Giving Well
Celebrating Women in Philanthropy
Giving Well is Vancouver Foundation’s first giving circle. It brings women in philanthropy together to learn about current community needs and support women’s issues together.
Back to our roots
Vancouver Foundation started in 1943, with a gift of $1,000 from Alice MacKay, who had saved it from her secretarial job. She wanted this gift to help homeless women trapped in a cycle of poverty. Inspired by her generosity, W. J. VanDusen added his own gift and encouraged nine others to match it. Now, 70 years later, one woman’s vision has grown to become Canada’s largest community foundation.
vancouver Foundation
At Vancouver Foundation, our mission is to harness the gifts of energy, ideas, time and money to make meaningful and lasting impacts in communities. To achieve this, we engage more than 150 experts in their respective fields to collectively advise on a wide range of issues.
Known as a reputable grantmaker by leveraging community expertise, we effectively evaluate grant proposals to ensure projects will have the most positive impacts possible. This strict evaluation process allows us to direct funding to innovative projects that meet the most pressing needs of the community, including a wide range of projects addressing women’s issues.
Over the past 25 years, we have allocated over $8 million to projects addressing the challenges women face across BC, such as overcoming violence, finding and maintaining housing or gaining financial independence.
We developed Giving Well in response to our supporters’ wishes to be engaged in grant making, to learn more about current community issues and to connect with other like-minded people.
Since 2011, Giving Well members have granted $46,000 to nine charitable projects supporting women.
How Giving Well works
Giving Well members each contribute $1,000 and decide together, which charitable projects to support with grants of $5,000 or more. Vancouver Foundation will bring forward selected grant applications, to Giving Well members for consideration, that have been submitted by charities and pre-screened by our volunteer Advisory Committees.
Each project will be presented, discussed and debated, and Giving Well members will decide which projects to support together. In addition to grantmaking, members in the giving circle also have an opportunity to attend a site visit at a local charity and discuss the issues facing women in BC with an expert guest speaker.
The 2013 Giving Well circle will be chaired by Vancouver Foundation Board member, Miranda Lam. Miranda has served on Vancouver Foundation’s Board of Directors since 2012, and is currently our Education Advisory Committee Chair.
Click here to view a PDF of the Giving Well form
Meeting schedule
Giving Well meetings take place twice a year in Vancouver Foundation’s office at 200 - 475 West Georgia Street, Vancouver
Spring Cycle: Wednesday May 29, 2013, 3:30pm - 5:30pm
(Registration deadline: May 16, 2013)
Fall Cycle: Early December
(Stay tuned for more details)
Contact us
If you are interested in becoming a member of Giving Well or want to learn more, please contact:Kim Macphee
Manager, Development and Donor Services
Vancouver Foundation
T: 604.639.3051
Members past and Present
