Fund-Raising Resources

The Foundation Center
The mission of the Foundation Center is to foster public understanding of the foundation field by collecting, organizing, analyzing, and disseminating information on foundations, corporate giving, and related subjects. Audiences include grantseekers, grantmakers, researchers, policymakers, the media, and the general public

Online Foundation Finder
Use the Foundation Finder to search by name for basic information about foundations within the universe of more than 54,000 private and community foundations in the U.S.

National Society of Fund Raising Executives
The National Society of Fund Raising Executives (NSFRE), an individual member association, advances philanthropy through education, training and advocacy based on research and a Code of Ethical Principles and Standards of Professional Practice. NSFRE members and affiliates enable people and organizations to better serve diverse communities and Society as a whole.

The Internet Prospector
The Internet Prospector is produced by a network of volunteers who mine the Net for prospect research nuggets.

The Chronicle of Philanthropy
The Chronicle of Philanthropy is the newspaper of the non-profit world. Published every other week, it is the No. 1 news source for charity leaders, fund raisers, grant makers, and other people involved in the philanthropic enterprise. It's resources include:

The Council on Foundations
The site offers links to Web sites maintained by foundations that are members of the council, as well as to associations of grant makers and to philanthropy research centers worldwide.

Granthelp
Developed by grant-proposal writer Frank Evangelisti, in Binghamton, N.Y., this Web site provides advice on how to write grant proposals, a glossary of grant-seeking terms, and a list of commonly used acronyms.

Grant Guides Plus
Grantseeker.com Maintained by Grant Guides Plus, a Denver company that publishes state foundation directories, this Web site offers advice on grant seeking and fund raising.

Grantsmanship Center
Lists daily announcements of grants from the Federal Register and provides contact information for community foundations and links to international grant makers. Articles on grant seeking, fund raising, and non-profit management -- originally published in The Grantsmanship Center Magazine -- are also available on the site.

Progressive Foundations Database
Developed by Progressive Resources Publications, a Washington company that sells books and other materials produced by public-policy organizations, this Web site profiles more than 300 grant makers that support progressive projects.

Charity Village
Maintained by the Hilborn Group, a Toronto, Ontario, publisher that specializes in non-profit material, this site provides more than 3,000 computer "pages" of news, jobs, information, and resources for non-profit professionals and volunteers in Canada. Includes links to non-profit organizations, on-line resources, and government agencies around the world.

Echoing Green Foundation:
Resource Center The Echoing Green Foundation, in New York, offers full-time fellowships to individuals who are starting innovative social-change organizations. The "Resource Center" section of the foundation's Web site features articles, written by the foundation's fellows, on starting a charity, non-profit management, fund raising, financial management, communications, and human resources, as well as links to other Web sites that provide additional information.

HandsNet
Developed by HandsNet, a San Jose, Cal., organization that provides technology help to other non-profit groups, this Web site provides links to news and information for social-services groups. The site also includes the WebClipper service, which searches more than 500 Web sites that provide information for social-services groups and sends members a daily e-mail message with new information in their fields of interest. It also allows members to conduct Internet searches on social-services topics, publish reports on line, and contact other members. A one-year subscription to WebClipper costs $99, and a 30-day trial membership is available.

W.K. Kellogg Foundation:
"E-Philanthropy, Volunteerism, and Social Changemaking: A New Landscape of Resources, Issues, and Opportunities" This report, published by the W.K. Kellogg Foundation, provides summaries of and links to more than 140 Web sites of interest to non-profit organizations. The sites are organized into eight categories. Four of the categories involve online fund raising: shopping sites that allow consumers to donate a portion of their purchases to charity, sites that allow visitors to make charitable contributions online, sites that offer information for donors, and online fund-raising events. The other four types of sites included are those that focus on non-profit news, volunteerism, and advocacy, as well as sites that provide multiple services.

