Creative Solutions to Arkansas’s Needs

Heather Larkin, ARCF CEO

Arkansas Community Foundation engages people, connects resources and inspires solutions to build community. This mission statement is the essence of our work, and I want to share with you what it really means to our staff, our family of philanthropists, our nonprofits and our communities.

First, we raise awareness about the causes that affect the communities where people live. Then we bring together grant dollars, people and talent to build connections and address local needs.

In addition, we partner with communities to find answers for local issues. We help solicit ideas and give people the opportunities and resources to be creative in answering local needs.

A home-grown example of connecting resources is our Giving Tree grant program. All 27 of our local affiliate offices and our central office put out a call for grant requests at least once a year. Nonprofits from throughout the state apply for the grants, and our local and statewide boards decide which programs and projects will be supported.

Beyond the borders of our state, we are actively pursuing grants from national foundations. For example, this year we partnered with the University of Arkansas for Medical Sciences to receive a $250,000 grant from the Partners Investing in Nursing’s Future program led by the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation and the Northwest Health Foundation.

And to spearhead our efforts to generate solutions that will help build our communities, David Johnson has been hired as the Foundation’s Vice President for Community Investment. In one major initiative, he is working with researchers at the University of Arkansas at Little Rock on a report that will give us an excellent, county-by-county look at community needs throughout the state.

Arkansas Community Foundation is a family of philanthropists, and our family includes you. When you make a gift or establish an endowment through the Foundation, you help this mission come alive for Arkansas. You provide a permanent source of funding for the causes you care about, and you partner with other philanthropists to learn about emerging needs and provide the resources to make creative solutions possible.

Our statewide perspective and local focus mean creative solutions for Arkansas. I hope you will choose to be a part of our family of philanthropists and engage with us to help seek solutions.

Best regards,

Heather Larkin
President and CEO