The W.K. Kellogg Foundation was founded in June 1930 as the W.K. Kellogg Child Welfare Foundation by breakfast cereal pioneer Will Keith Kellogg. In 1934, Kellogg donated more than $66 million in Kellogg Company stock and other investments to the W.K. Kellogg Trust ($1.1 billion in 2012 dollars). As with other endowments, the yearly income from this trust funds the foundation.
The private foundation continues to hold substantial equity in and enjoy a strong relationship with the Kellogg Company, both of which are based in Battle Creek, Michigan. It is governed by an independent board of trustees.
The foundation is now the 7th largest philanthropic foundation in the U.S. In 2005, the foundation reported that the total assets of the foundation and its trust were US$7.3 billion; about US$5.5 billion of this was in Kellogg Company stock. The foundation funded US$243 million in grants and programs in its 2005 fiscal year. 82% of this was spent in the United States; 9% in southern Africa; and 9% in Latin America and the Caribbean. In 1996 it supplied a multi-year grant worth $750,000 ($1.05 million in 2012 dollars) to start mass salt fluoridation programs which were then carried out by the Pan American Health Organization (PAHO), covering 350 million people in Bolivia, Dominican Republic, Honduras, Nicaragua, Panama and Venezuela. The project was part of a multi-year plan launched by PAHO in 1994 to “fluoridate the entire Region of the Americas”. More recently, they have provided funding for HealthCorps to prevent childhood obesity by encouraging students to take personal responsibility for their health and wellness[1].
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The foundation provides a number of grants to organizations across the country on a number of topics.
One grantee is the Birth to Five Policy Alliance, with the stated purpose of the grant being, to increase public and private support so young children, particularly those facing the most challenges, get the high quality services they need to be successful.[2]
Prominent educational institutions that have received significant grants from the foundation are: