Among the 122 new grants totaling $5.3 million that the Helen Bader Foundation has recently bestowed are 16 totaling $731,138 to projects coming under its Jewish Life and Learning area.
And a number of these are going to marketing efforts, according to Tobey Libber, the area’s program officer at the foundation.
“We’re beginning to see much more interest in marketing efforts by Jewish organizations,” Libber said in a telephone interview last week. “Many Jewish organizations in the community offer very high quality services,” and “they have to find ways to let the Jewish community and, in some cases, the general community know what they have to offer.”
A second trend Libber said he sees in the grants has to do with “financial security,” with organizations hiring consultants or part-time staff members in order “to further strengthen the financial condition of non-profit organizations.”
According to a release from the foundation, grants to the Jewish Life and Learning area included:
• $150,000 to the Wisconsin Jewish Group Benefits Plan, Inc., “to offer transitional support to Milwaukee-area Jewish agencies participating in a group plan offering affordable heath care coverage.”
• $125,000 over two years to the Wisconsin Society for Jewish Learning to create a documentary film about Jewish communities in Wisconsin’s smaller towns.
• $85,000 over three years to the Harry & Rose Samson Family Jewish Community Center for its outreach efforts to interfaith families and unaffiliated Jews.
• $75,000 over three years to Yeshiva Elementary School to help strengthen its administrative infrastructure.
• The Hillel Academy Jewish day school and the Mequon Jewish Preschool each received $40,000 over three years for marketing efforts.
• $30,000 to the Milwaukee Jewish Federation to help start the Wisconsin Jewish Group Benefits Plan.
• Two grants totaling $25,820 to the Milwaukee Jewish Day School to enhance its Israel curriculum and for a marketing campaign.
• Two grants totaling $21,500 to Congregation Sinai to hire staff to help with long-term financial development, and to improve its Web site and congregational communications.
In addition, the foundation gave a two-year, $50,000 grant to Jewish Family Services to work with Lutheran Social Services on creating a health education and wellness center for eastern European immigrants in the Milwaukee area.
Under its Alzheimer’s and Aging area, in which the foundation awarded 12 grants totaling $964,630, the foundation gave the Jewish Home and Care Center a two-year, $235,000 grant for the redesigning of its long-term care services for older adult residents.
The foundation also presented 10 grants totaling $307,000 for its Early Childhood Development in Israel area. These projects benefit a variety of organizations that work with immigrant and special needs children.
The foundation also gave 14 grants totaling $1,178,000 for Economic Development, 11 grants totaling $61,000 for Sankofa-Youth Development, five directed grants totaling $284,000, and 40 grants totaling $764,429 for Homework First, an educational enrichment program for Milwaukee Public Schools third-fifth graders.
The foundation, which has offices in Milwaukee and Jerusalem, has awarded more than $147 million in grants since it was established in 1992.
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