Jearl Smart Foundation Inc.

The Jearl Smart Foundation Inc. is a small, hyper-local family foundation headquartered in Wewoka, Oklahoma (Seminole County), operating with roughly $2.97 million in assets and no professional program staff — the board is entirely family and community volunteers (Chairman Bryan Cain, Vice Chairman Jamie Ann Strickland, Secretary Keith Claybrook, and board members James Smart, Teresa Smart, Shari Carter, and James Barnes), none of whom draw compensation. Founded in 1995 by Jearl and Jo Smart and their sons John and Jim as "a lasting memorial" to Jearl's own experience receiving educational assistance after WWII, the foundation's DNA is personal: it favors organizations and individuals with a direct, demonstrable tie to Seminole County or to Oklahoma higher education. Of 88 tracked grants totaling $656,200, 77 went to Oklahoma recipients versus a scattering of 1-3 grants each to AZ, CO, KS, MI, and NY — this is not a foundation built for cold, out-of-state applications. There is no formal RFP, no online portal, and no staff program officer; the IRS filing instructions state plainly: "NO SPECIFIC FORM REQUIRED. THE INFORMATION SHOULD IDENTIFY THE NATURE OF THE REQUEST." First-time applicants should treat this as a relationship-driven, letter-based ask rather than a competitive grants-management process. The strongest path in is a short written letter or scholarship application that clearly ties the request to Seminole County roots, education, or community infrastructure — the three pillars evident in its grantee list (Wewoka Public School, East Central University, Seminole State College, Seminole Nation Historical Society, First Baptist Church of Wewoka). Repeat funding is common: several top grantees (East Central University, Osu, Ou, Seminole State College) received 3-4 separate grants, indicating the board renews relationships with familiar institutions rather than constantly seeking new ones. For scholarship applicants specifically, renewal is conditional — recipients must reapply every semester and stay in compliance, so this is best understood as an ongoing relationship rather than a single award. Given the foundation's size (~$150-200K in typical annual giving) and all-volunteer governance, expect a slow, informal, personal-network-driven review rather than a structured multi-stage LOI-to-site-visit pipeline typical of larger funders.

Grant sizes here are modest and heavily skewed toward small, recurring gifts: the average tracked grant is $7,457 against $656,200 in total giving across 88 grants, and the foundation's own reported typical range is $500-$19,500 (median $3,000, average $6,162 across 21 sampled grants), with historical outliers as high as $63,313 per the Instrumentl 990 summary. Annual total giving has ranged narrowly between $100,623 (2014) and $230,142 (2017) over the past decade, with the most recent complete years showing $204,742 (2022), $183,319 (2023), and 2024 revenue of $170,107 (giving figure not yet finalized in the data bundle, though Instrumentl reports $121,700 across 25 awards for 2024). Total assets have held essentially flat near $3 million since at least 2012 ($2.97M in 2024 vs. $3.0M in 2012), funded by steady net investment income (roughly $150-165K/year) rather than new contributions — contributions received were $0 in most years, with occasional infusions ($100,000 in 2022, $20,000 in 2021). By purpose, education dominates: the top 50 grantees show EDUCATIONAL/EDUCATION-tagged recipients (Wewoka Public School $115,000/2 grants, East Central University $78,400/4 grants, Osu $64,250/4 grants, Ou $50,500/4 grants, Seminole State College $45,850/4 grants, Oklahoma Christian University $25,000/4 grants) far outweighing COMMUNITY-purpose gifts (Center for Community Transformation $55,000, Seminole Nation Historical Society $40,000, Wewoka High School $22,500, Wewoka Lion Club $20,000) and a single BENEVOLENCE line (First Baptist Church, $48,000/4 grants). Geographically, 77 of 88 tracked grants (87.5%) went to Oklahoma recipients, with small residual giving to AZ (3), KS (3), MI (2), NY (2), and CO (1) — almost certainly alumni-driven scholarship gifts to out-of-state schools attended by Seminole County graduates rather than a genuine multi-state program. There is no officer compensation in the most recent years (2022-2024: $0), a marker of the all-volunteer, low-overhead structure.

