When philanthropist Mona Sinha walked into her first meeting on a museum advisory board, she immediately noticed that she was the youngest person in the room and the only person of color there.
Instead of being welcomed as a new colleague, fellow members of the advisory board asked her if she was a fundraiser for the museum. Such experiences often make people of color feel unwelcome in philanthropy.
The study was released Wednesday by the Donors of Color Network, a membership organization for wealthy philanthropists from marginalized backgrounds, along with two consulting companies, Radiant Strategies and the Vaid Group. From 2016 to 2018, Lee and a research team traveled to 10 U.S. cities to conduct 90-minute conversations with donors of color who had $1 million or more in cash on hand. The result, the authors say, is a “qualitative snapshot” rather than a representative sample.
“The growth in racial-justice giving that has happened recently was prefigured in our data,” Vaid says. “This is a community that was giving — heavily.” Another commonality among the donors interviewed is that more than 65 percent were self-made millionaires. Nearly 78 percent of the donors interviewed said they had helped relatives and friends cover living and educational expenses, provided emergency monetary support, and helped pay for weddings, among other costs, in the year before they were interviewed.
“If you’re the Sierra Club, you’re not competing with the National Wildlife Conservancy, you’re actually competing with somebody’s aunt or cousin,” Maxton says. As much as donors may want to support a new nonprofit program, they also may need to help a friend pay a water bill or put their nephew through college.