Social Venture Partners Connecticut Invites Letters of Interest for Investment

Friday, September 15, 2017

Venture philanthropy seeks to invest in innovative and high-impact organizations focused on closing the opportunity gap in Connecticut

WESTPORT, CT -- Social Venture Partners Connecticut (SVP Connecticut), a program and field of interest fund of Fairfield County’s Community Foundation, announced that it is accepting Letters of Interest for investment through an online application. The submission deadline is Monday, October 16.  

Organizations that have an effective strategy and model that materially impacts the Opportunity Gap in the areas of education and workforce development are invited to apply.  Cross sector initiatives to provide employment or educational opportunities to disadvantaged families are also supported.  

“SVP aims to significantly reduce or eliminate the most pressing social issue facing Connecticut -- the Opportunity Gap, “explains Mark Argosh, SVP Connecticut’s Executive Director. “By the term ‘Opportunity Gap’ we mean the severe obstacles that low income and often minority citizens in Connecticut face in securing a quality education and accessing pathways to rewarding careers. This gap imposes enormous costs on individuals, their families, communities, and Connecticut, as a whole”.

Using a venture philanthropy grant model, SVP Connecticut provides innovative organizations operating in Connecticut with multi-year grants of up to $25,000 per year and pro bono strategic consulting and advisory services.  The members of SVP Connecticut, called Partners, seek to help organizations who align with SVP’s mission of closing the Opportunity Gap to scale their programs and organizational structure to reach more people in Connecticut.  

SVP Partners engage with staff and board members to help achieve shared goals, increase business effectiveness, and improve the impact of services delivered. This combination of SVP Partners’ professional skills and expertise, along with financial support, produces positive long-term impact for the Investees.

An information session about SVP Connecticut’s philanthropy model and the investment criteria for the 2017 grant program will be held on Thursday, September 28, 3:30-5:00 pm in the East Campus Forum of Norwalk Community College, 188 Richards Avenue, Norwalk, CT.  Leaders of organizations interested in submitting a Letter of Interest are strongly encouraged to attend.  An online information session will be held on Monday, October 2 from 1:00-2:30pm. 

Advance registration for the information sessions is required.  Registration information as well as SVP Connecticut’s investment criteria and eligibility parameters can be found on the SVP Connecticut website.     

For further information, email info@svp-ct.org or visit the organization’s website at www.socialventurepartners.org/connecticut

Social Venture Partners Connecticut , a program and field of interest fund administered by Fairfield County’s Community Foundation, is an engaged community of Partners leveraging time, expertise, and resources for sustainable solutions to social problems, while becoming more strategic and effective in our personal giving.  The group is part of the SVP Network of engaged donors, founded in 1997, with more than 3500 partners in 41 cities around the world.  To date the global network has given more than $55 million and hundreds of thousands of volunteer hours to nonprofits that are creating social change in their respective regions.  SVP Connecticut members, referred to as Partners, are successful entrepreneurs, corporate executives, and professionals drawn from Fairfield County and beyond, who are skilled at growing organizations with a heart for making a better world.  SVP Connecticut was founded in 2013 and is based in Westport, CT.  www.socialventurepartners.org/connecticut

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Contact:

Camille Guthrie
Director of Operations
Social Venture Partners Connecticut
917-751-5966
camille@svp-ct.org

Websites: www.svp-ct.org; fccfoundation.org