Arnold Ventures LLC (formerly known as The Laura and John Arnold Foundation) is focused on evidence-based giving in a wide range of categories including: criminal justice, education, health care, and public finance. The organization was founded by billionaires John D. Arnold and

Laura Arnold Laura Arnold (born 1972/1973) is an American philanthropist and co-founder of Arnold Ventures LLC. In addition to serving as co-chair of Arnold Ventures, Arnold also hosts the podcast “Deep Dive with Laura Arnold” and serves as member of the ...

in 2010. The fund has invested in and funded a wide range of studies and programs in the areas of health care (opioids, contraceptive choice and access, drug prices, commercial sector prices, complex care),

education reform Education reform is the name given to the goal of changing public education. The meaning and education methods have changed through debates over what content or experiences result in an educated individual or an educated society. Historically, t ...

, criminal justice, and improving reproducibility and transparency in science through the funding of open science and

metascience Metascience (also known as meta-research) is the use of scientific methodology to study science itself. Metascience seeks to increase the quality of scientific research while reducing inefficiency. It is also known as "''research on research''" ...

History

The Laura and John Arnold Foundation was initially created as a philanthropic organization, but was restructured as a limited liability company (LLC) and renamed Arnold Ventures in January 2019. The transition was made in order to combine the Arnolds efforts as many foundations are limited to only making grants to recognized 501(c)(3) nonprofits. Arnold Ventures donates and spends money through a private foundation, a donor-advised fund, and a

501(c)(4) A 501(c) organization is a nonprofit organization in the federal law of the United States according to Internal Revenue Code (26 U.S.C. § 501(c)) and is one of over 29 types of nonprofit organizations exempt from some federal income taxes. ...

. The organizations' limited liability company form allows the firm to operate in a much faster and more cohesive fashion. Since 2010, the foundation has invested more than $1 billion in a variety of initiatives, focusing on pretrial and criminal justice, health care, prescription drug prices, the quality of academic research, combating predatory higher education practices, the evaluation of social programs, school system governance, and electoral reform. The organization focuses on using expert research and statistical analysis to guide its efforts in creating systemic social change. As of 2021, Arnold Ventures made over $1 billion in grants, distributed as follows: $316 million for criminal justice, $425 million for education, $347 million for health, and $165 million for public finance. In August 2012, the foundation launched the Giving Library to help other philanthropists make their gifts more efficient and effective. Arnold Ventures has published guidelines, based on the

Open Science Framework The Center for Open Science is a non-profit technology organization based in Charlottesville, Virginia with a mission to "increase the openness, integrity, and reproducibility of scientific research." Brian Nosek and Jeffrey Spies founded the or ...

, that anybody seeking research funding from them must follow. In 2018, the organization gave away $204.3 million, focused on the areas of health care, education, criminal justice, and public finance. In January 2019, the Laura and John Arnold Foundation was restructured as an LLC and renamed Arnold Ventures. The transition was made in order to combine the Arnolds efforts as many foundations are limited to only making grants to recognized 501(c)(3) nonprofits. Arnold Ventures donates and spends money through a private foundation, a donor-advised fund, and a

. The Arnolds were among the first to sign the Giving Pledge in 2008, a pledge by some high-net-worth individuals to donate a large percentage of their income to philanthropic causes during their lifetimes.

Areas of focus

The Arnolds have used an investment management approach to giving. Meaning that the foundation targeted a large portion of its giving to higher risk efforts that the Arnold's viewed as having a higher potential to drive change over the long term and then some portion of its giving to low risk, well-established institutions to help maintain their efforts

Criminal justice

As of 2021, Arnold Ventures allocated $316 million in grants for its criminal justice initiative. An overview of criminal justice reform in the United States by

GiveWell GiveWell is an American non-profit charity assessment and effective altruism-focused organization. GiveWell focuses primarily on the cost-effectiveness of the organizations that it evaluates, rather than traditional metrics such as the percentag ...

listed the Arnold Foundation as one of the top foundations in the United States working in the area.

Partnerships

In March 2019, Arnold Ventures announced the opening of the National Partnership for Pretrial Justice, focused on bringing together individuals and organizations from every constituency affected by pretrial policies. By November 2020, the organization had committed $48 million to the Partnership. Arnold Ventures also supports the Council on Criminal Justice, a bipartisan reform group formed in 2019 in order to improve the criminal justice system. The Council grew out of the federal

First Step Act The First Step Act, formally known as the Formerly Incarcerated Reenter Society Transformed Safely Transitioning Every Person Act, is a bipartisan criminal justice bill passed by the 115th Congress and signed by President Donald Trump in Decembe ...

and its two initial research projects were to explore incarceration trends by race and gender; and, examine the fallout from the 1994 Crime Bill.

Gun Violence Research

In July 2019, Arnold Ventures provided $9.8 million for 17 research grants awarded by the National Collaborative on Gun Violence Research. The grant awardees are studying a range of topics that includes background check laws, the role of firearms in domestic violence, gun-carrying by high-risk youth, and police training for high-stakes situations.

