Chairman’s Message

The Heckscher Foundation for Children serves the evolving needs of children through meaningful contributions and support of worthwhile programs principally in education, as well as workforce development, health, recreation, social services, juvenile justice and the arts. The guiding concept of our mission today is to level the playing field for needy youth through our gifts and our leadership, and to be a catalyst for innovative projects and thinking on fundamental concerns affecting youth.

In 2012, the Foundation celebrates over ninety-one years of supporting hundreds of organizations and programs, serving needy youth more broadly and effectively than its founders and early leaders August Heckscher, Arthur Smadbeck and Ruth Smadbeck envisioned.

We fund organizations and individuals who clearly articulate, using our Logic Model, what the youth they serve will accomplish in the short and long term. We perform periodic reviews of grantees’ success in meeting their goals. Our focus is on contributing to organizations and individuals who demonstrate measurable results. We also seek collaborative partnerships with other funders, public and private. In all of our giving, we honor the generosity of spirit, and sweat, of our leaders through the years who have made it all possible.

Peter Sloane
Chairman, Board of Trustees
January 2012