The Hershey Foundation

The Hershey Foundation operates as a small, deeply personal family foundation now in generational transition. Founded in 1986 by Jo Hershey Selden in memory of her husband Alvin A. Hershey, it was run by her three children for 35 years before a fourth-generation handoff in 2025 installed Sara B. Guren as President and CEO, alongside Zachary A. Guren (VP), Adam M. Guren (Treasurer), Debra Hershey Guren (Secretary), and directors Carole Hershey Walters and David J. Walters. The sole staff contact is Alecia May, Director of Foundation Administration.

Critically, the foundation has moved to a "proactive grantmaking" model: it explicitly asks organizations NOT to send unsolicited proposals or inquiries, and states applicants "may only apply for a grant if you receive an invitation." Board members identify prospective grantees themselves, typically organizations already embedded in the Cleveland arts, science, and Montessori-education ecosystem the family has funded for decades. This means the realistic path to funding is relationship-driven, not application-driven: getting on the board's radar — through shared board memberships, sector visibility, or introductions via existing grantees like Hershey Montessori School, Cleveland Museum of Natural History, or Cleveland Zoological Society — matters far more than a polished cold LOI.

For organizations that do receive an invitation, the process runs through the GrantInterface online portal and requires a program narrative (objectives, timeline, budget, funding sources), organizational overview, recent annual report and financial statements, a current board/officer list, and IRS determination letter. The foundation favors capital and endowment campaigns with tangible, child-facing outcomes — equipment, renovations, building capacity — over operating support, and explicitly will not fund salaries, technology, consulting, research, or general operating budgets. Multi-year commitments (2-5 years) are standard for larger capital asks, so first-time invited applicants should be prepared to structure a request as a phased campaign rather than a single-year ask. Given 2025 giving of just $625,000 across 19 grants and a shrinking $13.47M asset base, expectations should be calibrated: this is a boutique funder capable of one flagship gift near $300,000 a year — almost always to Hershey Montessori School — plus roughly a dozen $5,000-$25,000 grants across the rest of its Northeast Ohio portfolio.

Total assets have declined from $18,505,220 in FY2013 to $13,470,750 in FY2024 — a 27% drop — tracking a broader drawdown of the endowment as the foundation moves between generations of family leadership. Annual grants paid ranged from $563,000 (2021, pandemic-depressed) to $1,456,000 (2015) across the tracked decade, averaging roughly $1.05M/year, before falling further to $625,000 across 19 grants in 2025 — the smallest single-year total in the available record. The foundation's own typical-grant-size data (a 12-grant recent sample) shows a median of $22,500, an average of $46,917, and a full range of $1,000 to $300,000; the $300,000 outlier is the 2025 award to Hershey Montessori School, which alone accounted for 48% of that year's total giving.

Historically, Montessori-affiliated giving dominates the portfolio. Across the top 50 tracked grantees ($3,233,500 total across 97 grants, averaging $33,335/grant), Hershey Montessori School alone received $1,700,000 over 5 grants (COVID relief, sustainable-design capital work, and renovations). Combined Montessori-related giving — Hershey Montessori School, Montessori Development Partnerships, MDP, International Montessori Training Institute, Hudson Montessori School, and Ruffing Montessori School — totals approximately $2,232,000, or 69% of all tracked dollars. The remaining ~31% spreads thinly across Cleveland arts and culture (Cleveland Museum of Natural History, $80,000/4 grants; Cleveland Council on World Affairs, $80,000/4 grants; Cleveland Institute of Music, $40,000/2 grants), health-adjacent causes (Angie Fowler Adolescent Cancer Institute, $100,000/4 grants; Flying Horse Farms, $50,000/2 grants), and dozens of $2,000-$25,000 grants to nature centers, museums, and youth-serving nonprofits.

Geographically, 95 of 97 tracked grants went to Ohio recipients; the two exceptions were small ($1,500-$2,000) gifts to Washington DC-based field-infrastructure groups (National Center for Family Philanthropy, Foundation Center/Candid) rather than program grants — confirming the "Northeast Ohio children" mandate is essentially absolute for program funding. Multi-year structuring is common: several 2025 grants closed out pre-committed 3-5 year capital pledges, including Cleveland Zoological Society's Primate Forest grant (final year of 4) and Holden Forests & Gardens' Children's Garden repairs (year 3 of 4).

