Associate Program Director – Once Upon A Time Foundation

The Once Upon A Time Foundation (OUAT) is a $275 million foundation in Fort Worth, TX with three main areas of interest – community partnerships, health and medicine, and the Philanthropy Lab.

Responsibilities

An Associate Program Director at the Foundation will work alongside the Foundation’s current Senior Program Director to help manage OUAT’s current programs and the future expansion of the Foundation’s grant-making. The role entails a wide range of responsibilities, is dynamic and evolving, and involves coordination across a broad group of stakeholders including the Foundation’s funder, community leaders and educators, medical researchers, partner universities, and current and former students who are part of the Foundation’s Philanthropy Lab program.

You will be joining a team of 6-7 people who are ultimately responsible for supporting the Funder of OUAT with the broader work of the Foundation. This will be a full-time, in-office position of an average of 45 to 50 hours a week (depending on level of experience) and may periodically include travel or events in the evenings and/or on weekends. Flexibility in schedule is important.

Specific responsibilities may include, but are not limited to:

• Managing the implementation and administration of all of OUAT’s current programs and initiatives (see additional details below), with a focus on maximum impact, continuous improvement, and comprehensive and detailed updates to OUAT’s Funder.
• Building relationships with non-profit leaders, research partners, and university administrators, and assisting in the vetting process for developing new partnerships and possible grant recipients.
• Coordinating and facilitating collaboration amongst research partners at different sites in our multi-site research studies through our Philanthropy Lab, Raynor Cerebellum Project, EDMH and CAS initiatives.
• Overseeing the organization of multiple conferences and events hosted in conjunction with our major initiatives.
• Developing and seeking out current and new community partnerships for the implementation of in-kind donations program.
• Develop, maintain, and analyze foundation data to track grants and program activity; clean and aggregate datasets, interpret quantitative results, and produce clear summaries, tables, and visuals to support decision-making.

Qualifications

• Bachelor’s and/or Master’s degree with strong academics and a minimum 3.5 GPA.
• A commitment to work an average of 45 to 50 hours per week, depending on experience level. Exceptional ability to balance multiple projects and tasks.
• Willingness and ability to travel up to 20% of the time.
• Willingness to make a minimum two/three-year commitment to the position.
• Candidate with Texas Ties strongly preferred.
• Candidate who took a Philanthropy Lab course strongly preferred.

Compensation

• Compensation will be increased up to 10% over current, depending on experience, plus full benefits.
• Benefits include the opportunity to personally direct each year $2,500 grants per year of service to any 501(c)3 of your choice, up to a maximum of $25,000/year after 10 years of service. For example, a Foundation employee with three years of service gets to award $7,500 in grants to one or more non-profits of his/her choice (the award amount can be directed to a single non-profit or split between up to four non-profits). This is a personal benefit to direct grant funding to organizations the employee personally cares about, separate and apart from grants managed on behalf of the Foundation’s activities.

BACKGROUND ON THE FOUNDATION

• OUAT’s strategic and funding priorities are informed by the Funder’s life experiences and circumstances and have evolved and will continue to further evolve over time. Consistent focus areas have included health and medicine, philanthropy education, and community support. Some of our most significant active initiatives include: One of the OUATs largest and most public initiatives is to support the creation of experiential classes on Philanthropy at leading universities around the country including Stanford, Harvard, University of Texas, Notre Dame, etc. Each class is awarded up to $110,000 for the students themselves to give away to 501c(3)s as they see fit. Since our first Philanthropy Lab class in 2011, over 4,100 students from 160 classes have directed grants totaling $12.3 million through this program. If you are interested, more information about this initiative is available at our website at http://www.thephilanthropylab.org.
• OUAT’s EDMH Research platform funded three research grants of one million dollars each at the University of Pennsylvania, Johns Hopkins University, and McLean/Harvard to study the use of patients electronic communications in psychiatric evaluation and treatment.
• OUAT works to help families of children with Childhood Apraxia of Speech (CAS) by educating parents and speech-language pathologists (SLPs) about evidence-based treatment practices, funding multiple research grants aimed at identifying and evaluating best therapeutic practices, and funding training workshops across the nation for SLPs.
• In 2022, OUAT launched the Raynor Cerebellum Project (RCP) with the goal of finding the shortest path to improving the lives of people suffering from cerebellar disorders. Through collaborative and innovative research and purposeful gatherings, RCP will be known as the greatest collaboration of minds and resources solving the issues of cerebellar dysfunction and disorders.
• OUAT has had a particularly strong and enduring partnership with UT Southwestern Medical Center (“UTSW”). In 2016, OUAT provided a $5 million gift towards the establishment of the Once Upon a Time Foundation Human Genomics Center aimed at advancing the power of genomics and delivering personalized therapies for cancer patients. OUAT also funded $10 million dollars in research grants at UTSW to fund cutting edge research in areas ranging from studying how disease-causing bacteria manipulate host cells for their own benefit and survival, to studying how cellular and molecular mechanisms that regulate stem and cancer cell function in the nervous and hematopoietic systems, to understanding and managing the mysteries involved in multiple sclerosis. In 2022, OUAT committed $14 million commitment to launch the Raynor Cerebellum Lab and support other related initiatives at UTSW.
• While smaller in terms of funding amount, OUAT also has a number of programs partnering with local area schools and other non-profits. These include a Mavericks ticket program that awards exclusive courtside seats to deserving students from local area high schools in lower socioeconomic areas who have persevered to overcome difficult circumstances, an in-kind donations program that places items like furniture, toys, clothing and Halloween costumes at non-profits with a demonstrated need, and a grant writing program in which we help small 501(c)(3)s with limited or no Development staff prepare and submit grant applications.

Pay: From $70,000.00 per year

Benefits:

• Dental insurance
• Health insurance
• Paid time off
• Vision insurance

Work Location: In person

Salary : $2,500 - $70,000