The top ten philanthropy stories of 2021

Asian American Foundation raises nearly $1.1 billion

Established with initial commitments totaling $125 million from founding board members, the foundation has raised more than $900 million from foundations, corporations, and individuals in support of efforts to address a longstanding lack of investment in Asian-American and Pacific Islander communities and combat anti-AAPI violence….

Marguerite Casey calls for funding police and criminal justice reform

Launched on the one-year anniversary of the police killing of George Floyd, Answering the Uprising: Closing the Say/Do Gap in Philanthropy is aimed at “correcting” the inadequate response of philanthropy to the racial justice uprisings in 2020….

MacKenzie Scott awards grants totaling nearly $2.74 billion

Grants were awarded to nearly three hundred “high-impact organizations in categories and communities that have been historically underfunded and overlooked”….

Rockefeller, IKEA foundations launch $1 billion clean energy platform

With the aim of reducing a billion tons of greenhouse gas emissions and providing a billion people with distributed renewable energy through mini-grid and off-grid solutions, the initiative will be run as a public charity designed to deploy catalytic capital more efficiently and at scale that supports the expansion of local renewable energy projects….

Nearly $40 billion pledged to accelerate gender equality by 2026

Commitments announced at the Generation Equality Forum convened by UN Women included $21 billion from governments and public-sector institutions, $13 billion from the private sector, $1.3 billion from UN entities and multilateral organizations, and $4.5 billion from philanthropy….

Philanthropies pledge $5 billion to ‘Protecting Our Planet Challenge’

The commitments from nine philanthropies will fund efforts to meet the 30×30 goal to protect 30 percent of land and sea by 2030 in partnership with Indigenous peoples, local communities, civil society, and governments….

Powell Jobs to invest $3.5 billion in climate action over ten years

According to an Emerson Collective official, the Waverley Street Foundation “will focus on initiatives and ideas that will aid underserved communities who are most impacted by climate change” and sunset after ten years….

GivingTuesday 2021 raises an estimated $2.7 billion in the U.S.

The GivingTuesday Data Commons estimates that giving totals increased 9 percent from $2.47 billion in 2020, with thirty-five million adults in the U.S. participating, a 6 percent increase over last year….

Bloomberg Philanthropies commits $750 million for charter schools

The five-year initiative is aimed at closing student achievement gaps — which have been exacerbated by the COVID-19 pandemic, particularly for students from lower-income families — and creating an additional hundred and fifty thousand seats at high-quality charter schools in twenty metro areas….