OVERVIEW: The Peery Foundation’s global development grantmaking invests in market-based interventions to advance poverty alleviation and development efforts around the world. Its global health grants fund organizations serving vulnerable, marginalized and rural communities around the world.
IP TAKE: According to Peery’s website, Peery is “undergoing a significant organizational shift.” It has suspended its grantmaking until further notice. New grantseekers should keep a close eye on the foundation’s website for updates.
PROFILE: The Peery Foundation was established in 1978 but did not begin its grantmaking activities until 2001. It funds market-based approaches due to its commitment to providing unrestricted multi-year funding. The foundation has since increased its grantmaking in order to “strengthen youth and families to build lives of dignity and self-reliance.” Based in Palo Alto, California, Peery has a small staff, which uses business-based solutions as a way, it believes, to safeguard good intentions. It invests in organizations located “[a]long the San Francisco Peninsula and around the world.” Peery divides its grantmaking priorities according to geography — local, regional, or global. It invests in poverty alleviation.
Grants for Global Development and Global Health
Although five generations of the Peery family have called Palo Alto, California home, many have spent years living and traveling in developing countries. Inspired by time spent working on service projects for the vulnerable, the foundation established a Global Portfolio to address poverty issues around the world. According to former Executive Director Jessamyn Lau, the foundation believes its “primary function is to support and serve the social entrepreneurs” it works with and to keep its “funding as flexible as possible.”
Peery is in tune with global philanthropy and is a member of Big Bang Philanthropy, a collaborative of like-minded funders who favor entrepreneurial approaches to reducing global poverty. In each of its grantmaking portfolios, the Peery Foundation is willing to take risks and acknowledges that not all results can be measured, but a promise of great impact is required.
Examples of past global grantees include VisionSpring, which received funding for its program providing access to high quality reading glasses; and Medic Mobile, which received funding to support its free, open source mobile health technology platform. Additional global grantees include the One Acre Fund, Living Goods, Samasource, and Vittana.
Grants for the Bay Area
The funder’s local program focuses on closing the opportunity gap to prevent the achievement gap from widening. Peery prefers to see a demonstrated and articulated need by community stakeholders, high-quality services and transformational experiences. It does not fund programs that are not requested by local schools or the community, nor does it typically fund housing or health causes. Past local grantees include the East Palo Alto Charter School, the East Palo Alto Youth Court and the Ravenswood Education Foundation.
Important Grant Details:
Funding is made in the form of one-time and multi-year unrestricted grants that range between $1,000 and $100,000 per year. The foundation does not have specific grant making cycles and awards grants on a rolling basis. The Peery Foundation does not accept unsolicited grant applications or requests for funding.
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