501(c)(3) non profit grantmaker

Arts and education grantmakers at an historic gathering in Santa Fe in October of 2007 agreed on the need to forge a new vision for public education in the United States and to collectively explore how the arts can help shape and realize that vision.

Convened by Grantmakers in the Arts and Grantmakers for Education, more than 100 foundation representatives met formally for the first time under the aegis of their two affinity organizations to debate and discuss the role of the arts in education.

There are few moments in life when you get to experience a series of "firsts." That thought occurred to me in the Albuquerque airport as a first-time visitor to New Mexico, as well as a first-time attendee to both the GFE and GIA conferences.

When funders move into indigenous communities they tread a very fine line. On one side of the line they have a duty to undertake sufficient investigation to ensure that they properly understand a funding request and their own role in relation to it. On the other side, obtaining the information may conflict with the ability to acknowledge and give appropriate respect to the applicant's indigenous culture and its bounds.

My first horse was like New Mexico.

On summer grass under an arch of the cottonwoods, no creature could have been more beautiful, at least to my eye. He was a big rangy bay with a white blaze, and he animated the afternoons just by lazing into view. He was an ordinary country gelding, but his long-limbed grace and equine pride conjured a kind of magic. At a hundred yards, when he lifted his head, I could feel his kingly disdain. He was all horse, not an ounce of Flicka, and he could fly over the hills. Not to coin a phrase, but I was enchanted.

2006, 254 pages. Indiana University Press, 601 North Morton Street, Bloomington, IN 47404, iupress.indiana.edu

2007, 304 pages. Southern Illinois University Press, 1915 University Press Drive, SIUC Mail Code 6806, Carbondale, IL 62901, 618-453-2281, www.siuc.edu

2006, 30 pages. Grantmakers Concerned with Immigrants and Refugees, P.O. Box 1100, Sebastopol, CA, 95473, 707-824-4374, www.gcir.org

2007, 102 pages. RAND Corporation, 1776 Main Street, P.O. Box 2138, Santa Monica, CA 90407, 310-451-7002, www.rand.org