About a published material on the Fairfield County’s Community Foundation website regarding the experience of the youth philanthropic council, the third bank revisits the idea not as a fleeting grant opportunity, but as a model for educating the new generation on understanding needs and making charitable decisions. The following text is prepared with intellectual adaptation that preserves the literary rights of the original source and addresses the most important question: how do we teach young people that grants are not just money distributed, but responsibilities that need to be understood before being granted?

Young people do not learn giving from lectures alone, nor is it enough to talk to them for long about the value of giving, the impact of grants, and the importance of community service unless we give them a genuine opportunity to see needs from the inside and to touch the precise distance between money as a number in a budget, and money when it becomes a decision that changes a person's life or opens a door for an underprivileged community.

Here, precisely, the idea of the "Youth Philanthropy Council" appears deeper than just a small initiative for distributing limited grants. At its core, it is an educational experience in philanthropy, where young people learn that grants are not merely an administrative procedure that starts with a request form and ends with an acceptance or rejection notification, but rather an ethical and cognitive responsibility that requires an understanding of need, the ability to listen, a sense of justice, and an awareness that every funding decision carries an impact that goes beyond the number written on the check.

In the model presented by the Fairfield County Community Foundation through the youth philanthropic council, young people do not remain in the position of recipients of information, but transition to being partners in understanding and decision-making. Local nonprofits submit requests for small grants, while council members learn about the nature of these organizations, and may participate in visits or volunteer opportunities that help them understand fieldwork before recommending financial support. Despite the modest amount of the grants, which range from $500 to $1,000, the true value of the model does not lie in the size of the funding, but in the way the relationship between young people and giving is redefined.

This transformation is important; because when philanthropy is presented to young people solely as a public virtue, it remains close to preaching, and when it is presented as a decision-making experience, it becomes closer to practical education. The difference between the two is significant. In the first case, the young person hears about the poor, students, the sick, and underprivileged communities, while in the second case, they learn how to read need, how to differentiate between an impactful project and another that is nicely presented but weak in its effect, and how to ask about the gap that the organization addresses, not just the quality of its presentation.

From this angle, youth philanthropy councils do not seem like just a side activity that grant-making institutions can organize on the margins of their programs, but can be viewed as an early school in the ethics of granting. A young person who sits in front of a funding request, ponders its goals, compares its impact, asks about the beneficiaries, and then connects that with a field visit or a volunteering experience does not learn giving as a fleeting emotional response, but rather as a responsible practice requiring wisdom and good judgment.

In the Saudi nonprofit sector, the need for such models increases with the expansion of civil work, the growth of grant-making institutions, and the increasing conversation about impact, sustainability, governance, and outcome measurement. However, this growth should not remain confined to executive leaders, specialized committees, and formal councils, as building a new generation of donors and social actors begins early, from the university, from school, from clubs, from family, and from the youth environments where their first perceptions of society and responsibility are shaped.

Many initiatives directed towards youth in philanthropic work are confined to quick volunteering, seasonal campaigns, or participation in events, which are important paths undoubtedly, but they are not sufficient to create a deep awareness of grants. Volunteering teaches young people to participate with their time and effort, while philanthropy councils teach them to ask: why do we support this entity over that one? What is the most pressing need? Who is the group less able to access opportunities? Does the project address the symptom or the cause? And does this funding create a temporary impact or open a longer path to change?

These questions are at the core of modern philanthropic education. Grants are not a charity from a higher party to a lower one, nor are they just a response to the best articulating request, but rather a responsibility to direct limited resources towards the clearest needs and the most effective impact. When young people learn this truth early, they move from the traditional conception of giving as "helping" to a deeper understanding of it as "social investment" in dignity, opportunity, and empowerment.

The Saudi nonprofit sector can draw inspiration from this model in various ways without simply copying it as is. Grant-making institutions can establish youth advisory councils that provide their members with a small budget to direct towards selected initiatives, community associations can design programs that engage young people in analyzing needs before implementing activities, universities can link volunteering to small grant labs run by students, while companies through social responsibility programs can create youth paths that allow new employees to understand how financial contributions turn into community impact.

More importantly, the experience must be genuine, not superficial. Young people do not need a council that bears their names while the adults make all the decisions, nor do they need a workshop that informs them what they should think before asking them to applaud at the end. They need a safe space to learn, the right to question, an opportunity to compare, and an experience in decision-making, even if the decision is limited in size. The small grant recommended by a young person after understanding, visiting, and discussing may have a greater impact on their awareness than ten lectures about the importance of giving.

