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The FirstEnergy Foundation awarded more than $3.43 million to nearly 100 organizations across its six-state service territory for the final round of "Investing with Purpose," an initiative focused on supporting nonprofit organizations that advance health and safety, workforce development, educational and social justice initiatives. In addition, FirstEnergy Corp. (NYSE: FE) provided $220,000 to five organizations as part of the initiative. The grants build on $3.3 million in charitable contributions the Foundation awarded in December 2020 as part of the initial round of giving, which has collectively gifted $7 million to nearly 200 nonprofit organizations making a difference in the communities served by FirstEnergy's 10 electric companies.
"Investing with Purpose" was developed in response to the COVID pandemic, which created health, financial and educational hardships for customers across FirstEnergy's footprint, and in response to the events of 2020 that highlighted racial and social injustices impacting our nation. With those issues in mind, the Foundation identified philanthropic opportunities through nonprofit organizations across its service territory that are responding to needs of vulnerable populations. The "Investing with Purpose" initiative represents an additional commitment on top of the company's annual charitable giving, which averages approximately $10 million per year.
"Many of our communities are still facing a significant hardship due to the pandemic. Nonprofit organizations on the frontline of our current health and economic crisis have realigned to support current needs in the community, including housing, workforce development and training, and the continued support of our healthcare workers," said Lorna Wisham, vice president of Corporate Affairs & Community Involvement and president of the FirstEnergy Foundation. "We've witnessed the positive impact these grants made for deserving organizations in 2020, and we look forward to seeing how the second round of contributions will help strengthen the communities we serve."
CNJG is pleased to offer the 2024 Virtual Budget and Tax Briefing Series, hosted by our partners at Economic Opportunity Funders, to our members.
Learn about key trends, battles and opportunities, and what’s at stake and in play in 2024. Panelists will share insights on the recent historic state tax credit expansions, consequential state races and ballot initiatives, and efforts to support the equitable implementation of federal investments, including the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act, the Creating Helpful Incentives to Produce Semiconductors (CHIPS) and Science Act, and the Inflation Reduction Act.
Kamolika Das, Associate Director, Local Taxes, Institute on Taxation and Economic Policy
Chris Melody Fields Figuredo, Executive Director, Ballot Initiative Strategy Center
Justin Maxson, Executive Director, BuildUS (invited, pending confirmation)
Cost: Free for CNJG Grantmakers and Non Member Grantmakers.
Note: This program is for funders and philanthropic advisors whose primary activity is grantmaking.
This program will be livestreamed via YouTube, starting at 1:40 pm. Registrants will receive a link to the livestream prior to the program. Please register by noon on March 18 to receive the link. If you cannot watch during this time, you can use the same link to access the recording and watch at a later time.
For questions, please contact Chanika Svetvilas, Manager of Programs and Learning.
The program supports community-based projects that foster neighborhood stability and growth by providing grants to residents and organizations in Newark.
On May 21, Prudential Financial announced the recipients of the second annual Prudential Community Grants Program during a ceremony at Prudential’s headquarters in Newark, New Jersey.
The program, launched in 2023, was created to support neighborhood-based solutions that foster community vitality through grants to residents and organizations in Newark. Among this year’s recipients are a variety of inspiring projects supporting community health and wellness, arts, education, beautification and development.
“Through the Community Grants program, Prudential is proud to continue our support of the residents and projects that are driving growth and quality of life in our hometown city,” said Lata Reddy, senior vice president of Inclusive Solutions at Prudential Financial and chair of The Prudential Foundation. “Thriving neighborhoods are the heartbeat of a strong city, and we designed this program to directly support residents as they work to solve challenges in their community. We look forward to seeing the positive impact this next group of grantees has across all five wards of Newark.”
With a $300,000 grant to the Community Foundation of New Jersey, Prudential will support neighborhood-based solutions that increase community vitality. The program received 400 applications this year, up from 225 applications in 2023 (a 78% increase), from a combination of individuals, 501(c)(3) organizations, and small business owners. Of the 66 community-based projects chosen, 19 are repeat recipients.
Community colleges offer greater affordability than private or state colleges, are adept at providing flexible education schedules and delivery, and are often deeply tied to the local areas in which they reside. This type of accessibility and inclusivity provides enormous opportunities for students left out of traditional higher education models. And while there is a road to recovery for community colleges post-COVID, they can play a critical role in building a future workforce in local communities and creating a more equitable higher education system for New Jersey students.
