2021 annual report

Dear Friends,

Our annual report this year is centered on Resume (ReZoom). We set out in January of 2021 to return to our pre-pandemic way of life only to be thrust back into long days of Zooming with colleagues and navigating virtual conference agendas, all the while longing to exchange ideas and information in person. Instead, the clever COVID-19 virus reinvented itself in the guise of the Delta and Omicron variants. Health protocols and masks continued to infringe on our daily routines, but also, coupled with vaccines, saved lives, and prevented serious illness for many.

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Dear Friends,

Our annual report this year is centered on Resume (ReZoom). We set out in January of 2021 to return to our pre-pandemic way of life only to be thrust back into long days of Zooming with colleagues and navigating virtual conference agendas, all the while longing to exchange ideas and information in person. Instead, the clever COVID-19 virus reinvented itself in the guise of the Delta and Omicron variants. Health protocols and masks continued to infringe on our daily routines, but also, coupled with vaccines, saved lives, and prevented serious illness for many. We will always be grateful for the ability to work safely, save time, and carefully steward resources through virtual meeting tools, but we will in the future be happy to balance efficiency with collegiality generated by the joys of being together.

Despite the many challenges of this last year, I am proud to say that our team thrived, scaling new heights through creativity, innovative spirit, and grit. I extend my personal thanks to the entire team for their ability to resume—and then reimagine, reconnect, and rejuvenate staying focused on our mission, goals, and networks. This report will dive more deeply into each of these themes as we share how our year shaped up.

Aligned with these timely 2021 themes of reimagining, reconnecting, and rejuvenating, I made my own life-changing decision to transition away from the Foundation in 2022. It has been a privilege to serve the vision of Burt Morgan, connecting entrepreneurial energy with philanthropic strategy. My most fervent wish is that Burt would be pleased with Morgan Foundation’s achievements as a pioneer, thought leader, and driver in entrepreneurship education, ecosystem building, and venture creation and growth. I am deeply grateful for the career recognition I received in December 2021 through the Philanthropist of the Year Pillar Award sponsored by Smart Business and Medical Mutual!

Having spent considerable time learning from Burt during his later years and even after his passing, I have continued to absorb lessons emanating from his entrepreneurial spirit. I will be building my own consulting practice and working to advance entrepreneurial support programs, ecosystem building efforts, and lively connections between entrepreneurship and philanthropy in Northeast Ohio and nationally. I am deeply grateful to all my colleagues near and far who have inspired me throughout my time at Morgan Foundation, and I look forward to working with you in new ways as I reimagine my place as an influencer in the social sector promoting the power and potential of the entrepreneurial mindset.

With gratitude,

Deborah D. Hoover
President and CEO

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reimagine

REIMAGINE

Imagination is the engine that powered our team to conceive new ways of approaching entrepreneurship grantmaking and ecosystem building during this last year. Burton D. Morgan Foundation and Young Entrepreneur Institute partnered to create YIPPEE, the Go-To Marketplace for all things in entrepreneurship education designed to help K-12 students build entrepreneurial skills for the real world. Through this first-of-its-kind digital marketplace, educators search for resources, receive free products, and share reviews; funders sponsor programs and resources in categories that align with their mission; and education providers offer quality products enhanced through audience feedback.

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REIMAGINE

Imagination is the engine that powered our team to conceive new ways of approaching entrepreneurship grantmaking and ecosystem building during this last year.

Burton D. Morgan Foundation and Young Entrepreneur Institute partnered to create YIPPEE, the Go-To Marketplace for all things in entrepreneurship education designed to help K-12 students build entrepreneurial skills for the real world. Through this first-of-its-kind digital marketplace, educators search for resources, receive free products, and share reviews; funders sponsor programs and resources in categories that align with their mission; and education providers offer quality products enhanced through audience feedback. YIPPEE is being created with technology developed by WonderKiln, an Akron-based technology developer. The YIPPEE platform (Youth. Ideas. Products. Points. Entrepreneurs. Exchange.) connects educators to a host of free entrepreneurship education resources and to one another. YIPPEE will dramatically transform how youth entrepreneurship education is sourced and delivered.

