Stanford Social Innovation Review

Manchester Bidwell Corporation replicates by adapting general strategies to local cultures

Over the past few years, Washington, D.C., has witnessed two explosive nonprofit scandals. Both scandals invited embarrassing publicity and congressional scrutiny. Both exposed the governance flaws of experienced and well-intentioned board members. And both could have been avoided. —By Pete Smith

To grow to full scale, serving 50,000 students a year, YouthBuild’s federal funding must increase from $60 million to $125 million annually. Local programs will also need to raise $250 million annually from state and local education and criminal justice funds, and from private donors. How does YouthBuild plan to achieve this breakthrough and help five times as many people? —By Dorothy Stoneman, founder and president of YouthBuild USA

National Instrument’s partnerships not only energize science education, but also boost the company’s brand and employee morale.

Left: An engineer readies her robot at the 2008 FIRST Lego League World Festival, an annual competition that brings together teams of students to show off their engineering chops. Powering her robot was sophisticated software developed by National Instruments. Her team, the Power Peeps of Swartz Creek, Mich., placed third. 

GreenNote helps students with no credit history obtain college loans. 

The Posse Foundation sends diverse students to college together so that they can lean on each other and lead their schools.

The polling place influences voting behavior.

Museum teaches about ending world hunger.

Grassroot Soccer uses the world’s most popular sport to educate kids in sub-Saharan Africa about HIV and its prevention.

How did Room to Read create more than 5,000 libraries in less than eight years? The media have largely focused on founder John Wood as the catalytic figure in the organization’s success story. Of equal importance, however, is Room to Read’s solid and replicable operational choices. 

In the early, heady days of the venture philanthropy movement, its proponents touted it as revolutionary, while critics said it was just old wine in new bottles. The experiences of the Center for Venture Philanthropy show that the truth lies somewhere in between: Venture philanthropy is no miracle cure, yet it can be particularly good at building strong organizations, knitting together new networks, and shrinking the power gap between funders and grantees.

How to get more racial minorities into corner offices.

SSIR Managing Editor Eric Nee spoke with Escuela Nueva’s president Vicky Colbert about her efforts to change the way children are educated.

An innovative federal project turns retiring military personnel into teachers.