Internet Nonprofit Center:
The Nonprofit FAQ Hosted by the Evergreen State Society, a Seattle charity that promotes civic involvement, this site answers the most frequent questions asked via the soc.org.nonprofit newsgroup, an on-line discussion about the non-profit world. The questions are arranged by category, including fund raising, management, regulations, and non-profit resources. This site was formerly known as Soc.Org.Nonprofit FAQ File.

NonProfit Pathfinder
Developed by Independent Sector and the University of Maryland's Civil Society Initiative, this site features annotated links to Web sites run by academic research centers and associations that study philanthropy, non-profit organizations and commissions that promote civil society, think tanks, foundations, and periodicals that report on non-profit activities. The site also describes and provides links to Web sites that offer information on evaluating non-profit programs. A section of the site, entitled "Innovations," profiles creative local programs in areas such as arts and culture, economic development, housing, and technology.

The Nonprofit Resource Center
Sponsored by Nonprofits Incorporators, a law firm that provides incorporation and tax-exemption services to California organizations, this Web site provides links to other Web sites that contain information for non-profit groups. Categories of links include legal information, fund raising, financial managment, governance, consultants, advocacy, publications, and research on the non-profit world.

PhilanthropySearch.com
Created by the Wentworth Group, a Dallas public-relations company, PhilanthropySearch.com is a search engine that lists Web sites run by non-profit organizations as well as Web sites that provide information or sell products to non-profit organizations -- for example, sites that provide management advice or sell fund-raising software. Visitors to the site can conduct searches of the listings or browse through set categories, such as "Managing Non-Profits" or "Children and Youth."

United Way of Greater Utica (N.Y.):
Internet Resources for Nonprofits Maintained by the United Way of Greater Utica (N.Y.), this Web site provides annotated links to Web sites that provide information for non-profit organizations. The site features links to topics of interest to all charities, such as grant seeking, fund raising, management, evaluation, and volunteerism, as well as more specialized categories such as children and families, education, and public policy. Each month the site publishes an article about a featured Web site.

Web Sites Related to Philanthropy and Voluntarism
Designed to accompany professor of public policy studies Joel L. Fleishman's class "The Idea of the Voluntary Society" at the Center for the Study of Philanthropy and Voluntarism at Duke University, this Web site includes links to Internet Resources on general non-profit information, academic centers that study philanthropy, foundations, volunteerism, and government resources.

American Association of Fund-Raising Counsel:
Giving USA Run by the American Association of Fund-Raising Counsel, an organization in New York for fund-raising consulting firms, this Web site includes information from Giving USA, the association's annual report on charitable giving in the United States.

Independent Sector:
Research Maintained by Independent Sector, a coalition of more than 800 charities and grant makers, this Web site provides statistical information from Giving and Volunteering in the United States, a survey that Independent Sector has commissioned every two years since 1988, with the exception of 1998, and a list of academic centers that specialize in the study of philanthropy.

Literature of the Nonprofit Sector Online
Developed by the Foundation Center in New York, this data base, scheduled to be updated every two months, contains more than 17,000 bibliographic citations for books, articles, CD-ROM's, and other resources on non-profit matters; more than 11,000 of the entries include abstracts. The data base can be searched by author, title, keyword, journal name, or subject. Citations are for resources ranging from publications that specialize in covering non-profit issues, such as The Chronicle, to newspapers and magazines that occasionally write about charitable causes, such as The Wall Street Journal.

The Nathan Cummings Foundation: "Holding the Center: America's Nonprofit Sector at a Crossroads"
This report, written by Lester M. Salamon, a professor at Johns Hopkins University, and published by the Nathan Cummings Foundation in January 1997, examines serious challenges that face the non-profit world -- such as cutbacks in government funds, questions about charities' effectiveness, and eroding public confidence in the wake of charity scandals -- as well as positive trends in the non-profit world. It also offers proposals to improve the way the non-profit world works.