The Jearl Smart Foundation sits within a tight cluster of similarly-sized ($2.9-3.0M asset) Philanthropy & Grantmaking-classified private foundations, several of which are also unstaffed family vehicles rather than public-facing grantmakers.

All six foundations cluster within a $2,000 band of total assets ($2.967M-$2.969M), which is a data-source artifact of how this peer set was selected (matched by asset size, not necessarily by mission overlap) rather than evidence of a true competitive set — none of the peer records in the data bundle include disclosed websites, giving totals, or public application processes, making direct programmatic comparison impossible from this data alone. What differentiates Jearl Smart from a typical small family foundation is transparency: it maintains a public website with a founders' history, a published (if informal) application process, and a public past-recipients list — none of which the peer foundations appear to offer, based on the absence of listed websites. Grant seekers should treat Jearl Smart as unusually accessible for its asset tier; most similarly-sized family foundations in this peer group provide no public entry point at all.

Concrete, dated news specific to the Jearl Smart Foundation is limited — this is expected for a small, all-volunteer family foundation with no communications staff and no press function. The foundation's Oklahoma Center for Nonprofits member profile surfaced two dated items, "Shutdown Further Shuts Out Nonprofits" (2025-10-27) and "Patt Potts Legacy Inspires Making a Difference" (2025-09-29), but these read as general nonprofit-sector news items associated with the foundation's directory listing rather than foundation-authored announcements, and no further detail could be confirmed. The most concrete recent programmatic activity findable is the foundation's role, alongside Lions Club International and a Major League Baseball community grant, in restoring the Wewoka Little League Baseball Field — an example of the board's continuing pattern of funding tangible, visible Seminole County infrastructure alongside its scholarship program, though an exact date could not be confirmed. The foundation's own published past-recipients page runs only through the 2021 scholarship class (18 recipients that year, drawn from Seminole, Varnum, Wewoka, and Westmoore high schools), with no 2022-2026 classes posted — grant seekers should not assume the absence of newer postings means the scholarship program has paused; it more likely reflects the site simply not being kept current, consistent with the foundation's minimal web presence. Board leadership (Chairman Bryan Cain, Vice Chairman Jamie Ann Strickland, Secretary Keith Claybrook) has remained stable across the filing years reviewed, with no reported leadership turnover. There is no evidence of a new program launch, strategic plan, or funding-priority announcement in 2025-2026; the safest assumption for applicants is business-as-usual continuity of the education-and-community giving pattern documented above.

There is no formal application form or online portal — the foundation's own IRS filing states plainly that no specific form is required and that a written request need only "identify the nature of the request." This favors a direct, well-written letter over a polished grant-application packet: lead with a one-paragraph statement of what you're asking for and why, and get to the Seminole County or Oklahoma-education connection in the first few sentences, since that link is the single strongest predictor of funding based on the 87.5% in-state concentration of tracked grants. Scholarship applicants must be Oklahoma high school seniors, with explicit preference for Seminole County school graduates (Seminole, Wewoka, and surrounding districts dominate the published recipient rosters) — applicants from outside Seminole County should not assume disqualification but should expect to be a lower priority unless they can show a personal or family tie to the area. The foundation values "high moral character" and "a desire to further their education" in its own words — character references, community-involvement descriptions, and a clear statement of post-graduation goals will matter more here than in a metrics-driven application. A common mistake would be treating this like a large institutional funder: there is no multi-stage LOI-to-full-proposal-to-site-visit pipeline, no published deadline, and no grants-management system, so over-engineering a submission (long narrative budgets, logic models, etc.) is more likely to read as a mismatch than as diligence — keep the ask concise and personal. Because renewal scholarships require semester-by-semester reapplication and continued rule compliance, ongoing recipients should build a light-touch update habit (a short note each term) rather than assuming a one-time award. For organizations (as opposed to individual scholarship applicants), the strongest opening is a warm connection through an existing grantee relationship — East Central University, Seminole State College, and the Seminole Nation Historical Society have each received four or more separate gifts, suggesting the board renews familiar relationships readily; a cold approach from an out-of-state or non-education nonprofit is the least likely profile to succeed given the data. Contact directly via jearlsmartfoundation@gmail.com since no separate program-officer or portal contact was found; given the volunteer board structure, expect a slower, informal response time and be prepared to follow up.