Alliance Online - June 2007

Reassessing the role of grant-giving in a foundation’s strategy:
The case of the Roma Education Fund

Alexandre Marc and Costel Bercus

Foundations whose aim is to achieve social and institutional change must have clear strategies. In this article we argue that in democratic societies grant-giving should not be the driving agenda for these foundations; rather it should be part of a much broader strategy, which might include direct implementation of programmes, especially in the field of advocacy, and using the foundation’s convening power to bring various stakeholders together. This was the conclusion the Roma Education Fund (REF) came two over its first two years of operation. The Fund is now trying to find the right balance between supporting local or national initiatives through grants and playing a direct role in advocacy, building knowledge, and influencing policies.

How the Roma Education Fund came about

REF, which is both a Swiss and a Hungarian foundation, was created in May 2005 in the framework of the Decade for Roma Inclusion, an initiative started by George Soros, founder and chairman of the board of the Open Society Institute (OSI), and James Wolfensohn, then president of the World Bank. The initiative brought together eight governments from countries with a significant Roma population: Hungary, Romania, Bulgaria, Slovakia, the Czech Republic, Serbia, Macedonia and Croatia. Newly independent Montenegro is also taking part.

These countries committed themselves to implementing national action plans to improve the situation of their Roma populations. REF aims to assist these efforts by:

reducing the gap in educational outcomes between Roma and non-Roma children by providing better access to quality education;
promoting Roma inclusion in all aspects of the national education systems of the participating countries, as well as others wishing to join this effort;
combating segregation of Roma children in education systems.

REF is financed by about 25 donors, with George Soros being the main contributor, followed by the World Bank. Support has also come from a number of European bilateral donors; the Network of European Foundations (foundations participating through NEF are Evens Foundation, the Remembrance and Future Fund, Freudenberg Foundation, Barrow Cadbury Trust, and the Charles Stewart Mott Foundation); private companies such as Putumayo World Music; and individuals.

REF runs various programmes: grants to civil society, governments, and local governments; studies and technical assistance; advocacy and communication; and the Roma Memorial University Scholarships Programme, the largest scholarship programme for Roma university students in the world. It has financed 67 projects in 13 countries and produced in-depth assessments of education systems in eight countries and a number of studies and policy notes. Over the last two years, REF has progressively elaborated a vision for tackling the issue of Roma inclusion in education systems.

The basic issues in Roma education

The gap in education outcomes between Roma and non-Roma is huge, but varies considerably by country: in the Czech Republic, Hungary and Slovakia, practically all children of school age are in school, while in Serbia many Roma children simply do not attend school. However, even where Roma children are in school they usually receive a sub-standard education. In Slovakia, it is estimated that 80 per cent of Roma children enrolled in elementary education are in schools for the mentally handicapped or in special classes for children with learning disabilities. This places them at a great disadvantage in the labour market and is, moreover, a violation of European basic human rights standards. Given that the Roma are the largest minority in Europe, probably accounting for between 8 and 10 million students, it presents a huge risk to social cohesion.

Education, however, is not an isolated issue. Roma face a multiplicity of problems such as rapidly developing socio-economic and geographical segregation. This is caused in part by market forces and the increasing cost of housing, but also in some countries by policies aimed at segregation. In the Czech Republic and Slovakia, for example, Roma are evicted from their homes and forced to move to isolated areas with no basic service delivery. They are often unable to integrate into the new liberal economies of Eastern Europe because they were mostly not given land, they lost jobs in state enterprises, and they face serious discrimination. There is a lack of trust and understanding between communities, and negative stereotypes and stigmas are surprisingly high in many countries.

All these problems are generally known to people who work on Roma issues. What is less recognized is that there are considerable differences between countries both in the general status of Roma and in educational outcomes. These different circumstances mean that different policies are needed to address them.

Elaborating a strategy

As soon as REF started receiving project proposals, it became clear that just operating a demand-driven grants scheme for civil society and governments would not allow it to meet its objectives. It could even be counter-productive, giving the impression that the issue of Roma education was entirely covered by REF. It is of course essential to support a vibrant and solid civil society, especially in the field of Roma inclusion, where civil society is still not fully developed. But, in a democratic society where mechanisms exist to define policies, and processes are in place to deal with social questions democratically, even if in a very imperfect way, a foundation needs to influence democratic processes as much as possible. This is the only way the foundation’s actions can be legitimate among society as a whole.

