The Project
Our nonprofit video productions are a critical fundraising tool featured at the annual CSF gala.
+ About Children's Scholarship Fund
The Children’s Scholarship Fund believes a quality education puts children on the path to success in life. We expand educational opportunity by providing scholarships to families in need so children can attend the K-8 schools that are the best fit, regardless of their ability to pay or where they live. We also support scholarship programs and policy reform efforts nationwide that help all children get the education they deserve.
OBJECTIVE
CSF must fill the evening with programming that compels gala attendees to donate in support of the cause. The challenge is to produce videos that pay tribute to billionaires who give back, honor the families benefiting from this philanthropy and explain the instrumental role played by the Children’ Scholarship Fund (CSF), an innovative nonprofit with a simple mission requiring expert execution.
PUTTING THE PUZZLE TOGETHER
Since 2011, I’ve worked with CSF to profile families impacted by the scholarship. In recent years we’ve produced tribute videos to donors who have made significant financial contributions – people whose names are engraved in stone and metal at institutions across the country, but whose stories have not been told on video. Our task is to distill the values of these donors to a single message point that aligns with the CSF mission and pair each donor with an alumni of the program who embodies that value.
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With a healthy (but still nonprofit) budget we’ll from New York to North Carolina, California and Connecticut filming with students, alumni, faculty, policymakers and community activists. Videos are edited with time for critique and signoff by various stakeholders, ready to debut at the gala.
Our nonprofit video productions make the case for the good CSF engenders and provide evidence of success that is qualitative (short case study documentaries), quantitative (animated, stylized info-graphic) and comprehensive (anthemic, mission video).
FINISHED PRODUCT
Inspiration from the Arts
You’d be hard-pressed to name anyone who has done more the arts in Los Angeles than Eli Broad. So, when Nicole received a CSF scholarship from Eli’s donations following the murder of her mother, she was able to find inspiration in poetry and art at her school. Today, Nicole continues to realize Eli’s dreams as she pursues a career in filmmaking.
Give Without Knowing
The Ortega sisters came from Mexico and grew up amongst gunshots. Arthur Rock, Silicon Valley legend and early investor in Apple and Intel, gave to the Ortegas without knowing them. Arthur gave CSF scholarship assistance to thousands of families without any criteria other than the fact that they could not afford to send their children to a school that would allow them to succeed. Mom could care for a son with special needs.Dad could work picking fruit and the Ortega sisters could go on to Yale, studying ways to improve the lives of future immigrant generations back in the Bay area and beyond.
Giving Back
Julian Robertson’s investments yielded a great fortune and a cult following. Fulfillment for Julian comes from the dividends reinvested. Silas took this lesson to heart, returning the wisdom of his CSF scholarship schooling with generous spirit as a teacher at the American School of Ballet. At the 20th anniversary gala for CSF, Julian stood at the podium following the video presentation and said that we really knew how to make an old man cry.
Empowering Parents
As owners of Wal-Mart, John Walton came from one of the world’s most influential families. Empowering families to have a say in the education of their children was paramount for John. When Hansel’s parents had no resources, the CSF scholarship provided them the ability to choose a better path for their children.
If You Save One Life You Save the World
Ted Forstman pioneered the leveraged buyout, reshaping the landscpe of corporate finance. Ted believed if you save one life, you save the world. Mary grew up in New York’s Chinatown, helping to care for her little sister and translating for her parents as they worked long hours tailoring. The CSF scholarship helped Mary find her way to UPenn, where she studies science and strives to cure cancer.
By The Numbers
Animations and Infographics styled with stop motion school supplies illustrate the success of CSF over 20+ years.
The Community Organizer | Returning the community that gave so much to you
When Jason was fighting cancer in Washington Heights, folks from CSF provided support to his family and the scholarship helped him to succeed at school. After graduating from Columbia and with a dream job in midtown, Jason makes it a priority to returning home and help his family and the community from which he came.
I Was That Boy
Derrell Bradford “won the lottery” with surprise financial assistance from an unlikely source as a young kid from a poor neighborhood in Baltimore. He’s seen first-hand how a little help can go a long way and has made it his life’s work to give more kids born into struggle, at no fault of their own, the same opportunity he was given.
The Mission
Our Mission video encapsulates the work CSF has been doing to change the lives of children and giving new chances to families across the country.
TRIVIA
CSF has granted scholarships to over 174,000 students and graduation rates amongst CSF partner schools are almost 20% higher than in NYC public schools.
CLIENT FEEDBACK
Working on a tight schedule, Sam was extremely responsive and adaptable in adjusting to our requests, and the final videos were everything we had hoped for. We can always count on Sam’s talented artistic vision to create videos that really capture the essence of the messages we want to convey, while he is also highly reliable and open to collaboration.
Elizabeth Toomey | Director of Communications at Children’s Scholarship Fund.