College students with side hustles, lifestyle businesses, main street businesses, and freelance opportunities often need funding to jumpstart their inventory, acquire a website, or set up a company. Through a two-school pilot at Baldwin Wallace University and Kent State University in 2021, the Foundation witnessed entrepreneurship programs expand their reach with the addition of the microgrants tool. The pilot offered microgrants of up to $500 and served 24 student businesses. The Foundation subsequently funded an expanded experiment for 15 institutions with funding to test a microgrants program that aligns with campus culture and student needs. Each institution created a distribution process and provided details on the supplemental supports that students will receive including access to mentors, co-working spaces, workshops, and staff support on their individual campuses. In partnership with our grantees, we focused on critical gaps and reimagined how we can support students embarking on their entrepreneurial journeys.

In recent years, the Foundation has taken steps to assess the youth, collegiate, and adult ecosystems to better understand strengths and opportunities. Phase 1 of a comprehensive collegiate assessment process took place in 2020 and collected feedback from 140 stakeholders. The responses highlighted the importance of addressing regional needs and creating greater collegiate ecosystem cohesion. Phase 2 of the collegiate assessment conducted in 2021 centered on exploring the creation of a collegiate entrepreneurship hub with the capacity to execute a more cohesive ecosystem strategy and promote navigable pathways amongst the youth, collegiate, and adult ecosystems. Ultimately, stakeholders opted to expand the role of Entrepreneurship Education Consortium (EEC). This well-respected organization already provides programming to 11 NEO institutions and recently invited other campuses to participate. The Foundation has invested over $1 million in EEC since 2007. Benefits of evolving EEC into a collegiate hub include fostering student access to essential entrepreneurship services and experiences; addressing widespread needs with broad regional solutions; consolidating programs; unifying around common goals and messaging; and connecting with greater intention and purpose to the business community (and other ecosystem stakeholders) to create opportunities for students. EEC will be reimagined to vigorously support the dreams of all Northeast Ohio higher education students who aspire to build entrepreneurial muscle and skills for the future.

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reconnect

RECONNECT

Connection is the glue that keeps our ecosystem charging forward, renewing bonds, and regrouping energetically as circumstances shift. We often jest how Burt Morgan’s renowned career in the adhesives industry (sticky trade as he called it) influenced the Foundation’s dedication to serving as a connector and ecosystem builder. In 2021, it was critically important for the Foundation to find creative ways to connect and reconnect with our ecosystem partners following a year of pandemic disruptions.

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RECONNECT

Connection is the glue that keeps our ecosystem charging forward, renewing bonds, and regrouping energetically as circumstances shift. We often jest how Burt Morgan’s renowned career in the adhesives industry (sticky trade as he called it) influenced the Foundation’s dedication to serving as a connector and ecosystem builder. In 2021, it was critically important for the Foundation to find creative ways to connect and reconnect with our ecosystem partners following a year of pandemic disruptions.

Morgan Foundation served as a Co-Chair for the 2021 all-virtual Deshpande Symposium in June. Cofounded by the Deshpande Foundation and the University of Massachusetts-Lowell in 2012, Deshpande Symposium on Innovation and Entrepreneurship in Higher Education is a gathering of practitioners with a focus on accelerating innovation and entrepreneurship across the university and college environment. The Symposium provides a community for participants to learn from each other’s experiences; to gain wider exposure for their ideas, successes and startups; and to collaborate on activities that increase innovation and entrepreneurship in their communities and nationally. In 2022, the Symposium will be live in Cleveland in mid-June and will seek to showcase Northeast Ohio’s active ecosystem while promoting connectivity among campuses nationally.

Ecosystem building has become an important strategy among entrepreneurship funders and is representative of innovative approaches foundations are employing to drive change. Since 2017, Morgan Foundation has been deeply engaged with Entrepreneurship Funders Network (EFN), a growing national community of funding organizations focused on entrepreneurship, including family, community, institutional, and corporate foundations; philanthropic individuals; government agencies; and other non-traditional funders. EFN’s mission is “to galvanize philanthropic funders to inspire entrepreneurship, support entrepreneurs, and strengthen entrepreneurial ecosystems. By informing, connecting, and catalyzing action, EFN increases its members’ knowledge, networks, and efficacy; bolsters entrepreneurship; and contributes to shared prosperity.” Members have diverse philanthropic approaches and collectively work at local, state, regional, and national levels in the United States. We have been active participants in EFN’s learning communities sharing lessons learned about the art and science of entrepreneurship funding, grounded in Burt Morgan’s pioneering role supporting entrepreneurship spaces and activities.