Hershey sits at the small end of this Northeast Ohio family-foundation peer set, closely matched in asset size to the now-shuttered Fowler Family Foundation but giving away roughly a fifth of what Reinberger distributes annually. Unlike Reinberger, which maintains a standing LOI process, Hershey and (formerly) Fowler both ran tightly invitation-controlled programs — a pattern common among small, family-governed Cleveland foundations that prefer proactive relationship management over open competitions. With Fowler's exit, Hershey is now one of relatively few sub-$15M family foundations in the region still actively funding children's Montessori, arts, and science programming.

The most consequential recent development is generational: in 2025 the Hershey family completed a leadership transition, installing Sara B. Guren as President and CEO after 35 years of governance by Jo Hershey Selden's three children. This coincided with the foundation's smallest annual grant total in the available record — $625,000 distributed to 19 organizations in 2025, versus $1,065,000 (2023), $827,000 (2022), and a 2012-2015 average above $1.2M/year. Total assets have fallen to $13,470,750 (FY2024) from $18,505,220 in FY2013, a 27% decline over roughly a decade, reflecting both market conditions and sustained payout against a shrinking corpus.

The headline 2025 grant was $300,000 to Hershey Montessori School for "Building Capacity towards Sustainability" — the school's largest single award on record and roughly half of all 2025 giving, underscoring its status as the foundation's flagship institutional relationship. Other 2025 awards closed out multi-year pledges: Cleveland Zoological Society's Primate Forest support concluded its 4-year cycle at $25,000, and Cleveland Institute of Music's Musical Pathway Fellowship entered year 4 of 5 at $20,000. Holden Forests & Gardens, Ruffing Montessori School, and Cleveland Metroparks all received installment payments on active multi-year capital commitments.

In the broader Northeast Ohio funder landscape, the similarly-sized Char and Chuck Fowler Family Foundation (~$12.3M in assets, also focused on education, arts, and adolescent cancer care) concluded its grantmaking operations entirely as of December 31, 2025 — removing a comparably-scaled peer funder from the region and potentially increasing competition for Hershey Foundation attention among NE Ohio children's organizations that previously had two similarly-sized options to court.

1. Do not cold-apply. The single most important fact about this funder: it explicitly states "you may only apply for a grant if you receive an invitation" and asks that unsolicited proposals not be sent. Time spent drafting an unsolicited LOI to Hershey is largely wasted — the board proactively identifies organizations of interest.

2. Build visibility the way past grantees did. Nearly 70% of tracked historical dollars went to Montessori education (Hershey Montessori School, Montessori Development Partnerships, Hudson and Ruffing Montessori Schools) with the balance going to well-known Cleveland arts/science/nature institutions (Cleveland Museum of Natural History, Cleveland Zoological Society, Holden Forests & Gardens, Cleveland Institute of Music). Organizations serving NE Ohio children through Montessori education, hands-on science/nature programming, or the arts — with any existing connection to this network — represent the realistic entry point, not the website's "apply" button.

3. If invited, move fast and complete on the GrantInterface portal. Invited applicants must supply a program narrative with budget and timeline, an organizational overview, recent financials, current board list, and IRS determination letter — have these current and ready before an invitation arrives, since the foundation "notifies grantees within a week of board approval."

4. Frame the ask as capital, not operating. The foundation explicitly will not fund salaries, technology, consulting, research/feasibility studies, or general operating support — it funds equipment with direct child impact, capital campaigns, and endowment campaigns. Translate program needs into capital-equivalent asks.

5. Propose multi-year, phased requests for larger amounts. Most 2025 awards above $20,000 were tranches of pre-agreed 2-5 year commitments (Cleveland Zoological Society, Holden Forests & Gardens, Cleveland Institute of Music, Ruffing Montessori). A phased 3-5 year capital plan aligns better with established practice than a single-year ask.

6. Keep geographic scope tight. 95 of 97 tracked historical grants went to Ohio organizations; the only exceptions were token $1,500-$2,000 gifts to national philanthropy-infrastructure groups, not program grants. Requests must serve Northeast Ohio children specifically.

7. Route all questions to amay@thehersheyfoundation.org (Alecia May, Director of Foundation Administration) — the foundation asks that applicants not call for status updates.