acting as an intermediary for the Social Innovation Fund, is seeking outstanding organizations to join its newly-created the Pathways Fund.

The Pathways Fund is seeking innovative nonprofit organizations that address improvements in one or more of the following outcomes:
·  High school graduation and/or GED attainment
·  College enrollment
·  College credit accumulation
·  Living wage employment

Applications Due: October 13, 2010

To read about the vision for the Pathways Fund, please visit HERE.

For application instructions, please visit HERE.