The Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation (BMGF), a merging of the William H. Gates Foundation and the Gates Learning Foundation, is an American private foundation founded by Bill Gates and Melinda French Gates. Based in Seattle, Washington, it was launched in 2000 and is reported to be the second largest charitable foundation in the world, holding $69 billion in assets as of 2020. On his 43rd birthday, Bill Gates gave the foundation $1 billion. The primary stated goals of the foundation are to enhance healthcare and reduce extreme poverty across the world, and to expand educational opportunities and access to information technology in the U.S. Key individuals of the foundation include Bill Gates, Melinda French Gates, Warren Buffett, chief executive officer Mark Suzman, and Michael Larson.
Orange Coast College (OCC) is a public community college in Costa Mesa in Orange County, California. It was founded in 1947, with its first classes opening in the fall of 1948. It provides Associate of Art and Associate of Science degrees, certificates of achievement, and lower-division classes transferable to other colleges and universities. The college enrolls approximately 24,000 undergraduate students. In terms of population size, Orange Coast College is the third-largest college in Orange County.
Oregon State University (OSU) is a public land-grant research university based in Corvallis, Oregon. OSU offers more than 200 undergraduate-degree programs along with a variety of graduate and doctoral degrees through each college. It has the seventh-largest engineering college in the nation for 2023. Undergraduate enrollment for all colleges combined averages over 32,000 while an additional 5,000 students are engaged in post-graduate coursework through the university. In 2023, over 37,000 students were enrolled at OSU – making it the largest university in the state. Out-of-state students typically make up over one-quarter of the student body. Since its founding, over 272,000 students have graduated from OSU. The university is classified by the Carnegie Classification of Institutions of Higher Education as an "...R1: Doctoral University," with "...very high research activity."
New Mexico State University is a public land-grant research university in Las Cruces, New Mexico. Founded in 1888, it is the state's oldest public institution of higher education and one of two flagship universities in New Mexico. NMSU has campuses in Alamogordo, Doña Ana County, and Grants, as well as research centers and programs in all 33 counties in the state.
The William and Flora Hewlett Foundation, commonly known as the Hewlett Foundation, is a private foundation, established by Hewlett-Packard cofounder William Redington Hewlett and his wife Flora Lamson Hewlett in 1966. The Hewlett Foundation awards grants to a variety of liberal and progressive causes.
California State University, Sacramento is a public university in Sacramento, California. Founded in 1947 as Sacramento State College, it is part of the California State University system.
The Advertising Council, commonly known as the Ad Council, is an American nonprofit organization that produces, distributes, and promotes public service announcements on behalf of various sponsors, including nonprofit organizations, non-governmental organizations and agencies of the United States government.
Student financial aid in the United States is funding that is available exclusively to students attending a post-secondary educational institution in the United States. This funding is used to assist in covering the many costs incurred in the pursuit of post-secondary education. Financial aid is available from federal and state governments, educational institutions, and private organizations. It can be awarded in the form of grants, loans, work-study, and scholarships. In order to apply for federal financial aid, students must first complete the Free Application for Federal Student Aid (FAFSA).
Kaplan University (KU) was a private online for-profit university owned by Kaplan, Inc., a subsidiary of Graham Holdings Company. It was predominantly a distance learning institution, maintaining 14 ground locations across the United States. The university was named in honor of Stanley H. Kaplan, who founded Kaplan Test Prep. It was regionally accredited by the Higher Learning Commission, one of seven major accrediting bodies in the U.S., but some programs did not have the field-specific accreditation needed for graduates to obtain certification.
The Moody Foundation is a charitable foundation incorporated in Texas and based in the island city of Galveston. It was chartered in 1942 by William Lewis Moody Jr. and his wife Libbie Rice Shearn Moody "to benefit, in perpetuity, present and future generations of Texans." The Foundation focuses the majority of its funding on programs involving education, social services, children's needs, and community development.