Prison violence and health

In June 2020, the organization donated $2.7 million to the

University of California, Irvine The University of California, Irvine (UCI or UC Irvine) is a public land-grant research university in Irvine, California. One of the ten campuses of the University of California system, UCI offers 87 undergraduate degrees and 129 graduate and p ...

(UCI) to conduct a study into the sources and consequences of prison violence in seven states. The goal of the three-year, multi-strategy study is to create an evidence-based framework for reducing and preventing incidents of violence. The seven states participating in the study are Arizona, Colorado, Massachusetts, Ohio, Oregon, Pennsylvania, and Texas. As of April 2021, the organization had committed $7.8 million to

COVID Coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) is a contagious disease caused by a virus, the severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2). The first known case was identified in Wuhan, China, in December 2019. The disease quickly ...

-related criminal justice grants supporting goals such as alternatives to arrest, pretrial reforms, and release of vulnerable inmates.

Data-Driven Justice

The Foundation funded Data-Driven Justice, a program to identify repeat low-level offenders suffering from drug abuse or mental illness, and the treatment options and intervention points that work to address their needs. The program was started by the Obama administration in 2016. In 2018, the Foundation pledged $1.6 million for several Data-Driven Justice pilot programs in Middlesex County in Massachusetts; Long Beach, California; and Johnson County, Iowa. In May 2018, the Foundation announced $4.1 million in grants to help communities address “frequent utilizers” - people who cycle between jails and hospitals on a steady basis. They included $1.6 million for pilot programs to test new methods of coordination between police, hospitals, and social services; $2.1 million to fund evaluations of intervention programs; and $375,000 to the

National Association of Counties The National Association of Counties (NACo) is an organization that represents county governments in the United States. The Foundation also supported the

University of Rochester Medical Center The University of Rochester Medical Center (URMC), now known as UR Medicine, is located in Rochester, New York, is one of the main campuses of the University of Rochester and comprises the university's primary medical education, research and pat ...

, the City of Long Beach, and MDRC with grants to evaluate their interventions and research into what actually works to address frequent utilizers’ needs. In 2011, the Vice President of Criminal Justice at the then LJAF, former

New Jersey New Jersey is a state in the Mid-Atlantic and Northeastern regions of the United States. It is bordered on the north and east by the state of New York; on the east, southeast, and south by the Atlantic Ocean; on the west by the Delaware ...

Attorney General

Anne Milgram Anne Melissa Milgram (born December 1, 1970) is an American attorney and academic who serves as the Administrator of the Drug Enforcement Administration. Milgram was previously the 57th Attorney General of New Jersey from 2007 to 2010. Early ...

, led a team in creating a risk assessment instrument, the Public Safety Assessment (PSA), for courts to use as part of their pretrial release systems. The Leadership Conference Education Fund published a statement about their support for ending secured money bail and the principles that pretrial risk assessments should ensure if they are necessary to be used. In 2017, a family whose son was allegedly murdered by a man granted pretrial release submitted a complaint against the PSA. In 2020, a U.S. Appellate Court supported the District Court's dismissal of the complaint. In 2019, the Metropolitan Crime Commission released a report calling the "public safety assessment tool" a "waste of money" and concluded that the tool "underrates the risk offenders pose to public safety." The foundation remains a partner for the Data Collaborative for Justice. In 2016, the foundation donated $360,000 to a trial of continuous aerial surveillance using drones of Baltimore, Maryland. The project was funded by the LLC and was implemented without approval from the city’s Board of Estimates and without the knowledge of then-Mayor Stephanie Rawlings-Blake, the Baltimore City Council, or State’s Attorney Marilyn Mosby. The ACLU filed a lawsuit on behalf of the Leaders of a Beautiful Struggle, an activist group concerned about privacy violations. A federal appeals court ruled the use of drones was constitutional, but Arnold Ventures halted funding for the drone program’s expansion into St. Louis. In 2019, the Foundation committed $17 million in grants to study prisons in the U.S. and how they can be a more effective part of the criminal justice system.

Education

According to their list of grants, they have spent $425 million on grants related to education as of 2020. In May 2012,

Reuters Reuters ( ) is a news agency owned by Thomson Reuters Corporation. It employs around 2,500 journalists and 600 photojournalists in about 200 locations worldwide. Reuters is one of the largest news agencies in the world. The agency was esta ...

reported that the Laura and John Arnold Foundation had committed $20 million over a five-year period to an initiative called

StudentsFirst StudentsFirst is a political lobbying organization formed in 2010 by Michelle Rhee, former school chancellor of Washington D.C. public schools, in support of education reform. The organization worked to pass state laws on issues such as expandin ...

, led by

Michelle Rhee Michelle Ann Rhee (born December 25, 1969) is an American educator and advocate for education reform. She was Chancellor of District of Columbia Public Schools from 2007 to 2010. In late 2010, she founded StudentsFirst, a non-profit organizati ...

