Convergence Innovation Fund: A national funding strategy for sustainable local change

A collaboration of funders called the Convergence Partnership (CP) –which includes the California Endowment, Kaiser Permanente, Kresge Foundation, Nemours, Robert Wood Johnson, the W.K. Kellogg Foundation and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention as technical partners –has identified several strategies across their individual initiatives to be important in promoting and sustaining healthy, equitable communities. These include:policy and environmental change strategies, which can support long-term population impacts compared to individual behavior change; multi-field partnerships, in order to work across key policy arenas and achieve multiple positive outcomes through a collective strategy, and; a focus on equity through community leadership, engagement and focused attention on communities of color and low-income communities where poor health outcomes are most prevalent. In order to promote these key strategies CP launched a new initiative called the Convergence Innovation Fund (CIF) in May 2009. The CIF provides a 50% match on dollars raised by local and regional foundations to support foundations as they take risks and shift their grantmaking to promote the three key strategies and advance community health outcomes for all. Fifteen awards were made in October of 2009 to diverse foundations from across the nation. The presentation will discuss the overall goals of the initiative, describe the grantee pool, provide a preliminary look at the efficacy of this funding strategy and discuss how the initiative will change in response to lessons learned from the pilot round of funding.