Philanthropy is not traditionally a sector for the young. 

When one imagines a philanthropist, the names of old, white families carved in marble come to mind: McConnell, Ryerson, Rockefeller, Carnegie. These families often spent vast sums of money building hospital wings, universities, and other grand public structures that would stand the test of time. Getting involved in the sector required a great deal of personal, often generational wealth that has been systematically denied to racialized groups. 

For many people of colour, accumulating this sort of capital and deploying it in pursuit of social or economic change has been far from easy. But that old reality is changing. 

Initiatives such as the Toronto Foundation’s Vision Next and the Association of Fundraising Professionals Foundation for Philanthropy – Canada are cultivating a new generation of philanthropists that better represents Canada’s multiracial population. A new generation of philanthropists is emerging, one that may not be so tied to traditional philanthropic practices. 

A report by the London-based Charities Aid Foundation found that many young philanthropists want to be more open about their giving and see income inequality as one of the key issues of our time. They often learn about philanthropy through their own networks rather than their peers and see giving to communities in greatest need as more important than making an impact. 

Future of Good spoke to five young philanthropists about their endeavours and where they see the sector going:

Abhishek Sarathy, 32, Toronto

Having grown up in the Middle East, volunteering helped Abhishek Sarathy feel more at home when he arrived in Canada as a 10-year-old boy. The South Asian cultural festivals at Toronto’s Harbourfront Centre became an entry point to not only giving back to his community, but exploring its intricacies and inequities. “It just helped me integrate and feel more comfortable in my surroundings,” he says. “I felt more confident in myself and really moved away from being a shy and introverted kid to really starting to understand the issues that existed in my environment — as much as I was grateful for my new environment.” 

Now in his 30s, Sarathy is doing something he never expected as an immigrant: starting his own family foundation. He is currently enrolled in the Toronto Foundation’s Vision Next program, an education initiative that walks 100 aspiring philanthropists through the process of starting their own foundations or getting involved in a social impact investment fund. Sarathy’s foundation is still a work in progress, but he says he has a soft spot for organizations working on newcomer settlement, housing affordability, and poverty reduction.

After volunteering on the donor engagement committee of a large non-profit, Sarathy says millennial donors are keen to see the results of their impact more directly — they want to see that their generosity benefits an organization and be more than what Sarathy calls a “dollar donor”. Not everyone can necessarily open their wallets and give to a cause, but Sarathy believes younger donors are fairly willing to give other non-material forms of support. “Can I donate other things? Can I share my network? Can I amplify people’s voices or organizations? Can I give my time?” Sarathy says. To millennials who offer this sort of generosity, the effects can be seen immediately. He says looking at philanthropy beyond just giving money is going to make major changes. 

Sarathy is doing something he never expected as an immigrant: starting his own family foundation.

So, too, will challenging notions of how philanthropy is done in North America. Sarathy describes North American philanthropy as “built on stolen lands on the backs of stolen people.” This origin brings with it a set of power dynamics that today’s philanthropists should seek to challenge. “There’s going to be power dynamics in every conversation we have, in everything we do in our lives,” he says. “But if we can really call it out as donors and as philanthropists, with organizations that are actually making an impact, then it means we’ll be able to co-design and co-create what the future will look like.”  

Diani Blanco, 27, Moncton

Diani Blanco co-founded Queens of Heart in May to support single mothers struggling to buy food or other essentials during the pandemic. Since then, nearly 800 members have joined the Facebook group to pledge or receive assistance. But Blanco doesn’t consider herself a philanthropist or an entrepreneur. “I just see myself as a human being,” she says. “It’s weird to say it like that. I just feel like it’s just who I am.” 

Blanco decided to try and replicate the culture of more direct giving she saw growing up in the Dominican Republic and the support she received in her current home of Moncton, New Brunswick. Last year, a fire destroyed her apartment in Saint-Antoine. “We lost everything,” she says. But strangers and friends of hers helped get her family back on their feet. She’s doing what she can to return the favour. 

Blanco decided to try and replicate the culture of more direct giving she saw growing up in the Dominican Republic.

As a single mother and night shift youth worker, she knows how tough it can be for single parents struggling to work and take care of their children, especially during the pandemic. In one recent case, a pregnant mother with a six-year old daughter was facing eviction just before she was due to give birth. She owed her landlord $1,000. Blanco says there simply aren’t resources available for these situations. So, she reached out to Queens of Heart and asked for help. “In three hours, we got all the money that we needed,” she says. 

She says philanthropic organizations should be a lot more responsive in the future. Offering urgent support in a matter of days or weeks simply isn’t good enough. “When it’s an emergency, it’s an emergency,” she says.

Heela Omarkhail, 33, Toronto

When Omarkhail’s parents first arrived in North York from Afghanistan 30 years ago, they depended heavily on after-school programs and friendly neighbours to care for their family as they worked. Today, she is vice president of social impact for The Daniels Corporation, a real estate developer known for its partnership with Toronto’s affordable housing program. “The approach that Daniels was taking beyond the bricks and mortar…to create a healthy social infrastructure and community impact really resonated with me,” she says — the very social infrastructure she depended on as a child. 