, who used to head the

Washington D.C. ) , image_skyline = , image_caption = Clockwise from top left: the Washington Monument and Lincoln Memorial on the National Mall, United States Capitol, Logan Circle, Jefferson Memorial, White House, Adams Morgan, Na ...

public school system. On June 26, 2012, the foundation launched the ERIN Project, a tool to help analyze the national K-12 education landscape. Arnold Ventures partnered with other organizations to create the nonprofit The City Fund in 2018. It works with cities and school systems to improve public schools using the portfolio model. Under this model, school systems invest in schools that deliver good results, while closing or changing schools that don’t. The City Fund raised nearly $200 million in its first year. In March 2020, Arnold Ventures gave $3 million to The City Fund to help schools during the coronavirus pandemic. The money was distributed between the 14 cities where the group has active grants.

Public finance and democracy

In 2016 and 2018 the foundation was part of a group that donated $40 million towards ending gerrymandering, and implementing open primaries and ranked choice voting. In 2018, Arnold Ventures partnered with six other organizations on a research initiative to increase public understanding of Facebook’s role in elections and democracy. The organizations sponsored an independent committee of scholars that invited researchers to conduct research using proprietary Facebook data. The Social Science Research Council oversaw the selection of research proposals and the peer-review process. The foundation has funded various politically-oriented 501(c) organization#501.28c.29.284.29, 501(c)4 organizations. Many of the organizations funded focus on tax and retirement policies. LJAF's attempts at pension reform have been met with hostility by some. However, the Foundation’s efforts haven’t been to eliminate pensions, but to identify where existing systems have failed and provide options for new, viable funding systems. Even critics recognize that there is a need for reform. In 2014, public pension systems faced shortfalls of more than $1 trillion; these shortfalls had contributed to two cities in California and Michigan filing for bankruptcy. In July 2014, the Arnold Foundation donated $2.8 million to the Center for Public Integrity to launch a new project focused on state campaign finance. The Foundation also provided funds to various think tanks and research institutes focused on public pension, both those who advocate for the current system, such as the libertarian Reason Foundation, and those focused on other solutions, like the Boston College’s Center for Retirement Research. In 2016, the Foundation and unions in Arizona both supported a ballot measure that reduced cost-of-living payments to retired police and firefighters.

Health Care

By 2020, Arnold Ventures had donated $347million to address concerns with health care organizations. This included funds for the Center for Healthcare Transparency ($5.67 million), Nutrition Science Initiative ($23.19 million), and the Research Triangle Institute ($1.67 million). Arnold Ventures was one of three organizations to invest in Civica RX, a nonprofit focused on driving down drug costs. Fifty large hospital systems partnered with Civica RX. Arnold Ventures donated $27.6 million to the Institute for Clinical and Economic Review (ICER), roughly 69 percent of its funding. ICER is a nonprofit that does cost-analysis of prescription drugs and medical tests and procedures to determine a value for each treatment. ICER uses the quality-adjusted life year (QALY) and the Equal Value of Life Years Gained (evLYG) to determine if a treatment adds valuable years to the patient's life. Arnold Ventures’ work through ICER has been praised by those seeking to standardize drug pricing, but criticized by those who fear that ICER’s reviews are not peer reviewed and could limit investment in medications for elderly patients or those with rare diseases. In January 2021, the organization helped fund the Action Collaborative on Countering the U.S. Opioid Epidemic. The Collaborative was formed by the National Academy of Medicine and the Aspen Institute to address the COVID-19 risks faced by people with substance use disorders and chronic pain.

Research integrity

One of the first projects funded by the foundation was research into obesity, which was drawn to Arnold's attention when he heard an interview with Gary Taubes on the ''EconTalk'' podcast. Subsequent conversation between Arnold and Taubes led to the foundation making a $4.7 million seed grant to the Nutrition Science Initiative (NuSI) in San Diego, a nonprofit cofounded by Taubes where he and Peter Attia are trying to find the cause of obesity. The following year, the foundation promised an additional $35.5 million. The foundation also funds The Nutrition Coalition (TNC), which works to reshape the process by which the Center for Nutrition Policy and Promotion#Dietary Guidelines for Americans, Dietary Guidelines for America are formulated. The foundation also funded the launch of the Center for Open Science with a $5.25 million grant and by 2017 had provided an additional $10 million in funding. Among other projects, the Center has been responsible for a few reproducibility projects - reviewing published scientific research in order to see if all reported findings can be confirmed. The foundation also funded the launch of the Meta-Research Innovation Center at Stanford at Stanford University run by John Ioannidis and Steven Goodman to study ways to improve scientific research; and provided funding for the AllTrials initiative led in part by Ben Goldacre. As of 2017 it had given around $80 million in grants under its "Research Integrity" initiative.

References

External links

* {{official website Foundations based in the United States Organizations established in 2010 Philanthropic organizations based in the United States 2010 establishments in the United States