Q: What inspired the idea behind the Best Practices NGO Leadership Academy?
Haldun Tashman: The idea really comes from my own experience in business and from something I have believed for a long time: there is always a better way of doing things, and one of the best ways to improve is to learn from people who are already doing something exceptionally well.

We were in the medical device plastics business in the United States, in a very competitive industry. At one point, I attended a seminar with Dr. W. Edwards Deming, who became famous for his work on quality and management and for helping transform manufacturing practices in Japan. He was already in his 90s when I had the opportunity to hear him. That experience had a tremendous impact on me. It changed the way I thought about management, quality, leadership, and improvement.

Q: What did you take away from Deming’s philosophy?
Haldun Tashman: One of the most important lessons was that quality does not happen simply because people work harder. You have to design systems that help people succeed and that prevent mistakes from happening in the first place. He taught us to look continuously at the system: Where are the problems? Why are they happening? What can we change so they do not happen again?

The idea of continuous improvement stayed with me. You never reach a point where you say, “We are finished. We know everything.” You continue asking: How can we do this better? We brought many of those principles into our own company. In a very competitive industry, we were ultimately able to become one of the leading companies in our field, particularly when it came to quality.

Q: How did learning from others influence the way you ran your company?
Haldun Tashman: I was always looking outside our own company. Who is doing this better than we are? What are they doing differently? What can we learn from them? I would go to Germany, attend trade fairs, visit companies, talk to people, and observe how other organizations operated. Sometimes you discover very simple things that completely change the way you work.

For example, at one point we were operating our facilities five days a week while others in the industry were operating seven days. Simply changing the way we thought about our production schedule gave us the ability to significantly increase capacity. You cannot assume that because you have been doing something one way for many years, it is the best way. Knowledge often comes from outside. That has stayed with me throughout my life.

Q: Why do you think this idea is especially important for nonprofit leaders?
Haldun Tashman: Because the principle is exactly the same. Whether you are running a company, a nonprofit organization, or any institution, you should always be asking: How can we become better at what we do? There are best practices in governance. There are best practices in fundraising, finance, management, communications, transparency, hiring people, developing staff, building trust, and working with your board.

You do not have to discover all of these things yourself. Someone somewhere has already learned something that can help you. The purpose of this Academy is to open that door and give nonprofit leaders an opportunity to learn from experts, from organizations that have developed strong practices, and from one another. “Someone somewhere has already learned something that can help you.”

Q: Why should a nonprofit leader participate in the Academy if they are already experienced?
Haldun Tashman: Because learning has no age. It is a little like an athlete going to a training camp. Even the best athletes continue working with coaches. They continue practicing. They study what other great athletes are doing because they still want to improve. Leadership should be the same.You may already know some of the things your organization needs. Maybe you know you need to improve fundraising, governance, financial management, or communications.
But there are also things you do not yet know that you need to know.That is very important.There are things you are aware you need to learn, and there are things you have not yet discovered. A program like this gives you the opportunity to find both.

Q: What do you hope participants will gain from the Academy?
Haldun Tashman: I hope they leave asking better questions.
How do we gain people’s trust?
How do we become more transparent?
How do we fundraise more effectively?
How do we select and develop good people?
How do we work better with our board?
How do we create systems that allow our organization to grow?
How do we build quality into everything we do?

An organization is made up of many processes. Even something that seems very simple, such as thanking a donor, is part of a larger process. Hiring someone is a process. Training people is a process. Continuing education should be a process. When you start looking at an organization this way, you can begin designing better ways of working rather than simply reacting to problems. My hope is that participants will not only learn new ideas, but will go back to their organizations and put those ideas into practice.

Q: What does “best practices” mean to you?
Haldun Tashman: Best practices does not mean copying someone else.It means looking at people who are achieving excellent results and understanding the principles behind what they are doing. Then you ask: What can I learn from this? How can I apply it to my organization? How can we make it work for us? That is how organizations grow. You look outside. You learn. You adapt. You practice. And then you continue improving. There is always something more to learn and always a better way of doing something.

Q: Why is investing in leadership so important to you?
Haldun Tashman: Giving grants is important. Organizations need financial resources to do their work. But I believe giving people knowledge can be an even greater gift. Money can support a project. Knowledge can change the way someone leads an organization for many years.

