Leaders and Champions: The Role of Funders in Strategic Public Financing

The majority of funding for children’s programs and services in our country comes from public dollars, by a long shot. If we want to scale the programs and services that all children need over time, we need to think of them as a public good, sustained by public investments. This opens philanthropy up to focus strategic investments in things like innovation, evaluation and capacity building rather than paying for direct services year after year. Because private dollars are comparatively small to the total public dollars flowing toward children’s services from the federal, state and local levels, some of the most impactful investments foundations can make are those that help organizations advocate for, access and use public dollars. 

The report was created in partnership with the Children's Funding Project.