During this program, we’ll hear from several community college leaders on the impact of the pandemic on enrollment and learning, the biggest challenges facing higher education right now, and the opportunities they see to close education gaps and improve student outcomes. Join us to learn more about community colleges as a pathway to success for students in New Jersey, and philanthropy’s role in supporting more accessible, affordable, and flexible higher education models.
Speakers include:
Brian Bridges, Ph.D., Secretary of Higher Education, State of New Jersey
Dr. Michael Gorman, President, Salem Community College
Steven M. Rose, President, Passaic Community College
Cost: Free for CNJG Members; $50 for Non Member Grantmakers.
This program is only open to staff and trustees from grantmaking organizations.
Webinar Video
The Montclair Foundation is proud to announce the awarding of $90,000 in grants to 17 local nonprofit organizations through its Spring 2025 grant cycle. These grants will support critical initiatives in the areas of Education, Community Service and Cultural Arts — continuing the Foundation’s long-standing commitment to nurturing and strengthening the greater Montclair community.
Thanks to the success of the Foundation’s recent capital campaign, this grant cycle includes several larger awards and a multi-year grant, reflecting an exciting new chapter of expanded community investment.
“We are incredibly grateful to our donors and supporters whose generosity through our capital campaign has allowed us to increase both the scope and impact of our grantmaking,” said Peggy Deehan, Chair of the Grants Committee. “Montclair is home to so many extraordinary organizations making a meaningful difference every day. It’s a privilege to partner with them in creating a more vibrant, inclusive, and compassionate community.”
This season’s recipients include organizations providing emergency medical services, youth tutoring and mentoring, early childhood care, community wellness, arts education, and cultural programming. Among the highlights is a multi-year grant to Imani — the inaugural recipient of the newly established Emer Featherstone Education Grant, named in honor of our esteemed past Board Chair - and a $15,000 grant to the Montclair Ambulance Unit to support a critical outreach campaign. The Foundation extends its sincere appreciation to all applicants for their dedication and invaluable work in the community.
The Devils Youth Foundation announced today for the upcoming 2025-26 season that it has issued a record $1.3 million worth of grants supporting 35 local organizations and awarded ten high school students with a $5,000 scholarship each for the second annual Devils Youth Foundation Scholarship Program, in collaboration with New Jersey Devils Alumni. The Foundation continues to break its record of grant offerings annually.
The 2025-26 Grant Class is a diverse mix of returning and new partners, and the Foundation aims to foster innovation and collaboration within its grantee network. Each grant category has been designed to reflect a pillar of the Foundation: physically and mentally healthy kids, food and nutrition security, access to the arts, and getting kids active and moving. Through multi-year grant commitments and strategic partnerships, the Devils Youth Foundation will significantly impact the lives of over 86,000 youth and its support of community outreach programs throughout New Jersey.
“At the Devils Youth Foundation, our mission is rooted in strengthening the communities we serve,” said Allison Blitzer, Chair of the Devils Youth Foundation. “This growth reflects our ongoing commitment to creating meaningful, lasting value—ensuring that youth across the state have real access to physical and mental wellness, food and nutrition security, the arts, and education. By continuing to raise the bar, we are expanding our reach and helping to build healthier, more resilient communities for generations to come.”
In predominantly renter-based markets across the Northeast, housing-related financial strain remains a significant barrier to household stability and long-term economic security. Yet innovative models are emerging that seek to flip that script, creating pathways for renters to build assets, reduce risk, and participate more fully in local prosperity.
Building on the momentum from AFN’s September 2024 webinar exploring regional strategies to increase affordability, reduce evictions, and deliver financial return or dividends to renters, this session will take a deeper dive into renter wealth-building models in action.
Join AFN, partners in New Jersey, and collaborators from national nonprofits and financial institutions as we explore promising approaches that leverage public-private tools, housing finance innovation, and credit-building strategies tied to rent payment. We’ll examine how these approaches can expand renter access to economic opportunity and help funders consider how to adapt similar efforts in urban centers across the region.
Speakers:
Rachel Levy-Culler, Housing Innovations Senior Specialist, Credit Builders Alliance (CBA)
Marcus Randolph, President & CEO, Invest Newark
Khaatim Sherrer El, Executive Director, Clinton Hill Community Action
Marco Villegas, Program Officer, JPMorgan Chase
Who Should Attend:
Philanthropic leaders, community investors, housing advocates, and public-private partners working to advance financial security and equity for renters. This webinar is open to all and will focus on the New Jersey and Northeast AFN regions.