Her ideas around personal philanthropy were forged from her career. Making donations and writing checks can be incredibly important, Omarkhail says, but so is what she refers to as engagement philanthropy. “How do I leverage my networks and my time to create change?” she says. Providing referrals and opportunities for people is as important to her as offering money. 

Omarkhail’s own personal donor-advised fund at the Toronto Foundation is intended to help youth, women, and immigrants — helping them receive the same benefits she enjoyed. She’s also looking more and more at gender equality.On this year’s Giving Tuesday, she gave to Girls20, a Toronto non-profit that works to prepare young women for positions of leadership. 

For Omarkhail, the future of philanthropy includes a deeper connection between philanthropists and communities in need of their capital. She’s already thinking about how to make this happen within her own personal philanthropy. “One of the things I eventually want to do…is actually have a committee that’s making those decisions — a committee of women and immigrants, or individuals that identify with those backgrounds — actually directing those dollars that come into my fund,” she says. 

In this situation, she would want to remain on the board as a fundraiser, but leave the question of allocating capital to those in need. “I can only know so much about a community,” she says. “People who live in a community are the ones that have the strongest understanding of what that community needs for them to direct funding to those opportunities.” 

Kyle Kanovsky, 34, Calgary

While in high school, Kanovsky visited Mexico as part of a turtle conservation mission, one of his earliest international endeavours. Staying with local families, learning about turtle poaching and the reptile’s importance to the local diet, and providing a bursary to a local school primed him for philanthropy later in life. “That was kind of foundational,” he says of the experience. 

Since then, Kanovsky has worked with Shaw’s corporate social responsibility team, begun consulting in Calgary, and gotten more involved with his family’s foundation. It grants roughly a half-million dollars a year to a variety of initiatives, focusing mainly on youth development, youth mental health, and financial literacy. He also began working with early-stage companies such as Goodpin, a Calgary-based social enterprise he believes offers a blueprint for the future of philanthropy. “I really like the business side of things, but I think a lot of the best practices you learn in business can be applied to the philanthropic space,” he says. 

Goodpin’s platform allows companies to offer their customers the ability to direct donations to a charity of their choice. For instance, a pub could offer a $10 coupon for lunch and a beer with a $10 donation to the United Way. Or perhaps a 20 percent off coupon at a local retailer. A company using Goodpin can both get involved in corporate social responsibility while also allowing their customers to choose the direction this work takes. The same sorts of platforms could also be used to collect donations — maybe as small as $20 — in large community funds controlled by people in need. “They can allocate it. They can become the champions of money in their community,” he says. 

Kanovsky believes that philanthropy’s future lies in embracing digital platforms that not only hand over control of philanthropic giving to consumers and communities, but also allow those organizations to quantify their effect. “I think philanthropic organizations are always focused on impact in one way or another,” he says. “I don’t know that that really changes. What changes is the way that they pursue that impact and how they measure it and how they engage with donors and potential donors.”

Vanessa Evans, 27, New York City

Vanessa Evans wants to do more than just write checks. The 27-year-old co-director and treasurer of the Red Butterfly Foundation — a family-run philanthropic organization that gives about $1 million U.S. a year in support of animal conservation, feminist causes, and the arts — thinks a lot about how to become more useful to the various grantees her foundation serves. “Do I go back to school and really educate myself so I can be more knowledgeable in that space?” she asks. “I don’t know.”

She also thinks a lot about the direction philanthropy is going in. Her generation of philanthropists and donors is less married to specific organizations, and prefers to support causes more broadly. “I think that was made very obvious with the Black Lives Matter movement this past summer. I think we’re very loyal to those causes.” But young donors and philanthropists love the feeling that their contributions instantly benefit a cause. This can be an issue, but Evans believes philanthropic organizations should be ready to appeal to younger generations as both aspiring philanthropists and potential donors. “I think there’s a lot of learning for us as philanthropists, but I also think organizations need to keep up with what we’re expecting from them,” Evans says. 

Her generation of philanthropists and donors is less married to specific organizations, and prefers to support causes more broadly.

As much as Evans is hopeful about the future of philanthropy, the behaviour of some young wealthy people frustrates her. Evans describes them as only being concerned about the designer shoes they’re wearing or the clubs they’ve recently visited, rather than giving their money to important causes. “I know that they don’t have any interest in philanthropy — though they’ll share things about George Floyd on their Instagram page,” she says. Evans doesn’t believe there’s as much interest from wealthy people in learning about these causes, but organizations who focus on storytelling might be able to convince them to not only care about important causes, but donate to them.

Evans believes organizations looking for funds are turning their attention to older, more traditional foundations run by older philanthropists rather than younger players. But that will change. “Eventually our generation is going to be the generation of big foundations, big companies, big wealth. At some point, I think it’s important to acknowledge that rather than focusing on people who are going to die,” she says. 

Tell us this made you smarter | Contact us | Report error