Grantmaker Site Visits

Before making grant decisions, some foundations may schedule site visits to develop a better understanding of the organizations that submitted the proposal. To help foundations with few or no staff on planning and conducting site visits, the Association of Small Foundations (ASF) has released a brief guide on the topic, With Your Own Eyes: Using Site Visits to Make Better Grants and Fulfill Your Mission. Written by Elaine Gast and Andy Carroll, the paper will help foundations:

-Understand the different purposes of site visits
-Develop a strategy (Who will make the visit? Which organizations should be visited?)
-Get ready for the site visit (What will be on the agenda?)
-Analyze the information collected.

Turn to the appendices for a sample site visit checklist that can help with recording data.

For more information about other papers from the Primer Series, visit the Association of Small Foundations web site.