Friday, June 18, 2010

Useful Reading on Fundraising Diversity?

To help you select your professional reading, we've asked VLAA summer interns to highlight and comment on some of the books available in our collection (and elsewhere).

Cultivating Diversity in Fundraising by Janice Gow Pettey

This book gives tips on how to be successful in soliciting contributions from four major ethnic groups: African American, Asian American, Hispanic/Latino, and Native American. It offers interesting historical and cultural perspectives, but may have limited applicability for St. Louis area non-profit fundraisers. The organization of the book could be improved upon and the text is a bit repetitive at times, but its overall usefulness makes it a worthwhile fundraising tool.

The author provides an outstanding historical account of the immigration of the four groups into the United States and applies the groups’ immigration history and cultural characteristics to their charitable giving patterns. I recommend using the comprehensive index to zoom into ethnic groups and topics that are of interest to the reader. To a certain extent, the book stereotypes the different ethnic groups, but author does supply data and examples to support her conclusions. The second half of the book contains interviews and case studies that the reader probably will not find to be very helpful.

Reviewed by Shannon Martínez, VLAA Intern, Law Student at Saint Louis University School of Law