Knight Foundation

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Knight Blog

The blog of the John S. & James L. Knight Foundation

Refreshing Miami's startup community

May 23, 2013, 9:43 a.m., Posted by Matt Haggman – 0 Comments

miami

 

For some eight years, Refresh Miami has toiled away to connect Miami’s startup community.

But in the last year, as the Miami startup community has become increasingly energized, so has Refresh Miami. Monthly meetups that drew, say, a dozen people in the early years are now regularly bringing in an excess of 300 and 400 people.

To support Refresh Miami in building new and better ways to connect and serve Miami’s rapidly growing startup and entrepreneurial community, Knight Foundation is making a $150,000 grant to the non-profit.

The support is another step in Knight Foundation’s effort to help strengthen Miami’s startup community and connect it to the broader public by fostering greater connection, support and hopefully— inspiration. The ultimate goal of the effort: help make Miami more of a place where ideas are built.

The grant to Refresh Miami, the largest tech meetup group in South Florida, comes on the heels of Knight Foundation investments in The Lab Miami, a co-working space in Wynwood; the launch of Endeavor in Miami, which will be the global organization’s first U.S. outpost; numerous events including Startup City: MiamiRokkMiami with Brad Feld, the first pop-up NewMe Accelerator and next year’s technology conference, eMerge Americas; along with efforts to diversify and broaden our base of entrepreneurs through educational initiatives like Girls Who Code and Network for Teaching Entrepreneurship.  

At the heart of the investments is the belief that Miami is poised to make important gains as a community that’s alive with entrepreneurs, innovators and change-makers of all kinds, whether seeking social change or pure profit. And, in doing so, will deepen a sense of place and possibility that spurs greater resident engagement and stronger attachment to our young, rapidly evolving city.

Measuring what matters

May 22, 2013, 10:14 a.m., Posted by Mayur Patel – 2 Comments

Measuring What Matters from Knight Foundation on Slideshare

In his 2012 annual letter to grantees, Bill Gates stressed the value of measurement as a critical tool for delivering social impact – in classrooms, clinics and cities. “Setting clear goals and finding measures that will mark progress toward them can improve the human condition,” he said.

It’s a familiar and important refrain and it turns out most of us agree. More than 80% of nonprofit leaders recently surveyed believe that demonstrating impact through performance measurement is a top priority.  Yet still, when we get down to evaluating our work, it can feel like a time-sensitive and daunting task that delivers little value.

How, then, do we improve our practice of it? How can we use it to strengthen our programs without overtaxing our organizations?

These are questions we often grapple with at Knight Foundation. At the annual Philanthropy Miami Conference in March, we shared a few simple exercises on how to use evaluation to deliver better programs and promote greater effectiveness within organizations.

A lot of what we shared was drawn from three resources that we’ve found valuable in our work. Each comes at the topic of measurement from a different angle. Together they offer a great starting point on various approaches, techniques and tools for using data to make progress towards your goals.

  • Measuring the Networked Nonprofit (Beth Kanter and Katie Delahaye Paine) - Provides strategies and step-by-step guides for measuring relationships, social connectivity and engagement in nonprofits.
  • Lean Analytics (Alistair Croll and Benjamin Yoskovitz) – Offers a guide on how to use data to build a better startup, by tracking indicators that help you iterate and understand market needs and user engagement.
  • Leap of Reason: Managing to Outcomes in an Era of Scarcity (Mario Morino) – Provides a call to action and a set of case studies that highlight the importance of outcomes-based management in the nonprofit sector.

A few highlights from these resources include:  

Five things you need to know about the Knight Community Information Challenge

May 21, 2013, 10:08 a.m., Posted by Susan Patterson and Bahia Ramos – 0 Comments

2013 Knight Community Information Challenge from Knight Foundation

With just 11 days left apply to the Knight Community Information Challenge, we wanted to share the answers to a few questions we’ve been getting from potential applicants.

Here are five essential things to know about the challenge, which offers matching funding to community and place-based foundations supporting news and information projects:

1) The challenge continues to be an open call for all types of news and information ideas: We firmly believe that community foundations know their local information needs best, and should propose their own answers to help fill the gaps. This year, we are encouraging foundations to explore Open Government projects, which will be given priority in the judging. However, all types of media projects are eligible for challenge funding.

2) Our definition of Open Government is broad: We are looking for projects that help improve the relationship between people and their governments. That encompases a range of projects, from those that make government data more understandable and actionable to ways to use technology to increase participation in local issues. A few examples: A data project by the Chicago Community Trust uses data to help parents understand school closings. And in the past, Knight has funded a tool that uses text messaging to gather input on public issues, and another that makes it easy for communities to gather survey data on local issues. The goal is to get people informed and engaged in local issues.  

3) Community and place-based foundations must be the applicant for challenge funds: Partnerships