Monday, March 04, 2013

Has Venture Philanthropy Passed Its Peak? | Stanford Social Innovation Review

Has Venture Philanthropy Passed Its Peak? | Stanford Social Innovation Review: In philanthropy, we are seeing a lot of early-stage nonprofits with ideas and leadership that aren’t ready for prime time. Unfortunately, many are getting funded. Some talented and not-so-talented social entrepreneurs are getting hold of sizeable amounts of money to give their idea a go. This trend is reminiscent of the 1999-2000 Internet funding bubble.

Another indication that the end is near is when there are multiple variations of the same idea, or when the ideas themselves are on the periphery or so amorphous that it’s hard to know what the idea is, exactly. The number of tangential education-related nonprofits that claim that they will substantively change educational outcomes for kids is staggering. Many are doing good things for kids, but they don’t have meaningful, measurable impact and are diverting philanthropic dollars from organizations and interventions that have true impact.

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