If you can help a leader become better at managing people, raising funds, building trust, creating strong systems, or developing the organization, that knowledge continues to create value long after the original investment is made. That is what I hope this Academy can do. We are opening a door. We are bringing knowledge, experience, and people together. What participants do with that opportunity is up to them. But the goal is very simple: Learn from the best. Apply what you learn. And never stop asking, “How can we do better?”


About Haldun Tashman
Haldun Tashman is an entrepreneur, business leader, and philanthropist with a long-standing commitment to education, community building, and strengthening institutions. Born in Bolu, Türkiye, he graduated from Robert College in Istanbul in 1966 and came to the United States as a Fulbright Fellow to attend Columbia Business School. After completing his MBA, he began his career at Deloitte in New York before moving to Phoenix, Arizona, and embarking on his entrepreneurial career.

Tashman became co-owner and manager of The Tech Group, Inc., a plastics contract-manufacturing company serving the pharmaceutical, medical device, consumer products, and personal care industries. Together with his business partner, Steve Uhlmann, he grew the company into an international enterprise with approximately $200 million in annual sales and 12 manufacturing locations across three continents. The Tech Group was acquired by West Pharmaceutical Services in 2005.

Following his business career, Tashman increasingly turned his attention to philanthropy. His own experience with the Arizona Community Foundation introduced him to the potential of the community foundation model: bringing people together around shared needs, creating structures for effective giving, and building institutions that can serve communities over the long term. He and his wife, Nihal, also helped bring that model to Türkiye through the establishment of the Bolu Community Foundation, the country’s first community foundation.

In 2007, Tashman brought that same vision to the Turkish-American community as one of the founders and Founding Chairman of Turkish Philanthropy Funds (TPF). His goal was not simply to create another charitable organization, but to build a trusted platform through which people could come together, give strategically, and strengthen civil society in Türkiye. Today, he serves as Chairman Emeritus of TPF, continuing a relationship with the organization that has spanned nearly two decades.

The Best Practices NGO Leadership Academy reflects the next chapter of that philosophy. Drawing on lessons from a lifetime in business, philanthropy, and institution building, Tashman believes that financial resources alone are not enough to build strong organizations. Leaders also need access to knowledge, effective management practices, new perspectives, and opportunities to learn from those who are doing things well.

Through the Haldun Tashman Fund at TPF, his support of the Academy represents an investment not just in individual nonprofit leaders, but in the long-term strength and effectiveness of civil society in Türkiye.

About the Best Practices NGO Leadership Academy
The Best Practices NGO Leadership Academy is a nine-month leadership development program for nonprofit leaders in Türkiye, created in partnership by Turkish Philanthropy Funds (TPF) and Arizona State University’s Lodestar Center for Philanthropy and Nonprofit Innovation, with support from the Haldun Tashman Fund at TPF.

The Academy brings together a select cohort of nonprofit professionals to strengthen their leadership and organizational capabilities through executive education, peer learning, and practical application. Participants explore areas such as governance, financial management, fundraising, communications, organizational sustainability, and leadership, while applying what they learn to real challenges within their own organizations.

At its core, the Academy is designed around a simple idea: strong organizations are built by leaders who continue to learn, question, improve, and learn from others.


About W. Edwards Deming
W. Edwards Deming was an American statistician, professor, and management thinker whose ideas helped shape modern approaches to quality and organizational improvement. He became especially influential through his work with Japanese industry after World War II and later through his widely known 14 Points for Management. At the center of Deming’s philosophy was the belief that leaders should continually improve the systems in which people work, rather than simply focus on individual errors. His ideas on quality, learning, and continuous improvement influenced organizations around the world.

By Şenay Ataselim-Yılmaz, PhD

This week, I joined a table discussion at the Clinton Global Initiative titled “Disaster Response and Beyond: How Humanitarian Actors Can Drive Long-term Recovery and Resilience.” Led by GlobalGiving, and moderated by Taylor Dudley from Center for Disaster Philanthropy,  the conversation focused on a challenge that has become increasingly important across humanitarian and philanthropic work: how to bridge the gap between immediate disaster response and the much longer process of recovery.

