Patricia Hswe
Program Director
Mellon Foundation
Brett Bobley
Advisor, Humanities and AI Virtual Institute
Schmidt Sciences
Maria Sachiko Cecire
Program Officer
Mellon Foundation
Josh Greenberg
Program Director
Sloan Foundation
Christopher Thornton
Chief Programs Officer
American Council of Learned Societies
Public philanthropies such as the National Endowment for the Arts, the National Endowment for the Humanities, the Institute of Museum and Library Services, and the National Science Foundation experienced cataclysmic shifts in 2025, as staff were downsized, grants were rescinded (and then, in some cases, reinstated), agency goals were reconfigured, and—despite the intentionally closer alignment with federal government priorities—the funding of these agencies continued to be threatened. Although some private philanthropies may be helping to fill the gap that these shifts have wrought, they themselves have not been immune to the pressures encountered by their federal counterparts; risk assessment and mitigation, for example, are playing a larger role than previously. Unlike the tenor of past funder panels at CNI, in which funding possibilities were typically broadcast for possible interest among attendees, this session will be more exploratory in nature, though no less informational for the audience. The panelists will focus on prompts like the following: In this current funding climate, what issues have the philanthropies represented in the panel been addressing—why and how? How have funding strategies changed (or not)? What are the gathered funders currently supporting and why? What is top of mind among the gathered funders about future grantmaking—if not also the future of grantmaking—in their organizations?
The Mellon Foundation: https://www.mellon.org/
Schmidt Sciences Humanities and AI Virtual Institute: https://www.schmidtsciences.org/humanities-and-ai-virtual-institute/
