Pew Charitable Trusts
Contact information:
1 Commerce Square
2005 Market St., Ste. 1700
Philadelphia, PA 19103-7077
Phone: 215-575-9050
Fax: 215-575-4939
Website: http://www.pewtrusts.org
Type of foundation: Public Charity
Types of grants: Pew operates in three ways: through operating projects, managed by Pew staff; through donor partnerships built on collaboration with individuals or foundations to achieve shared purposes; and through targeted grantmaking. Description: Established in 1948, the Trusts reorganized into a public charity in 2004. The money in the Trusts comes from seven individual charitable funds established between 1948 and 1979 by two sons and two daughters of Sun Oil Company founder Joseph N. Pew and his wife, Mary Anderson Pew. The Trusts have three overarching areas of interest:
- Improving public policy: Pew studies and promotes nonpartisan policy solutions for pressing and emerging problems affecting the American public and the global community.
- Informing the public: The Pew Research Center, a Washington-based subsidiary, is home to most of Pew's information initiatives. It uses impartial, fact-based public-opinion polling and other research tools to track important issues and trends.
- Stimulating civic life: Pew supports national initiatives that encourage civic participation. In Philadelphia, Pew supports organizations that create a thriving arts and culture community and institutions that enhance the well-being of the region's neediest citizens.
Pew's program interests include:
- Public health and human services policy
- Food security and safety
- Family financial security
- Science and technology
- Environment
- State policy on critical issues
- Religion and public life
- Information and media
- U.S. Latino population
- Arts
Read more about these program areas here.
Sample grants:
- $2,000,000 to WGBH Educational Foundation (Boston) for God in America, a six-hour television series that will examine the religious history of the United States as it has played out in the public life of the nation (2008).
- $600,000 to National Public Radio for continuing support for coverage on religion and ways religion and religious discourse help shape American public life (2007).
- $125,000 to MacNeil-Lehrer Productions (Arlington, VA) to produce a one-hour documentary on lives, beliefs and aspirations of young Americans, to be aired nationally in prime time on PBS stations (2007).
Fit for public broadcasting: Pew will consider support for media-based projects only if the content and use of media address or in some way advance a specific objective of one or more program areas.
Eligibility: Most grants are made to U.S. organizations, qualified as 501(c)(3). Giving on a national basis. No support for political organizations or government agencies. No grants to individuals, or for endowment funds, capital campaigns, construction, equipment, deficit financing, scholarships, or fellowships (except those identified or initiated by the trusts).
Deadline: None
How to apply: Initial approach is by brief letter of inquiry (less than 3 pages). Learn more about the letter of inquiry requirements here. Applicants should not send full proposals unless requested by staff. Examples of past work, articles, reports, videos or other material should not be submitted with the letter of inquiry.
Giving range: Assets: $5,513,279,092 (total net assets, year ending 6/30/08)
Total giving: $142,268,588 (year ending 6/30/08)