We discussed what it means to plan for recovery early, to recognize local community organizations as responders in their own right, and to create greater continuity between emergency funding and the longer-term investments communities need to recover, adapt, and become more resilient.

The conversation felt especially timely for me because these are questions we have been wrestling with at Turkish Philanthropy Funds for the last few years.

Since the February 2023 earthquakes in Türkiye, our Earthquake Fund has moved through several distinct stages from immediate relief to recovery, from recovery to resilience, and now toward sustainability. Throughout that journey, we have repeatedly asked ourselves not only what communities need next, but also what our own role should become as those needs evolve. And, increasingly, one question has come to the center:

How does a disaster fund leave responsibly?

When a disaster strikes, philanthropy knows how to move quickly. Money is raised. Emergency grants are made. Food, shelter, health care, education, and psychosocial support become immediate priorities. Donors want to help, nonprofits mobilize, and funders build new partnerships at extraordinary speed. But the harder work begins when the emergency phase ends: public attention moves on, giving declines, and emergency funds begin to close while communities remain in the long process of recovery.

If disaster philanthropy is meant to contribute not only to survival but to long-term recovery and resilience, then responsible exit cannot be something we think about only when the money is nearly gone. At TPF, this is not a question we have started asking only now, as we approach the conclusion of our Earthquake Fund. Since 2023, we have repeatedly asked how long earthquake-specific philanthropy should continue, how the needs of affected communities were changing, what role TPF should play at each stage of recovery, and what would need to be in place before we could responsibly step away. Throughout this process, our understanding of what should come next has been shaped by the organizations working in affected communities, their staff, and the people they serve.

For us, locally led recovery does not mean stepping away from strategy or from the responsibility that comes with stewarding philanthropic resources. It means building that strategy with a much deeper understanding of what local organizations are seeing, what communities are experiencing, and how needs are changing over time. TPF still has a responsibility to assess results, financial accountability, organizational capacity, sustainability, and the overall use of limited resources. But those decisions should be grounded in ongoing dialogue with the organizations closest to the work and informed by the priorities and realities they bring forward. In that sense, our role is not to determine the future of local organizations, but to use philanthropy strategically in ways that strengthen their ability to shape that future themselves.

More than three years after the earthquakes, TPF’s Earthquake Fund has mobilized more than $20 million from more than 100,000 donors around the world and supported a broad network of civil society organizations working across earthquake-affected communities. Over that period, our grantmaking evolved significantly from immediate humanitarian relief to education, mental health, livelihoods, women’s economic participation, youth development, disability inclusion, social cohesion, environmental recovery, and the strengthening of local civil society. We supported organizations responding to urgent needs, but we also invested in locally rooted actors, partnerships, and community capacity that could play a role long after the emergency itself had passed.

That evolution required us to continually reassess what recovery meant. At different stages, the right intervention looked very different: first meeting urgent needs, then helping communities regain stability, then strengthening resilience, and increasingly asking what institutions, services, relationships, and local capacities need to remain in place for the long term. The Earthquake Fund therefore became more than a sequence of grants; it became an evolving recovery strategy shaped by changing conditions on the ground and by what we were learning from our partners.

From relatively early in that evolution, we also knew that a fund created in response to an extraordinary disaster could not, and should not, become permanent. The question was never simply when to stop funding. It was how to build toward an exit responsibly, while protecting the strongest organizations, capacities, and approaches that had emerged through the recovery.

Exit Planning Should Begin Long Before the Exit

In disaster philanthropy, exit is sometimes treated as the final administrative stage of a fund: the budget runs down, final grants are made, reports are collected, and the fund closes. We believe that thinking about exit only at that point is too late. Exit planning should influence decisions much earlier, including which organizations are funded, whether local capacity is being strengthened, whether organizations are becoming dependent on emergency resources, whether programs are responding to current rather than historical needs, and whether funders are helping build institutions that can survive after extraordinary philanthropic attention subsides.

What do communities and local organizations identify as important to sustain when TPF is no longer funding this work?

Disaster Response Has a Life Cycle 

The first months after the earthquakes demanded speed. TPF supported organizations responding to immediate humanitarian needs and helping communities navigate extraordinary disruption. But the needs did not remain static. As emergency response moved into recovery, our grantmaking evolved toward education, mental health, livelihoods, women’s economic participation, youth, disability inclusion, social cohesion, environmental recovery, and longer-term community resilience.