The Urban Institute: National Center for Charitable Statistics
Run by the National Center for Charitable Statistics, a project of the Urban Institute's Center on Nonprofits and Philanthropy, this Web site provides both a state and national breakdown of the number and types of charities and their sources of revenue. It also includes figures on private support, total expenses, and total assets for individual charities, as reported on the informational tax returns they file with the Internal Revenue Service.

Women in Philanthropy
Created by Ann Castle, a former university fund raiser, this Web site provides a bibliography of articles, dissertations, books, and periodicals on women and philanthropy, as well as a list of large gifts given by female donors. The site also includes links to Web sites on the subject.

Action Without Borders:
Idealist Run by Action Without Borders, a New York charity, this site offers a global directory of more than 20,000 non-profit groups' Web sites, as well as an interactive service that allows any organization, whether or not it has a Web site, to post information on its mission, volunteer and job opportunities, forthcoming events, and publications. The site also provides links to other on-line resources of interest to non-profit groups.

American Institute of Philanthropy
The American Institute of Philanthropy, in Bethesda, Md., is a private watchdog organization that rates charities based on how much they spend on program expenses versus fund raising and administration. The institute's Web site lists the more than 360 non-profit groups that have been rated and names the charities that have received "excellent" ratings in various areas, such as cancer groups, environmental organizations, and charities that serve the elderly.

Charities Review Council
The Charities Review Council is a private watchdog organization in St. Paul that evaluates Minnesota charities. The council's Web site includes a list of the charities that it has evaluated and whether they meet the council's standards for fund raising, governance, financial management, and public accountability.

Evangelical Council for Financial Accountability
The Evangelical Council for Financial Accountability, in Washington, is an association of more than 900 evangelical Christian charities that the council has evaluated and found to meet its standards for fund raising, governance, financial management, and public accountability. The council's Web site provides a directory of member organizations, including links to those that operate World-Wide Web sites.

GuideStar
Developed by Philanthropic Research, a non-profit organization based in Williamsburg, Va., this Web site contains descriptions of and financial data on 650,000 non-profit groups, drawn primarily from the organizations' informational tax returns filed with the Internal Revenue Service. The information includes a breakdown of each charity's assets, liabilities, revenue, and expenditures, including administrative and fund-raising costs. The site also includes profiles of non-profit groups and links to articles about philanthropy and non-profit management.

Internal Revenue Service:
Information for Tax-Exempt Organizations A data base of nearly 500,000 non-profit organizations, updated quarterly, that makes it possible to find all the groups in a certain city or state or to check whether a particular group has received tax-exempt status. The site also explains the different types of tax-exempt organizations and how to apply for tax-exempt status, and it includes answers to frequently asked questions about tax-exempt organizations, I.R.S. forms that can be downloaded, and articles on topics such as unrelated-business income tax, lobbying by tax-exempt organizations, and charitable remainder trusts.

National Charities Information Bureau
Operated by the National Charities Information Bureau in New York, this Web site includes a list of the 400 national charities that the private watchdog organization has evaluated and whether the organizations have met its standards for fund raising, governance, financial management, and public accountability. The site also includes tips for donors and a form that can be used to order a complete report on a charity.

Nonprofit Cyber-Accountability
Developed by Harriet Bograd, a non-profit lawyer and consultant, this site contains information about ways the Internet can make it easier for the public to find information about charities. It also discusses the debate on whether fund-raising solicitations over the Internet should be regulated. The site includes links to other sources of information on those issues, including links to state agencies whose Web sites include information on non-profit accountability and giving.

Philanthropic Advisory Service of the Council of Better Business Bureaus
Maintained by the Council of Better Business Bureaus in Arlington, Va., this site includes reports on more than 200 national charities and whether they meet the bureau's standards for fund raising, governance, financial management, and public accountability. The site also includes information on charitable giving, solicitations by police and fire-fighter organizations, tax deductions for donors, and how to handle unwanted mailings from charities.

Whitney Jones, Inc. publications