User:Vipul/Mulago Foundation

The Mulago Foundation is a private foundation focused on high impact philanthropy: investing in charities and philanthropic opportunities that have the highest impact. The foundation was originally envisioned by Rainer Arnold, a San Francisco pediatrician and philanthropist, who taught at Mulago Hospital, Kenya. The foundation was officiall created after Rainer Arnold's death in 1993 by his brother Henry Arnold.

Criteria for funding organizations
The Foundation's stated goal is to identify and invest in the highest impact giving opportunities. On their "How we fund" page, they write that they are looking for three things: a priority problem, a scalable solution, and an organization that can deliver. Once they identify an organization they wish to fund, they provide unrestricted and continued funding. Unlike most foundations, the Mulago Foundation does not accept or solicit proposals, but rather, the foundation itself tries to locate organizations to give to.

Organizations funded by Mulago
As of August 2012, the Mulago Foundation website lists about 30 organizations funded by the foundation. These include the Abdul Latif Jameel Poverty Action Lab and Innovations for Poverty Action, which are two of the foremost organizations that use randomized controlled trials and other methods to evaluate the effectiveness of poverty alleviation programs and other program aimed at helping poor people. Also on the list are VillageReach (which charity evaluator GiveWell listed as its top rated charity from 2009 to November 2011) and The MicroDreams Foundation.

Reception
Charity evaluator GiveWell described the Mulago Foundation as an "impact-focused" grantmaker (alongside the Gates Foundation, Skoll Foundation, Children's Investment Fund Foundation, Jasmine Social Investments, and Peery Foundation). GiveWell stated in 2011 it would consider the list of Mulago Foundation grantees as part of its list of charities to review to see if they qualified for GiveWell's highest ratings.

The Mulago Foundation was also mentioned on the Tactical Philanthropy blog, and Kevin Starr of Mulago wrote a guest post for the blog.

Kevin Starr of Mulago wrote an article for the Stanford Social Innovation Review describing Mulago's definition of impact and some of the subtleties associated with the concept. His piece was referenced on the Acumen Fund blog.

Similar resources

 * Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation
 * Skoll Foundation
 * GiveWell