It was quite clear to the board and management of REF that the first priority for fostering Roma inclusion in education was reform of education systems. Across the region, there is an urgent need to increase the attention paid to equity and multiculturalism. Reform of education should have three components:

an adequate legislative framework;
adequate information and understanding by the public of what could be covered by these policies and why they are needed;
an adequate institutional set-up to implement the policies.

So, in principle, to be able to reduce the education gap between Roma and non-Roma in an effective and meaningful way, the foundation needed to move on these three fronts. How is it to do this?

Influencing the legislative framework
This will require a good analysis of what needs to be changed, public support for these changes and laws to enshrine them. It is optimistic to assume that a small foundation can be effective on all of these fronts. What it can, do, however, is play a part in ensuring that the required analyses are done by the most influential partners. In the case of REF, this means the Council of Europe, the European Union, the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development and the World Bank.

It is important to lobby these organizations to ensure adequate analysis, to provide incentives for local research institutions to carry out the right analysis, and to create incentives for academics to get interested in the topic. The foundation should provide ammunition in the form, for instance, of policy notes for political parties or lobby groups. REF is now financing projects whose aim is to influence public opinion and political parties.

Creating support for the reforms
Creating political, and therefore public, support for the reforms is much more difficult. What needs to be done will vary considerably from country to country, but in every case it will require strong alliances with organizations that can influence public values and attitudes. For REF, the EU comes first, but large private firms (potential investors) also count, as well as international and local media.

To be effective in this area, a foundation needs to understand public opinion well, and to know how stereotypes work and how values are being formed. Again, there are very important country differences in attitudes to Roma, but some basic stereotypes seem universal – in particular, that Roma do not want their children to be educated and that projects supporting Roma education are expensive and do not work well – and they need to be changed urgently for any process of reform.

Supporting institutional change to implement reforms
Supporting institutional change to implement reforms is another major challenge, and perhaps the most difficult. Institutional change means that people have to question the way they work and interact with others. This involves changes in power structures and cultural adaptation, and it touches upon some very deep issues of identity and purpose. These things can only be done over time.

Here, grant-giving with the right criteria can play an important role. Proposals need to be assessed according to what they can do to encourage institutional change, how they change incentives, how they contribute to modifying power relations, etc. They therefore need to involve local and national governments, but in such a way that the resultant programmes will not be captured by old ways of doing things or by the existing power structure.

Implications for the grant-giving strategy

All this means that REF needs to be directly involved in implementing some programmes, especially in the areas of policy analysis, communication, learning and advocacy. The Fund has two entire programmes that are not demand-driven or based on grants: a policy development and technical assistance programme and a communication and advocacy programme.

When it comes to achieving change in public opinion and institutions, REF uses grants, but its criteria are country-specific, and it gives strong weight to the potential policy and institutional impact of the grants. REF uses a demand-driven mechanism, but combines this with calls for proposals when there are clear gaps in the demand.

Flexibility in adapting its approaches is very important. This requires close involvement of the board in adopting new programmes, modifying approved programmes, or discussing new directions in a country. Last year, for example, the board approved a programme of reimbursable grants to help Roma NGOs access and use structural funds in the middle of the year, and it reallocated funds for this purpose very rapidly.

The presence of REF staff in the field, where programmes and policy changes are being implemented, is also an essential part of the REF approach. It helps to maintain a good dialogue with the grant recipient, governments, and key local governments, as well as the media and other institutions – all channels of communication that must be kept open to complement the analytical work. Again, the board plays a key role and its composition is important: the contribution of the World Bank, OSI, the Network of European Foundations, Roma civil society, the Swiss Government and other governments to defining REF’s approach is one of the organization’s great assets.

Alexandre Marc is the Executive Director of the Roma Education Fund. Email amarc@romaeducationfund.org
Costel Bercus is the chairman of the board of REF. Email costel@romanicriss.org

For more information
www.romaeducationfund.hu

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