When it comes to building strong communities, a little experimentation goes a long way.
Last year, the Trust for Civic Life selected Nebraska Community Foundation as a Civic Hub, defined as a local, trusted group that is creating conditions for local participation, problem-solving, and belonging. With that honor came a new opportunity for the NCF network to dare to do something different. By providing guidance, funding and a collaborative framework, our new Civic Experiment Mini-Grants empowered affiliated funds to leverage local assets, build connections, and design innovative initiatives that reflect the unique strengths, culture, and vision of their hometowns.
We awarded grants to 17 communities. Every grant was matched 1:1 by a local NCF affiliated fund, inviting communities to pair outside resources with their own generosity, ideas, and leadership. Most importantly, they were encouraged to dream big and try something new.
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Leigh Legacy Fund, for instance, organized the first-ever Leigh Appreciation Day. The all-day event began with free coffee and community storytelling and ended with a drone show designed by local students with the help of a local company. The affiliated fund in Newman Grove hosted a similar event with games, history presentations, and a chance for residents to connect over their love of the community.
After Fairmont Legacy Foundation Fund gathered residents’ memories, a local artist turned their stories into a mural that helped usher in Fairmont’s 150th Old Settlers Picnic. Dodge Area Community Fund volunteers wanted to pay homage to the town’s rich baseball history, so they used a grant to fund the painting of a mural – also by a local artist – on the ballpark’s grandstand.
In Stuart and Red Cloud, local affiliated funds received grants to ensure edible schoolyards at local childcare centers continued to provide firsthand learning. Brain Builders Early Childhood Center in Stuart launched its garden this year. In Red Cloud, grant money helped continue support of The Valley Child Development Center’s existing edible schoolyard.
Beyond experimentation, these grants were also an extension of NCF’s adherence to a decentralized, community-centric model. Last month, the Trust for Civic Life published The local advantage: What rural communities reveal about building trust and agency. Of nearly 1,000 people surveyed, 154 were members of the NCF network. Two statements specifically caught my attention. The first is evidence of something we’ve long believed at NCF, acting with others to achieve a shared outcome, in both formal and informal settings, was strongly linked to feelings of trust, agency, and belonging. The more people acted together, the stronger those feelings were.
The second statement speaks to something at the core of our work, which is that the best way to engage people in building community with us is to offer them tangible power. The survey found that logging more volunteer hours was not connected to a greater sense of agency, but getting closer to the decision-making process—by taking on leadership roles and responsibilities—was. By working to build robust unrestricted endowments to benefit their places, our network of affiliated funds is creating resources that have both the breadth and depth to empower generations of future leaders to make the decisions they deem best for their community as new opportunities arise.
We’re hoping a new opportunity will allow more Nebraskans to step into leadership roles. Beginning this fall, Library Connection Grants are available to all NCF affiliated funds who wish to partner with a Greater Nebraska library – up to $10,000 is available with a 1:1 local match. Libraries play many roles in our communities, and we expect these grants to reflect that diversity of purpose. In the past, NCF affiliated funds have partnered with libraries to offer summer reading camps, English classes, makerspaces, seed libraries, tool libraries, historical exhibits, and so much more. There is ample room for experimentation, especially given the strong foundation already in place.
Fifteen library endowments are currently stewarded through NCF, totaling $8.5 million. Of those, five exceed $500,000, including the two largest: the Syracuse Public Library Endowment at $3.2 million and the Nebraska City Public Library Endowment at $1.9 million. NCF’s relationship with libraries extends beyond communities to statewide partners. The Nebraska Library Association maintains an NCF-affiliated endowment, further strengthening our connection. Since 2015, NCF affiliated funds have granted more than $6.1 million to support libraries statewide, including $3.6 million from 55 CBAFs. NCF’s asset-based approach recognizes libraries as among the most trusted and accessible institutions in rural communities.
NCF staff will walk alongside community members, local partners and affiliated fund leaders as they discern what comes next. In some communities, this might mean a one-year experiment designed to learn and discover what is possible. In others it might mean connecting resources or leveraging existing efforts already underway. And in others it might be funding a multi-year effort to sustain good work already occurring. We don’t know exactly what this will look like in each community, and that is by design.
What we do know, however, is that it never hurts to go off the beaten path. When communities are given permission to think beyond the familiar, that’s when the fun – and possibility – begins.
Your hometown may already benefit from one or more affiliated funds who are part of the Nebraska Community Foundation network. To learn more and to find your nearest affiliated fund, visit NebraskaHometown.org.