Emergency Response → Recovery → Resilience → Sustainability

This progression reinforced something that now shapes our broader approach to disaster philanthropy: a disaster fund should not be viewed simply as a pool of money distributed through a succession of grants. It has a life cycle, and each stage requires different forms of capital and asks different questions. At first, the question is what people need right now; later, it becomes what will enable communities to recover, what capacities will make them more resilient, and eventually what needs to be sustainable without us. A funder that continues answering the first question long after the context has changed risks extending an emergency model beyond its usefulness. We believe responsible philanthropy has to move with the community.

The Danger of Staying Too Long, and Leaving Too Quickly

There are risks on both sides of philanthropic exit. Leaving too quickly can destabilize organizations that have become essential parts of local recovery. Disaster-response organizations may have hired teams, built community trust, developed specialized expertise, established local partnerships, and assumed responsibilities that did not exist before the crisis. Abrupt withdrawal can put all of that at risk.

Staying indefinitely carries its own risks. Emergency philanthropy can unintentionally become part of an organization’s permanent financial model. Activities can continue because funding remains available rather than because they still represent the highest priority. Organizations may delay building diversified revenue because disaster-specific support continues. Responsible exit, therefore,  requires navigating between two undesirable outcomes: Our goal has been neither to withdraw suddenly nor to sustain every organization and program indefinitely, but to help organizations and investments that have demonstrated meaningful value to their communities and have a credible path forward beyond earthquake-specific philanthropy.

From Funding Projects to Asking What Should Remain

One of the most significant shifts in our thinking has been moving from asking “What should we fund next?” to asking “What should remain after we leave?” Those questions sound similar, but they lead to very different grantmaking decisions. A successful program may still not warrant another grant; an organization may have performed extremely well but need a different kind of support; and a smaller investment in organizational capacity might ultimately create more lasting value than another year of program delivery.

A project might also need to end while the knowledge, network, trained staff, or community capacity developed through it should remain. Once the exit becomes the lens, the objective changes. The goal is no longer continuation for its own sake, but helping ensure that the value communities and local organizations have built can endure.

Our Exit Strategy Has Two Phases

After years of observing how the recovery evolved and discussing what a responsible transition should look like, TPF is structuring the final stage of the Earthquake Fund around two complementary approaches. The first focuses on helping locally rooted organizations strengthen their ability to remain effective and sustainable; the second focuses on successful investments whose impact may benefit from one final strategic grant.

Phase One: Institutional Sustainability

Some organizations that became important parts of the recovery ecosystem are deeply rooted in earthquake-affected communities. They have built trust, knowledge, relationships, staff capacity, and physical presence that would be difficult to recreate. Yet many operate in an increasingly difficult funding environment as international and domestic attention shifts elsewhere. For a selected group of these organizations, TPF will provide flexible institutional support for up to two years.

We have been very deliberate about what this funding represents. It is not simply two more years of operating support. It is intended to serve as a bridge to sustainability. Organizations will be expected to use this period to strengthen areas such as strategic planning, governance, fundraising, revenue diversification, financial systems, partnerships, organizational infrastructure, and leadership, while articulating how they intend to operate in a world where TPF’s Earthquake Fund no longer exists.

If this organization is important to the long-term well-being of its community, what must become stronger now so that it can remain there without depending on earthquake-specific philanthropy?


That distinction matters because philanthropy often invests heavily in programs and not enough in the institutions responsible for delivering them. Long-term recovery ultimately depends upon capable local organizations, not permanently funded emergency projects.

Phase Two: Strategic Final Investments

Our second phase asks a different question. Across several years of grantmaking, some projects, partnerships, services, and models have demonstrated meaningful results, and in some cases, one additional investment may allow those results to become more durable. TPF will therefore consider a limited number of strategic follow-up grants to current and recent partners, but these will not be conventional renewals, and strong past performance will not, by itself, qualify an organization for another grant.