For such councils to succeed in the Saudi environment, they should begin with a clear educational design. It is not enough to gather a group of young people and ask them to choose initiatives; they should first be introduced to concepts of need, impact, equity in access, governance, sustainability, and opportunity cost, and then provided with simple tools to read applications, visit projects, ask professional questions, and understand the difference between activity and outcome. Thus, the experience transforms from symbolic participation to practical training on sound philanthropic thinking.

It is also important that this type of initiatives is connected to local reality, not just imported models. In the Kingdom, there are diverse needs related to education, health, family, youth, skills, the environment, quality of life, and groups with less access to services. When young people participate in understanding these needs within their cities, regions, and neighborhoods, they discover that philanthropy is not a distant issue for them, but rather part of daily life questions: a student in need of guidance, a family needing empowerment, a young person seeking a skill, a patient needing support, and a community needing smarter and closer initiatives.

Here, giving becomes knowledge before it is money. A young person who learns to read need will not easily be deceived by the glitter of initiatives, will not confuse the intensity of activity with depth of impact, and will not approach grants as rewards for the most media-present entities. They will begin to search for the tougher question: where does the grant make a real difference? Who are those whose voices do not normally reach the decision-making table? And how can a limited amount open a door larger than its financial value?

This vision gives grant-making institutions an opportunity to build a new relationship with the young generation. Instead of asking: how can we attract youth to philanthropy? they can ask: how can we make them partners in understanding it? Instead of only training them on volunteering, they can give them an experience in analysis, prioritization, and decision-making. And instead of addressing them solely with the language of duty, they can place them in front of a real responsibility that makes them feel that their voices contribute to directing resources towards what deserves it.

This does not mean burdening young people with what they cannot handle, or prematurely turning them into complicated evaluation committees. The goal is to build a smart gradient that starts with small grants, simplified files, field visits, and open discussions, and then develops over time into a deeper understanding of grants and their impact. Educating about giving does not always start with large funds; it may begin with a small amount, a sincere question, a field visit, and a dialogue that makes the young person see the human being behind the request, not just the paper.

Engaging young people in grants also opens another equally important door, which is renewing the language of the nonprofit sector. When young people approach fieldwork, they bring not just enthusiasm, but a different sense of reading experiences, digital awareness, and an ability to notice the details that traditional institutions may overlook. They see how services are received, how stories are told, how beneficiaries feel, and how access to programs can be simplified. Thus, their presence in philanthropy councils serves not just themselves, but the institutions themselves.

Conversely, young people need to learn that giving is not just an emotional rush. Some issues are impactful on the surface, but do not address the roots of the problem; some initiatives are beautifully presented but poorly managed; and some silent needs lack striking images or easy stories, yet are more urgent. Hence the importance of young people learning early that fair grants are not always those that go to the most impactful story, but rather to the most deserving effect.

The Saudi nonprofit sector can turn this idea into a mini national program within grant-making institutions, major associations, and universities. Each grant-making institution can have a “Youth Philanthropy Council” consisting of students, graduates, and young employees, who receive brief training and then manage a small grant cycle under professional supervision. At the end of the cycle, the achievement is not just the distribution of limited amounts, but graduating young people who understand the meaning of need, recognize the responsibility of charitable money, and know that a grant is not just a financial donation, but a grant of trust, decision, and impact.

Such experiences can reshape the relationship of the new generation with the nonprofit sector. A young person who participated in selecting an educational grant, visited an association working with an underprivileged group, or discussed a project that opens opportunities for training and work will no longer see philanthropy as a seasonal image or a fleeting fundraising campaign. Instead, they will see it as a system of thought, as a bridge between resources and needs, and as a practical way to turn empathy into organized impact.

In the end, the importance of the Youth Philanthropy Council lies not in distributing small grants, but in opening an early door for youth to the deep meaning of granting. It tells them that giving is not just good intent, and that money does not become an impact merely by leaving an account, but when it passes through sincere understanding, professional questioning, and responsible decision-making.

And when young people learn grants in this way, we prepare them not only to be better volunteers but to be more conscious donors, community leaders more sensitive to needs, and citizens aware that social responsibility does not always begin with having much money, but with the ability to understand where little money should go.

This article was prepared with adaptation and inspiration from material published on the Fairfield County’s Community Foundation website regarding the Youth Philanthropy Council grant opportunity for 2026, while preserving the literary rights of the original source.