Philanthropy is uniquely positioned to serve as ecosystem builder, drawing together people, organizations, and ideas to support entrepreneurs and their ventures. In 2021, Morgan Foundation led a presentation for our Philanthropy Ohio colleagues focused on Philanthropy as Ecosystem Builder designed to share the story of Akron’s evolving entrepreneurial ecosystem as an example of the many ways philanthropy can serve as a systems thinker working in complex environments with a multitude of players. Community leaders shared the story of how they as collaborative ecosystem partners, solidified a plan to bring MORTAR programming to Akron, to “create diverse communities by enabling historically marginalized entrepreneurs to access the resources needed to start and run successful businesses.” The story of this collaboration provides a great example of how philanthropy can deploy specific tools and resources to effectively step into an ecosystem building role, enhancing community capacity to serve entrepreneurs from diverse backgrounds. Morgan Foundation takes pride in its role of fostering strategic connectivity across our teeming regional ecosystem!

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rejuvenate

REJUVENATE

Over the last two years, our team recognized the need to take care of mind, body, and soul to do our best for each other, our grantees, our partners, and the ecosystem. We streamlined our processes, provided community grants to area nonprofits serving basic needs, and adapted programs and objectives to fit shifting priorities. With friends and colleagues, we practiced self care, enjoyed the outdoors, and sought balance in our work and personal lives. Our programs and activities incorporated opportunities to celebrate, reflect, and rejuvenate individually and as a group to better position ourselves and our teams for generating new ideas and navigating challenges.

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REJUVENATE

Over the last two years, our team recognized the need to take care of mind, body, and soul to do our best for each other, our grantees, our partners, and the ecosystem. We streamlined our processes, provided community grants to area nonprofits serving basic needs, and adapted programs and objectives to fit shifting priorities. With friends and colleagues, we practiced self care, enjoyed the outdoors, and sought balance in our work and personal lives. Our programs and activities incorporated opportunities to celebrate, reflect, and rejuvenate individually and as a group to better position ourselves and our teams for generating new ideas and navigating challenges.

Our Scalerator NEO program successfully adapted to virtual programming and adjusted to include content that helped participating companies weather pandemic pitfalls, pivot as needed, and continue to grow. Scalerator NEO is a six-month, cohort-based educational program for entrepreneurs and leaders who want to grow their companies and are eager to learn new ways to achieve this goal. Scalerator NEO is made possible through joint funding from Morgan Foundation and the Fasenmyer Fund. The program touts impressive results, with 75% of participating companies increasing their growth by 25% or more following completion of the program. Founder of the Scalerator program, Daniel Isenberg from Babson College, and his team of experienced professionals, have fostered the growth of more than 400 companies worldwide including more than 70 Northeast Ohio companies. The region’s 2021 Scalerator cohort developed close bonds as they supported the well-being and growth plans of their colleagues and company teams.

In early November 2021, our partner Young Entrepreneur Institute virtually delivered Enspire, a rejuvenating professional development conference for educators, program directors, and funders with a focus on building the entrepreneurial mindset in K-12 students. Woven into the array of speakers, panel discussions, and workshop sessions were opportunities to practice meditation and mindfulness emphasizing the importance of being present and engaging in shared learning opportunities. Morgan Foundation paid tribute to all teachers working on the front lines of education maintaining the integrity of the learning process in a time of monumental challenges. We hope Enspire provided a chance for these hard-working educators to recharge and embrace the benefits of the entrepreneurial mindset for themselves and their students.

Early in 2021, our Foundation team took a fresh look at our knowledge sharing efforts and launched a program to invite guest blogs to showcase the goals and unique perspectives of our grantees. This effort has proven to be a great success featuring stories about EntrepreNEW career technical education program, Collegiate Microgrants, the National Association of Community College Entrepreneurship, and other thought-provoking reflections. We are grateful to our grantees for sharing their stories and expertise with our readers especially as we moved through the harsh days of the pandemic. Celebrating the successes and creativity of our ecosystem partners is important to the Foundation as inspiration to others about the power of inclusiveness, unwavering resolve, and alignment around shared goals.