Instead, we will ask why TPF should make one more investment in the work before we leave, and what will remain because we did. A strong proposal might institutionalize a successful model, help transition a service to local ownership, strengthen a network that no longer needs TPF at its center, leverage another funder or partner, or preserve knowledge, infrastructure, skills, or local capacity developed through previous investments. The important distinction is between funding continuation and funding transition. Those are not the same thing.

The Exit Criteria Matter

We also want our decisions to be disciplined. Relationships become deep during disaster response. Funders and grantees work through difficult circumstances together, sometimes for years. And that trust matters enormously. But relationships alone cannot determine final investments. We are reviewing opportunities through several lenses: whether the previous investment demonstrated strong results, whether the need remains relevant today, why additional funding is required, what will be different because another grant is made, what lasting value will remain, whether there is a credible pathway beyond TPF funding, and whether the organization has demonstrated strong financial stewardship and reporting.

We are also asking whether each investment makes sense not only on its own, but as part of the final Earthquake Fund portfolio. That question becomes increasingly important as a disaster fund matures. At the beginning, the unit of analysis is often the immediate need; near the end, it should increasingly become the ecosystem.

Look at the Ecosystem, Not Only the Grants

After years of grantmaking, funders have an unusual vantage point because they can see across organizations, geographies, issues, and approaches. That creates a responsibility to step back and ask which organizations are recognized by their communities and partners as important local anchors, where local capacity has grown, where critical gaps remain, which services are duplicated, where local organizations and communities are already taking greater ownership, and what support may help that transition.

These questions sometimes produce uncomfortable answers. Not every successful project will require continued philanthropic support, and in some cases the right outcome may be a transition, adaptation, or responsible conclusion shaped with local partners. That is precisely why exit needs a strategy.

One of the most important lessons we have learned is that sustainability does not mean permanence. Philanthropy sometimes treats the continuation of a program as evidence of success. But some interventions exist because an emergency created an extraordinary need. If that need changes, continuing the intervention indefinitely may not be the right objective.

A program can end successfully. A temporary service can accomplish its purpose. What matters is whether the value created through the investment remains. Perhaps people were trained. A community network was established. An organization became stronger. A methodology was documented. A partnership was institutionalized. Local leadership developed. Knowledge remained in the community. The activity may conclude while the impact continues. That is a very different understanding of sustainability, and one particularly important in disaster philanthropy.

Measure What Remains

The philanthropic sector is understandably interested in what happens while a disaster fund is active: how much money was raised, how quickly it was deployed, how many grants were made, and how many people were reached. Those are important measures. But as we move toward the final years of TPF’s Earthquake Fund, we have become increasingly interested in another set of questions: what will remain five years from now, which organizations and partnerships will still be serving their communities, which capabilities will have become institutionalized, whether organizations will have diversified their funding, and whether communities will be better equipped to navigate the next crisis.

Those outcomes are much harder to capture in a grant report, but they may ultimately tell us more about whether disaster philanthropy succeeded.

Exit Is Part of the Response

Perhaps the most important lesson from our experience is that an exit strategy should not be thought of as something separate from disaster response. Thinking about how you leave changes how you enter. It encourages funders to invest earlier in local institutions, creates greater discipline around temporary programs, forces conversations about financial dependency, and puts sustainability on the table before the final grant.

TPF did not arrive at its Earthquake Fund exit strategy overnight. It has emerged from years of grantmaking, observation, conversation, adjustment, and sometimes difficult questions about our own role. The discussion at CGI this week reinforced something our own experience has been teaching us for several years: the transition from humanitarian response to long-term recovery requires deliberate planning and sustained attention.

If we want communities to emerge from disasters stronger and more resilient, funders must think beyond the immediate response, not only about what comes next for communities, but also about what comes next when philanthropic funding itself begins to recede. That requires planning for local ownership, institutional strength, financial sustainability, and the eventual transition away from disaster-specific funding. In that sense, exit is not separate from disaster response; it is part of responsible disaster response.

The February 2023 earthquakes required TPF to move quickly. Leaving requires something different: the responsibility to support a thoughtful transition as communities move from recovery toward longer-term resilience.  The success of a disaster fund should not ultimately be measured only by what happened while the funder was present, but also by what remained strong enough to continue after the funder was gone.

