Innovations in Philanthropy: Building More Philanthropy with Purpose Giving Circle
“When we think about who philanthropists are, we don’t think about people who look like us,” says Bo Thao-Urabe, who teamed up with Kaohly Her and Terri Thao to launch Building More Philanthropy with Purpose (BMPP) Giving Circle more than 10 years ago. “How do we change the face of philanthropy so that we are not just seen as the people who are begging for dimes to be dropped in our tin cup?”
The Minneapolis-based organization brings together Asian Americans whose families immigrated to America as refugees and adoptees, to pool their financial resources and provide small grants to support social justice projects in Asian American, Native Hawaiian, and Pacific Islander communities. To date, BMPP has given out more than $300,000 to 60 community projects.
BMPP describes itself as a family-based giving circle. Money comes directly out of the pockets of the participating families—most of whom live in Minnesota. The donation threshold is $1,000 per family—an intentionally low threshold to make participation possible for middle-class families. This upcoming year, BMPP will have 15 families involved in the Giving Circle. BMPP typically issues five to 10 grants per year.
In the traditional grant application process, the threshold to entry is high, requiring extensive writing and knowledge of navigating the funding process. “It was really important for us to create a new way of doing philanthropy,” Her says, “and doing it intentionally to impact communities that we care about.”
The micro-funds range from $2,500 to $10,000, and they’re granted to proposals that are reviewed and selected by all the BMPP families, including their children. The proposals might be considered “too small, too new, or too risky” for established foundations and larger funders, but these are BMPP’s crème de la crème. “These are projects that can be funded with low dollar amounts and are small enough in scale that they can have an impact right away,” Her explains.
When the Funny Asian Women Kollective first approached BMPP in 2014, the three women founders were a group of starving artists, says Thao-Urabe. The founders had the idea of using comedy as a platform to address stereotypes around Asian women while supporting other artists.
BMPP granted FAWK its first funding in 2014, and the collective has since blossomed into a stand-alone organization that puts on showcases and provides workshops for other Asian women comedians.
Other grantees include the Indigenous Roots Cultural Arts Center, a Karen soccer league for girls from low-income families, a textiles project for Hmong artisans, and a leadership conference for a group of Asian students from Saint Paul Public Schools.
BMPP doesn’t require grantees to report back. Instead, the organization hosts an annual Pho the Good of All celebration and invites grantees to share their progress and lessons learned. This keeps grantees accountable to the communities they serve, not to BMPP, says Thao-Urabe.
She acknowledges that BMPP can’t compete with larger philanthropic funds, but that’s not the point. “We hope that we demonstrate there is a different way to do grantmaking that is more accessible, that is more community-focused, and that will still have the impact that philanthropy always talks about.”