Newfoundland and Labrador has had the same growing pains as other provinces in developing its own form of education and now boasts a very strong, although relatively small, system. The direction of Newfoundland and Labrador's policy has evolved rapidly since the late 1990s, with increased funding, participation rates, accessibility and transferability. Many of the directives the government has been acting upon in the past 10 years have been a result of recommendations that stemmed from a 2005 white paper: Foundation for Success: White Paper on Public Post-Secondary Education. It set the course for furthering the strategic directives of the provincial post-secondary education sector. Some of its recommendations aimed to:
The Wikimedia Foundation, Inc., abbreviated WMF, is an American 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization headquartered in San Francisco, California, and registered there as a charitable foundation. It is best known as the host of Wikipedia, the seventh most visited website in the world. However, the foundation also hosts 14 other related content projects. It also supports the development of MediaWiki, the wiki software that underpins them all.
The Harlem Children's Zone (HCZ) is a nonprofit organization for children and families living in Harlem, providing free support in the form of parenting workshops, a preschool program, three charter schools, and child-oriented health programs for thousands of children and families. The HCZ is "aimed at doing nothing less than breaking the cycle of generational poverty for the thousands of children and families it serves."
Unigo is an online business matching students with colleges, scholarships, internships, student loans, majors and careers. According to USA Today, “millions of students use Unigo to assist in their college search.” Education publisher McGraw-Hill wrote “Unigo is the largest and most authoritative library of college reviews on the internet.”
The Community Foundation of the Eastern Shore (CFES) was established in 1984, and is located in Salisbury, Maryland. Its mission is to "To strengthen our community by connecting people who care with causes that matter to improve quality of life in our region" and its vision is for "...a community where all can live, learn, work, create and prosper". It serves the three lower counties of the Eastern Shore of Maryland: Somerset, Wicomico, and Worcester.
The Center for Community College Student Engagement is a research and service project of the Program in Higher Education Leadership in The University of Texas at Austin (UT) College of Education. The Center was founded in 2001 under the name Community College Survey of Student Engagement (CCSSE). Major grants from the Houston Endowment Inc., the Lumina Foundation for Education, the MetLife Foundation, the James Irvine Foundation, and The Pew Charitable Trusts have supported the Center's work.
Mitsubishi Electric America Foundation (MEAF) was established in 1991 by Mitsubishi Electric Corporation of Japan and the Mitsubishi Electric US group companies, which manufacture, market and distribute a wide range of consumer, industrial, commercial and professional electronics products. Based in the Washington D.C. area, MEAF works to make societal changes by investing in innovative strategies to empower youth with disabilities to lead productive lives. The Foundation supports national grant programs and employee volunteer programs across the United States. Since its inception, the Foundation has contributed more than $9 million to organizations assisting young people with disabilities.
Howard G. (Peter) Sloane is an American philanthropist and the Chairman and CEO of The Heckscher Foundation for Children, a New York-based private foundation established in 1921 by German-born industrialist, financier, and philanthropist August Heckscher. In 1997, Sloane took over the affairs of the Heckscher Foundation when its assets consisted largely of encumbered real estate which limited its ability to make meaningful gifts. He restructured and developed the Foundation into a significant funder of innovative education, job training, recreation, and the arts programs with assets of over $400 million. Under Sloane's leadership, the modern day Foundation underwrites projects with potential for catalytic impact when combined with public funds or other donors, and operates its own strategic philanthropy programs to promote the welfare of children and youth in New York City.
The Goldman Sachs Foundation is a New York–based, not-for-profit private foundation that is a subsidiary of the financial services firm Goldman Sachs and has the goal of bettering humanity worldwide, especially regarding health and education. In recent years its principal philanthropic projects have been: 10,000 Women, and 10,000 Small Businesses.
California Competes is an American nonprofit policy organization seeking to increase access to college and improve college graduation rates. Created in 2011 by civic and business leaders in California, the group has labeled the state's higher education system dysfunctional and called for better coordination and planning for the future needs of the state's economy. The group's work has included advocating for a more robust statewide education data system and for greater financial supports for parents in college. Prior research had revealed that lower-income areas of the state were being shortchanged in the support they were receiving for community colleges.