After welcoming 200 children affected by the February 6 earthquakes, Darüşşafaka’s student body has surpassed 1,000 for the first time in its history. To ensure no child is turned away, the school is now rebuilding its Maslak campus to expand capacity—creating more opportunities for future generations of leaders, dreamers, and changemakers. The Doluca Family is matching $250K in donations, with only $44K remaining—doubling the impact of every gift.

Support Darussafaka

lkyar works to ensure that children in rural Turkey have access to quality education and the resources they need to thrive—from books and libraries to hands‑on learning experiences that ignite curiosity and confidence. Your support helps sustain these vital programs and expands opportunities for students and teachers in underserved communities, keeping them connected to learning, growth, and their dreams for the future. An anonymous donor is matching gifts up to $5K, with $1.3K remaining—doubling the impact of your contribution.

Support Ilkyar

Nakiye and Ziya Boyacigiller exemplified generosity, leadership, and a lifelong commitment to empowering others—advancing education, women’s empowerment, and cultural life in Türkiye. In honor of their enduring legacy, their close friend Canan Kadioglu invites you to support the scholarship fund at Boğaziçi University, opening doors and creating opportunities for future generations. While the Basol Family’s matching gift has run out, the Karacam Family still has $2.5K in matching funds available, so your gift can go even further by doubling its impact.

Support BUMED

At TPF, we are committed to supporting initiatives that expand healthcare access and improve the well-being of women and girls across Türkiye. When women can access the care they need, it strengthens their ability to work, study, and plan for the future.

Join us on Wednesday, November 19th for our next Voices of Partners webinar, featuring Konuşmamız Gerek, KAMER,  and Türkiye Aile Sağlığı ve Planlaması Vakfı (TAPV). These dedicated organizations are advancing women’s health by promoting reproductive rights, providing essential health and preventive services, and supporting mental well-being and gender equality.

Together, we will explore how improving access to women’s health care creates ripple effects, strengthening families, supporting communities, and fostering a more equitable future for all.

Featured Speakers:

İlayda Eskitaşçıoğlu, Konuşmamız Gerek
Siibel Sakarya, TAPV
Nihal Çelik Ay, KAMER

We’ll be hosting a live Q&A session to answer your questions and provide deeper insights. We look forward to seeing you!

For these teachers, it wasn’t just about lessons. It was about building trust, offering stability, and helping children feel safe again. Many faced exhaustion, limited resources, and homesickness—but they kept going.

That’s where KODA’s Post-Disaster Rural Education Support Program made a difference. Through mentoring, workshops, and practical guidance, teachers gained the tools and confidence to connect with students, manage challenges, and create classrooms full of empathy and encouragement.

Today, these teachers are not just educators -they are mentors, guides, and sources of hope. And their students are thriving, learning, and discovering resilience every day.

We’re proud to stand with KODA, supporting teachers and communities as they rebuild hope, learning, and connection. Thank you for your support of the TPF Earthquake Fund. Together, we continue to build forward.

 TPF 2025 Year-End Giving Guide

As we approach the end of 2025, Turkish Philanthropy Funds (TPF) is here to help you make the most of your charitable giving. Whether you’re supporting causes you love or setting up long-term philanthropic plans, early preparation ensures you meet key tax deadlines and maximize your impact while aligning with updates from The One Big Beautiful Bill (OBBB).

The Impact of The One Big Beautiful Bill (OBBB)
The One Big Beautiful Bill (OBBB), passed earlier this year, has significantly reshaped the charitable giving landscape by expanding above-the-line deductions, raising AGI limits for cash contributions, and simplifying rules around Qualified Charitable Distributions (QCDs). Read our earlier updates on these changes here.

These changes make 2025 one of the most advantageous years in recent history for strategic, tax-smart philanthropy.

Donor-Advised Fund (DAF) & Bunching Strategy
If you’re unsure where to give but want to secure a deduction now, consider opening a Donor-Advised Fund (DAF) with TPF. A DAF allows you to contribute today, take an immediate deduction, and decide where to give later.

A popular “bunching” strategy lets you combine multiple years of donations into one, maximizing your deduction in 2025 while distributing grants over time.

New DAFs can be opened until noon on Tuesday, December 30, 2025.