Captioning will be provided. If you have any other accessibility requests or questions, please email Paula Dworek. Requests for reasonable accommodations must be received by May 5, 2025, to ensure our ability to meet your request.
The Culture Funders Affinity Group and the Health Funders Affinity Group are pleased to collaborate on this meeting. During the meeting, we will delve into critical questions on the topic - can the arts really improve wellness, what can funders learn from existing statewide models and what is needed to further this work? Globally, the field of arts and health is well-established with healthcare systems strategically positioning the arts to support wellness and wellbeing. In the US, many states are establishing Arts and Health programming to intentionally leverage art experiences as mitigation, intervention, and even as preventative care. In New Jersey, vibrant cross-sector partnerships have resulted in innovative programming and dynamic models to increase arts access and participation while expanding the traditional bounds of health and wellbeing. Bringing together voices from both the nonprofit and funding communities, this panel explores what’s working and envisions what’s possible as partners break down silos to build a stronger, healthier New Jersey through the art. Join us for an enlightening conversation. Light refreshments will be served.
Panelists
Jennifer Kastle-Goudy, Associate Director of The Horizon Foundation for New Jersey
Alyson Maier Lokuta, AVP, Arts & Well-Being, New Jersey Performing Arts Center
Morgan Yacoe, Director of the George Family Center for Healing Arts, Rowan University.
Cost: Free for CNJG Members; $75 for Non Member Grantmakers
This program is open to all funders.
Andrew Binger is the Program Officer for Community Partnerships at the New Jersey State Council on the Arts. In his role, Andrew manages the Local Arts Program, a $6 million partnership that provides state dollars to each of New Jersey’s 21 counties via a designated county arts agency (CAA). CAAs use these dollars to support their own local arts development programs and to provide regrants to local, grassroots organizations in their respective counties. In addition to managing this extensive grant program, Andrew plays a vital role in the Council’s emergency preparedness efforts and co-leads the agency’s arts and health initiatives. Andrew represents the Council in various cross-sector collaborations, including the NJ Department of Transportation’s Transit Village Task Force, Revolution NJ, and Performing Arts Readiness, to name a few. With a strong commitment to fostering cultural vitality, Andrew continues to make a significant impact in the local arts landscape. Andrew currently serves on the board of the New Jersey Arts and Culture Renewal Fund, Just Say It, and the steering committee for the Creating Healthy Communities convening. He is also pursuing a Master of Social Justice at Union Theological Seminary. Through his work, Andrew amplifies voices historically denied opportunity, fostering a more equitable, inclusive, and vibrant society.
Jennifer Kastle-Goudy is an Associate Director for The Horizon Foundation for New Jersey, the charitable giving arm of Horizon Blue Cross Blue Shield of New Jersey. She represents the Foundation in southern New Jersey and is responsible for cultivating strategic relationships with charitable organizations and identifying grant-making opportunities to advance the Foundation’s mission, which is to support organizations that make New Jersey healthier. A graduate of Moravian College in Bethlehem, Pennsylvania, Jennifer acquired a Bachelor of Arts in Advertising and Graphic Design. She serves on the Advisory Board for the Salvation Army Kroc Center in Camden and Chair’s their Community Relations and Development Committee. Jennifer also serves on the Community Advisory Committee for Jewish Family Service of Atlantic County. Jennifer is a resident of Audubon, New Jersey where she lives with her children Reagan and Jack.
Aly Maier Lokuta, MA (she/her) is the Assistant Vice President of Arts & Well-Being at the New Jersey Performing Arts Center (NJPAC), where she leads innovative programming, research, and education at the intersection of arts and health, serving communities in Newark and New Jersey. A multidisciplinary artist, Aly stays well through creating visual art and writing. You can learn more about NJPAC Arts & Well-Being at www.njpac.org/well and about Aly’s art and consulting work at www.alysonmaier.com.
