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Visiting Scholar, Center on Wealth and Philanthropy Boston College 508 McGuinn Hall Chestnut Hill, MA 02467 (617) 552-4070 email: louise.sawyer.1@bc.edu |
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Louise Sawyer is a Visiting Scholar at the Center on Wealth and Philanthropy. Louise received her J.D. from Boston College Law School. She earned a Nonprofit Management Executive Certificate from Georgetown University’s Public Policy Institute, and a BA in English and secondary education from Simmons College. Louise is a consultant to Learning by Giving a program of the Sunshine Lady Foundation founded by Doris Buffet. The Learning by Giving program promotes and supports the study of philanthropy and the nonprofit sector at the undergraduate level by providing students the responsibility of exercising philanthropic leadership by soliciting and evaluating grants and distributing $10,000 to local nonprofits. The Sunshine Lady Foundation funds undergraduate philanthropy courses at eight colleges nation wide. Louise assists the Foundation with the management, assessment and growth of the Learning by Giving program. Since January of 2007 Louise has been a Visiting Lecturer at Tufts University. Louise designed and teaches an undergraduate course in philanthropy at Tufts Experimental College. The innovative and highly successful course examines the role of philanthropy and the nonprofit sector and provides undergraduates the unique experience of managing the philanthropic process of awarding $10,000 in grants to non-profits in Somerville, Medford and Boston. Funding for the grants is provided by the Learning by Giving program of the Sunshine Lady Foundation. Louise has worked in the nonprofit sector for the past 15 years after practicing law in a corporate firm in Boston. Her work in the nonprofit sector includes working in the General Counsel’s Office at Boston University. She was also the president of the Winchester Foundation for Educational Excellence where she expanded the grants programs and managed all aspects of the foundation including board development, fund development, marketing, and financial oversight. As the Director of Grants and Programs at Crossroads Community Foundation Louise designed and implemented a philanthropy curriculum for independent and public secondary schools which continues to successfully promote a philanthropic attitude in youth. She currently serves as a consultant to family and public foundations interested in promoting youth philanthropy. Louise is conducting research on the growing trend of undergraduate philanthropy education that includes giving students grant making responsibility. She is interested in identifying best practices in the field with respect to both academic content and effective teaching methods. Of particular interest is the challenge of integrating the study of philanthropy with the practical element of grant making. The organizing question for her research is what impact this innovative approach to philanthropic education has on student philanthropic attitudes and actions, and how it might impact their future philanthropic and career decisions. Her theory is that an experiential approach to philanthropic education creates better informed and inspired young philanthropists. Preliminary anecdotal evidence indicates a positive response to this question.
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