Qualified Charitable Distributions (QCDs) from Your IRA
If you or your spouse are 70½ or older, each may contribute up to $100,000 directly from your IRA to TPF. Starting at age 73, QCDs can count toward your required minimum distribution (RMD), reducing taxable income.

Under OBBB, QCDs now have expanded annual limits (indexed for inflation) and can be made to certain split-interest entities, offering more flexibility for charitable planning. QCDs must be made directly from your IRA to TPF and cannot fund a DAF.

Donate Appreciated Stock
Gifting appreciated stock remains one of the most tax-efficient ways to give. You can:

• Avoid paying capital gains tax
• Claim a deduction for the stock’s full fair market value
• Increase both your impact and your tax savings

Here is an illustration of the value you would realize if you donated your appreciated stock to TPF:

For a direct stock donation with a value of $150K, you avoid $20,000 in capital gains tax while increasing your charitable deduction by the same amount.

To ensure timely processing, complete all stock transfers by Friday, December 19, 2025.

Important 2025 Deadlines
Check Gifts: Postmarked by December 31, 2025, or received by December 30 for express carriers.
Stock Gifts: Completed by Friday, December 19, 2025.
Wire Transfers: Initiated by Friday, December 26, 2025, to be received by December 30.
Online Contributions: Accepted until midnight, December 31, 2025.
Real Estate Gifts: Title transferred by December 19, 2025.
DAF Grant Recommendations: Submitted by Friday, December 5, 2025, to ensure grants are distributed in this calendar year. TPF DAF holders can make grant recommendations by logging into their account online.

For personalized assistance or to discuss the most effective strategies under OBBB, please contact:

Pinar Ozyurek

Director of Philanthropy, Turkish Philanthropy Funds

646.530.8988 | pinar@tpfund.org

This information is for educational purposes only and not intended as legal or financial advice. Please consult your tax or financial advisor for guidance specific to your situation.

A tablet is more than just a source of entertainment. Sometimes, it’s an educational tool that helps strengthen a child’s brain development. Sometimes, it’s music that gently stimulates and calms. And sometimes, it’s simply a much-needed distraction amid the rubble – something to hold onto after losing a favorite toy in the chaos.

With support from the TPF Earthquake Fund, the Tohum Autism Foundation has reached 2,000 children, helping strengthen their mental and emotional well-being, as well as that of their families.

Each tablet might be only 12 inches long, but the impact goes farther than we could all imagine. Thank you for giving them a new source of comfort and a new routine as they rebuild their lives

Strengthening teacher capacity is especially urgent. The latest PISA results place Türkiye 34th in mathematics and 33rd in science out of 81 countries, underscoring the need to equip teachers with the tools, training, and resilience required to prepare students for a rapidly changing world. By empowering teachers, we not only lift educational outcomes but also drive broader social and economic development—teachers are the catalysts for lifelong learning, civic participation, and innovation.

Through investments in professional development and mental health support for educators, we can improve classroom performance, enhance student well-being, and strengthen the very foundation of our communities. Together with our partners, we ensure that teachers are equipped to inspire, support, and rebuild, giving students the chance to learn, grow, and reach their fullest potential.

Join us at our upcoming Voices of Partners webinar on Wednesday, October 22nd, featuring ÖRAV (Öğretmen Akademisi Vakfı), Anadolu Vakfi, and Öğretmen Ağı. These organizations are shaping the future by reimagining teacher training, wellbeing, and professional development. From innovative classroom practices to building resilience in disaster-affected regions, their work demonstrates that supporting teachers is one of the most effective ways to advance educational goals and directly shape the future of entire communities.

Featured Speakers:
Arzu Atasoy, ÖRAV
Irmak Akıncı Canbaz, Öğretmen Ağı
Evrim Hizaler, Anadolu Vakfı

About ÖRAV (Öğretmen Akademisi Vakfı):

ÖRAV Vakfı is Türkiye’s first and only NGO dedicated to the professional and personal development of teachers. Through its innovative platforms and nationwide training programs, ÖRAV empowers educators to enhance their skills and adapt to modern teaching methods. By investing in teachers, ÖRAV strengthens the foundation of education, ensuring that every child has access to quality learning and the opportunity to thrive.