Morgan Yacoe (BFA, Virginia Commonwealth University; MFA, University of Florida) is the inaugural director of the George Family Center for Healing Arts at Rowan University, where she conducts research, education, and community initiatives at the intersection of arts and health. At the Center, she leads programs such as ArtWise Rx, Rowan’s arts prescribing initiative, GlassArt for Military Wellness, and multiple artist in residence programs within Rowan-Virtua Medicine. She also directs the Healing Arts Research Lab and is advancing new academic pathways, including the Healing Arts Area of Distinction for medical students at Rowan-Virtua School of Osteopathic Medicine and a Certificate of Undergraduate Study in Healing Arts. With 15 years of experience in the field, Yacoe is an interdisciplinary artist, sculptor by training, and researcher who develops innovative medical training tools and collaborative art projects designed to enhance wellness, health, empathy, enhance observation, and strengthen cultural competency in healthcare. She has presented nationally, published in peer reviewed medical journals, and secured competitive funding, including the NIH Behavioral Research Prize and multiple foundation grants supporting community-based, educational, and veteran mental health initiatives.
BOOKS
Julia Hotz, The Connection Cure
Susan Magsamen and Ivy Ross, Your Brain on Art
Arts on Prescription: A Field Guide
NeuroArts Blueprint
RESEARCH/DATA
Americans for the Arts
· Arts and Well-Being Info Fact Sheet
· Improving Our Nation’s Health Through the Arts
Arts Ed Newark: 5-Year Report on Community-Led Healing-Centered Engagement
White Papers: Arts in Health in Long-Term Care, Arts in Health in Social Domain, Arts in Health in Hospitals
Arts, Culture, and Social Prescribing in the US (23 Case Studies)
Music and Mind Harnessing the Arts for Health and Wellness
WHO 2019 Report
UF Epi Arts Lab Results Table
NJPAC Arts & Well-Being
Upcoming Event: Creating Healthy Communities Conference
The Council of New Jersey Grantmakers’ offers listserve services as a benefit of CNJG membership.
CNJG’s listserves facilitate ongoing group e-mail discussions among subscribed members. Members can share information and expertise, ask questions, and gather opinions of colleagues across the network. Listserves also enable members to get the most up-to-date information on related programs being offered throughout the field.
CNJG initially assigns new members to relevant listserves based on your submitted member profile. Contact Craig Weinrich to join any other listserve that interests you. You can unsubscribe from a listserve at any time by using the link found at the bottom of each email sent via the listserve.
In May 2024, our listserve provider updated its email engine, and now the automatic de-duping feature is no longer available, so sending an email to more than one listserve results in multiple emails to the recipient.
If you send an email to a listserve, and it bounces back to you, you are not on that listserve. Please contact Craig to add you to that listserve.
The listserves available are:
Camden Funders - [email protected]
Bergen Funders - [email protected]
Community Foundation CEO’s - [email protected]
CNJG Member CEO's - [email protected]
CNJG Member CFO’s and Finance Managers - [email protected]
CNJG Member Communications Staff - [email protected]
Corporate Funders - [email protected]
COVID-19 Funders - [email protected]
Culture Funders - [email protected]
Disaster Response Funders - [email protected]
Education Funders - [email protected]
Emerging Leaders in Philanthropy - [email protected]
Environmental Funders - [email protected]
Family Funders - [email protected]
Food Funders - [email protected]
Health Funders - [email protected]
Monmouth & Ocean Roundtable of Funders - [email protected]
Newark Funders - [email protected]
New Jersey Census Funders - [email protected]
Paterson Funders - [email protected]
Racial Equity Funders - [email protected]
STEAM Funders - [email protected]
South Jersey Funders - [email protected]
Strong & Thriving Communities - [email protected]
Trenton Area Funders - [email protected]
There are some restrictions for joining listserves:
· only CEOs (or equivalent) can join the CEO listserve;
· only CEOs (or equivalent) of a Community Foundation can join the Community Foundation CEO listserve;
· only CFOs (or equivalent) can join the Financial listserve
· only family foundation staff and trustees can join the Family Funders listserve;
· only corporate giving professionals can join the corporate listserve
Please refer to the Listserves’ Membership Policies below for information on using the listserves.
An overview on the self-dealing law, including definitions, common problem areas, exceptions, penalties, and resources.
Alexis Bivens, Vice President of Strategic Initiatives and Managing Director of the Supporting Organizing Work Funders Collaborative, Connecticut Council on Philanthropy, presents the process and progress of how an affinity group transformed into a funders collaborative, how it was resourced, and challenges along the way.
When considering how to improve health outcomes for low-income individuals, most people think about providing access to good medical care and keeping the cost of that care as low as possible. What people rarely think about is the connection between good health and quality affordable housing.