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2018 AC: Conference Highlights tab

2018 Forum Annual Conference - July 16-18 in Boston, MA

The Forum’s 2018 Annual Conference was the nation’s largest gathering of regional and national philanthropy-serving organizations.

#ForumCon18 was our best conference yet! While it was the largest Forum conference with more than 300 attendees and a record-breaking $146,000 in sponsorships, the real success of the conference may be measured in the conversations, community and courage that it generated.

The creation of the REAL lounge and studio helped support a continued and deep focus on the theme of racial equity, diversity and inclusion. REAL stands for racial equity and love and it elevated the difficult conversations and work of racial equity based in philanthropy’s love for mankind but also the love of colleagues within the Forum network. We captured 37 conversations on video in the REAL studio that will be used to keep the conversation, learning and action around racial equity happening throughout the year and beyond.

Other conference themes included building and maintaining partnerships and collaboration as well as a focus on skill building. Powerful messages were delivered by many including a phenomenal opening keynote by artist Titus Kaphar; an annual meeting message of courageous philanthropy from Grant Oliphant; and a closing plenary about narratives we tell about immigrants, black people and native communities by Cristina Jimenez, Michael McAfee and Sarah Eagle Heart connected beautifully by composer and violinist Shaw Pong Liu. Our other plenaries featured the amazing thought leadership of Ibram Kendi, Elizabeth Hinton and Richard Rothstein followed by deeper conversations with each speaker and a session that elevated the voices of infrastructure leadership in the field with Dan Cardinali, Carly Hare, and Donna Murrary-Brown. We captured the majority of these on video and will release them in the coming month.

Pre-conference sessions supported the work of CEOs coming together as well as emerging practitioners and for the first-time mid-level practitioners. We also piloted a workshop for PSO board members focusing on their unique roles. Fifteen of the concurrent sessions focused on skills building for both professional and personal strengths and included the gathering of peer communities.

Conference Resources

  • Don't miss the materials from the sessions including powerpoint slides, handouts and suggestions for further reading on the Resources tab. Click on "+Details" to see a session's description, speakers and available resources or click "+Expand All Details" at the top for all sessions.
  • See who attended by accessing the online event roster. Remember to update your profile with a picture and up-to-date contact information. You must be logged into the site as an attendee of the conference or a member of the Forum to access the event roster.
  • Still to come: photo highlights, twitter highlights and videos of many of our plenary speakers.

Planning Committee


This year's conference wouldn't be possible without the leadership and contributions of our planning committee:

  • John Barnes, Funders Concerned About AIDS
  • Kristen Cambell, Philanthropy for Active Civic Engagement (PACE)
  • Vanessa Castro, Philanthropy New York
  • Deborah Ellwood, CFLeads
  • Karla Fortunato, Connecticut Council for Philanthropy 
  • Biz Ghormley, Emerging Practitioners in Philanthropy (EPIP)
  • Paul Kim, Philanthropy Northwest
  • Tuly Martinez, Southern California Grantmakers
  • Grace Nicolette, The Center for Effective Philanthropy (CEP)
  • Jennifer Olney, Funders Together to End Homelessness
  • Kathy Sessions, Health and Environmental Funders Network
  • Elizabeth Whittaker-Walker, Council of Michigan Foundations
Questions about the event?

Please contact Mishka Parkins (202-457-8784) with any questions about the conference program.