About Anadolu Vakfi:
Anadolu Vakfı is dedicated to supporting the social development of individuals and communities across Türkiye. Anadolu Vakfı has built and supported more than 50 educational institutions, dormitories, sports facilities, hospitals, and health centers, impacting countless lives. Through its initiatives, the foundation continues to invest in the future of Türkiye, fostering a brighter tomorrow for all.

About Öğretmen Ağı:
Öğretmen Ağı is a nationwide network that empowers teachers through collaboration, professional development, and peer support. With over 1,000 “Change Ambassadors” across 62 cities, the network fosters a culture of lifelong learning and collective impact. By connecting educators with diverse disciplines and resources, Öğretmen Ağı strengthens the teaching profession and drives educational transformation across Turkiye

Opening Fireside Chat brought together visionary leaders Hamdi Ulukaya, Chobani & Tent Foundation and Ahmet C. Bozer, Former Coca-Cola International as they discussed the transformative power of entrepreneurship in building a sustainable and inclusive future.

The Role Of Corporations In Social Impact Panel brought together Didem Altop, Treeo VC (Moderator); Ümran Beba, Former PepsiCo, August Leadership; Emine Sabancı Kamışlı, Esas Sosyal, Esas Holding; Sinan Uzan, Tekfen Ventures to discuss how can businesses play a pivotal role in integrating social responsibility into their business models and driving innovation in the process. Our panelists shared their insights, best practices, innovative concepts, strategic approaches, and visions for contributing to a more sustainable future.

Disaster Resilience Through Innovation Panel brought together Ülkü Rowe, Google Cloud (Moderator); Can Cömertoğlu, Google; Tammy Glazer, Microsoft AI for Good Lab; Ayşe Hortaçsu, AppliedTechnology Council; Jeff Schlegelmilch, Ph.D., Columbia University to discuss how innovative technology and sustainable practices can revolutionize our approach to disaster preparedness. Experts discussed the use of advanced predictive analytics for early warning systems and explore strategies to strengthen community defenses against future disasters. Rather than merely addressing disaster response, the panel explored reimagining disaster preparedness, striving towards a safer and more resilient world.

AI for Social Good brought together Aylin Uysal, Oracle (Moderator); Cenk Sidar, Enquire AI; Murat Sönmez, trusted.ai; Timur Cüceloğlu Yarnall, Neutronian, Amazon Web Services to discuss how AI is driving innovation and social impact to improve education, healthcare, disaster response, environmental conservation, and more. They also delved into ethical considerations, responsible AI use, and the role of AI in creating a more equitable and sustainable future.

Closing Fireside Chat: Can Tech Accelerate Social Impact? features Zeynep Tüfekçi, Ph.D., Princeton University, New York Times and Ayşegül İldeniz, Global Tech Leader how can technology accelerate social impact.

PHOTO GALLERY

Wednesday, September 17
Yusuf Kudret, Samandag Sports Academy
Mehmet Sarica, INOGAR
Deniz Toprak, Hatay Surf Center

1PM EST/ 20:00 TR

The February 6, 2023 twin earthquakes affected approximately 2.6 million youth and children, about 19% of the total impacted population. Each child and young person experienced the disaster differently, yet many now face similar challenges: trauma, post-traumatic stress, anxiety, depression, and disruptions to education and social development.

At TPF, we believe that recovery is not only about healing wounds but also about equipping younger generations with the skills they need to thrive. Beyond addressing invisible scars, we focus on building pathways for youth to regain a sense of security, agency, and belonging. What better way than introducing them to sports—offering them a chance to regain confidence, foster resilience, build friendships, and dream again? A critical tool for resilience, sports teach discipline, perseverance, communication, and collaboration—qualities that not only support healing but also prepare youth to face future challenges with resilience and courage. It allows young people to envision a future shaped by their own capacities rather than by the limitations of disaster.

At our upcoming Voices of Partners webinar on September 17, we’ll bring together three of our inspiring partners working at the intersection of sports, skills-building, and youth empowerment. Together, we’ll dive deeper into the challenges young people face in the earthquake region and share how these initiatives are helping to create a generation equipped with both the emotional resilience and the practical skills to rebuild their lives, and to see the world as a safe, hopeful place once again.

Featured Speakers:

We’ll be hosting a live Q&A session to answer your questions and provide deeper insights. We look forward to seeing you!