Don Michelsen

Don Michelsen was a founding board member of the Community Foundation of the New River Valley.  He was a Chemistry professor at Virginia Tech, member of Blacksburg Presbyterian Church, and advocate for community, the environment, the poor and disadvantaged.  Three yeears before he died, he wrote a letter to the foundation board and asked, "Where is the community in the Community Foundation?"  Don was a trustee whose thinking knew no borders.

Grand Canyon: from rim to river

Hawks in the garden

A family of hawks lived for several weeks this Spring in the pines at the bottom of our yard.  Their reedy voices replaced those of other birds who seemed to stay away, wary of the hawks perhaps. Several weeks ago, they left.  Here one day.  Gone the next.

Transatlantic Community Foundation Peer Exchange in Prague

To advance a culture of philanthropy and legacy giving, community foundation staff and trustees from Russia, Mexico, the Czech Repbublic, Germany, Slovakia, Canada, Scotland, Ireland, UK, and the US convened in Prague.  

Left to right: Peter Walkenhorst, Bertelsmann Stiftung, Gutersloh, Germany;  Sandy Richardson,  the Victoria Foundation, Victoria, Canada; Mary Jalonick, the Dallas Foundation, Dallas, Texas USA; Vadim Samorodov, Wings Global Fund for Community Foundations, Russia.

Sponsors Bertelsmann Stiftung and the Charles Stuart Mott Foundation have enabled transatlantic community foundation leaders to form and cultivate relationships of trust and confidence that span boundaries of place, nation and culture.  

The gatherings, exchanges, and interchange have been substantial experiences that have come to define a body of practice for international community building.  Bertelsmann and Mott further demonstrate a willingness on the part of grant makers to commit to and support long-term participation action research.  The lessons learned flow to local informed action and contribute to interconnections of the broadest sort that cross traditional borders and encourage mutuality and shared aspiration for communities that serve all who live in them.