Annual Conference of the Kansas Association of Community Foundations "Healthy Foundations, Healthy Communities”

Join us for "Healthy Foundations, Healthy Communities” the theme of this year’s Kansas Association of Community Foundation’s Annual Conference (KACF). Healthy and strong is what every community foundation strives for because a healthy foundation can play a vital role in strengthening its community. At this year’s conference, you’ll explore ways to improve the health of your foundation and how your healthy foundation can take a lead role in the health of your community.

The 2013 KACF Conference Committee is excited to be bringing you the premiere event of the year with two sensational plenaries:

We will launch the conference with Ralph Serpe, nationally recognized as the ‘guru’ of building unrestricted endowment. Unrestricted endowment is the most desirable community foundation endowment, with it a foundation can be a nimble and flexible leader. Despite it being a keystone of a healthy foundation, many shy away. In this motivational plenary, Ralph will share his techniques and convert you into a believer that you too can build these important funds! As a bonus, Ralph will supplement his plenary with a subsequent session on building field of interest funds, including public health.

The costs of America’s obesity epidemic include both health and lost years of life – the statistics are staggering. Doing something about it, ‘Weight of the Nation’ is a powerful national public health campaign targeting obesity. California’s East Bay Community Foundation, in partnership with Kaiser Permanente, has become an important player in the work to combat obesity in their local communities. In the closing plenary, these partners will demonstrate how community foundations nationwide, including in Kansas, can lead collaborative efforts in fighting obesity.

CF board members! The number one thing you can do for your foundation this year is attend this conference. This is the place to learn about trends and best practices, and to gain knowledge and connections with your peers! Here’s a comment from last year: “I am very new to the Community Foundation board and learned many new things and opened my eyes to being an effective board member.”

Connect, Learn, Reflect

More is merrier! With four concurrent sessions to choose from, one person can’t take in everything the KACF Conference has to offer. That’s why so many community foundations have seen the value of bringing their entire team, including staff, board members and other volunteers to the event.

The 24 concurrent sessions this year look at Healthy Foundations, Healthy Communities from a variety of different lenses from dealing with complex gifts to effective board meetings to the hot topic of impact investment. The conference is a great board development opportunity – this is where learning happens and supportive links are forged with other board members.

This year, there is a full track of six sessions targeted specifically for younger foundations and people newer to CFs.

We also welcome board members and executive directors of other non-profit organizations in Kansas as this conference is relevant to the entire field!

The KACF Annual Conference is the place for community foundation connection and reflection. It’s an opportunity to learn, but it is also a space outside our daily foundation work to celebrate just how far we have all come. The diverse concurrent sessions of various levels: basic, intermediate and advanced will cover topics in:
• asset/donor development and sustainability
• programs
• marketing
• finance, technology and social media
• governance and leadership
• public policy and advocacy
• legal and legislative

This year’s conference boasts national speakers including popular KACF Faculty Sandy Hughes, Judy Sjostedt, Nancy Jones and Chris Larson, and representatives from FIMS and Pearl. New this year are Suzanne Friday, legal affairs with COF, Debra Natenson from the Center for What Works, Lori Finch from Kimbia and David Wood from Harvard. Sessions will also involve many of your peers and other experts from Kansas and neighboring states and include peer involvement in Workwell Kansas, Kansas Giving Days, and Healthy Community Design.

New opportunities this year: several speakers are offering tailored mini-consultations if you sign up and send them information in advance. Watch for emails from KACF alerting you to opportunities to speak with: Sandra Hughes and Chris Larson on governance issues, David Wood on impact investing, Debra Natenson on measuring grant impact, and Lori Finch on Kimbia giving days.

It's not all work, have some fun and enjoy networking at the Healthy Snacks Social and at the KACF Annual Meeting dinner.

KACF Conference Buzz
• I am brand new board member - was educated and inspired!
• This was my first KACF conference. I have received so much pertinent information that I intend to share with our board! I have found a connection with others who feel the same passion, deal with the same struggles, and continue to find ways to keep motivated. My passion has been re-lit and I will attend again next year!
• Governance is critical component going forward – lessons from this conference are helpful.
• The networking is wonderful in learning board responsibilities
• Regardless of CF size, we share issues and challenges.

Do not keep this event a secret, share it with your network of people who might benefit from this opportunity designed to bring you practical sessions to help your foundation thrive, best practices and models to strengthen the health of your community, thought provoking speakers to boost new ideas, and an opportunity to engage with and be inspired by your Kansas community foundation peers as well as experts and practitioners from other States.

For community foundations in our neighboring states, we believe in partnership of community foundations not only within Kansas but also within the circle of peers from other states and welcome you to take advantage of this opportunity to hear national and regional experts at a conference that is tailored to the needs of smaller rural and growing urban foundations.

Registration fee: $50 for KACF members
$350 for non-members

Hotel – KACF has reserved a block of hotel rooms at the Wichita Marriott Hotel for a rate of $102.00 plus tax. Reservations can be made by calling the hotel directly at 316-651-0333, calling Marriott’s Reservation Center at 1-800-228-9290 or going to http://www.marriott.com/ictwe and entering group code KCFKCFA. Please mention KACF when you make your reservation via phone.

The Kansas Association of Community Foundations has received a grant from the Kansas Health Foundation to support this Conference, which allowed KACF to subsidize the cost of the conference for member and non-member participants. The Kansas Health Foundation is a private philanthropy dedicated to improving the health of all Kansans. For more information about the Kansas Health Foundation, visit www.kansashealth.org.

The deadline for registration and for booking your hotel room is September 20, 2013. Space is limited, so please register early.

Conference details are at http://kansascfs.org/annual-conference.cfm