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With Appreciation Deborah D. Hoover
President & CEO 2007-2022

Bidding a Fond Farewell to Deborah Hoover

One could legitimately argue that aside from our founder, Burt Morgan, no one has had a greater impact on the entrepreneurship mission of Burton D. Morgan Foundation than current President and CEO Deborah Hoover. Deb’s degrees, accomplishments, and accolades are abundant, as detailed in her bio. But the mark she is leaving on the Foundation is so much greater than the sum of her achievements.

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Bidding a Fond Farewell to Deborah Hoover

One could legitimately argue that aside from our founder, Burt Morgan, no one has had a greater impact on the entrepreneurship mission of Burton D. Morgan Foundation than current President and CEO Deborah Hoover. Deb’s degrees, accomplishments, and accolades are abundant, as detailed in her bio. But the mark she is leaving on the Foundation is so much greater than the sum of her achievements.

Deb began her current role with the Foundation in 2007, after serving as Secretary-Treasurer and then Executive Vice President for the organization since 2003. Under her leadership, Morgan Foundation experienced tremendous growth, with its name quickly becoming synonymous with entrepreneurship support. In 2007, Deb was the driving force behind a partnership with Kauffman Foundation on the groundbreaking NEOCEP (Northeast Ohio Collegiate Entrepreneurship Program) initiative, a five-year, $6.6 million effort to create a culture of entrepreneurship at five liberal arts college campuses in the region. She was instrumental in establishing the Burton D. Morgan Center for Entrepreneurship Research at Hudson Library & Historical Society in 2009, and bringing the renowned youth entrepreneurship program, Lemonade Day, to Northeast Ohio in 2011.

While the purpose of this tribute is not to cite a laundry list of her accomplishments, it is important to note that these major milestones occurred in the first five years of Deb’s tenure with the Foundation. And she never slowed down. Deb has been a force at Morgan Foundation, in Northeast Ohio, and in the national entrepreneurship funding space. She generously shares her vision, tirelessly collaborates with likeminded partners, and inspires colleagues near and far with her keen mind and her superior strategic abilities. Deb is passionate about learning and the work of the Foundation; nothing energizes her more than a brainstorming session with her colleagues.

More recently, Deb spearheaded the establishment of Scalerator in Northeast Ohio, a program to spur growth in mid-size companies. Under her steady leadership, the Enspire educator conference was developed and has thrived, and Young Entrepreneur Institute’s position as the region’s hub for youth entrepreneurship was solidified. In total, Deb has overseen the distribution of nearly $75 million in grants, spurring exponential growth in the entrepreneurial ecosystem, all while leading and serving on numerous boards and regularly sharing her knowledge and insights in columns for publications such as Smart Business.

Deb is indeed human like the rest of us, but even in the face of frustration or adversity, her character shines through. She listens to understand, and she is unfailingly kind and tactful. We at the Foundation consider her a stellar colleague, mentor, and friend. Deb will leave the Foundation mid-year to begin a new venture. We are grateful for her leadership and wish her well!

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GRANTS & FINANCIALS

Youth
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Collegiate
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Adult
View Grants

Hudson
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GRANTS AWARDED

$6,720,335

In order to achieve our mission of championing the entrepreneurial spirit, Burton D. Morgan Foundation draws upon the endowment resources placed under the careful stewardship of our Board of Trustees.

VIEW FULL FINANCIAL INFO (PDF)

Trustees

Brown Keith A. Brown Trustee
Finley Patrick T. Finley Trustee
Hochschwender J. Michael Hochschwender Trustee
Hoover Deborah D. Hoover Trustee Ex Officio
Peshina Jenny Peshina Trustee
Robeson Mark D. Robeson Trustee
Seaman Richard N. Seaman Trustee
Taylor Eddie Taylor, Jr. Trustee

Staff

Hoover Deborah Hoover President & CEO
Griggs Denise Griggs Vice President & CFO
Evans Angela Kwallek Evans Senior Program Officer
Bean Emily Bean Program Officer
Dotson Gina Dotson Grants & Communications Manager
Harris Darby Harris Program Assistant
Pierce Souraya PierceOffice Manager & Bookkeeper
Silcox Jeanne Silcox Executive Assistant
Broer Victoria Broer Special Initiatives Officer
Lingo Sharon Lingo Office Manager
McHenry Mary McHenry Program Officer

In recent months we said goodbye to three of our valued team members who retired from Morgan Foundation or moved on to pursue other opportunities. We express deep appreciation for their meaningful contributions to our work in 2021 and for sharing their many talents in support of our mission.