Silicon Valley Community Foundation – No.5

It seems surprising that the area surrounding San Francisco Bay in northern California – arguably the world’s supreme entrepreneurial hotspot – is in need of charitable assistance.

 

Yet despite the wealth of some in Silicon Valley thanks to the hi-tech giants and start-ups, there are also what Silicon Valley Community Foundation (SVCF) describes as “stubborn social challenges”.

 

SVCF focuses its charitable efforts on the Mateo and Santa Clara counties, a region where it says there are more jobs than homes, where one-third of the residents are immigrants and nearly two-thirds of those are under the age of 18.

 

SVCG supports hundreds of non-profit organisations every year: among its priorities are education and immigrant integration – thanks to its grants more than 15,000 students received after-school or summer maths instruction and more than 4,500 adults have learned English through non-profit programmes it supports.

 

The charity made the news late last year when it received a record breaking £633m donation from Facebook founder and chief executive Mark Zuckerberg.

 

But it doesn’t just target well known names for donations, it’s one of the largest community foundations in the world, and aims to make it easier for individuals, families and companies to donate so that they can focus on charitable causes they want to support.

 

In 2013 it had £3bn in assets under management and received £0.9bn in contributions. SVCF awarded almost £232m in grants across all its funds. Of this, £125.5m went to local charities in Silicon Valley. Through its donors it awards more money to charities than any other community foundation in the US.

 

For the full World Charity Index 2014 list take a look at our interactive graphic