Turning generosity and MIT ingenuity into real-world impact. 

It’s easy to feel overwhelmed with the choice of how best to allocate your charitable giving. What causes do you care about most? Which organizations are most trustworthy? How do you know that your dollars are making the greatest impact they can?

At CSF, we’re committed to making giving simple and efficient. Our model ensures maximum community impact and organizational support—as well as maximum value for our donors.

Illustration of how funds go from the MIT to the larger Community


Building a better world—the MIT way.

CSF’s funding comes from staff and faculty across MIT. We raise those funds through the work of our CSF Advocates—helpful, dedicated, service-minded volunteers who can be found in just about every DLC!

MIT’s legacy of impact (local and global!) is thanks to the hard work, ingenuity, and generosity of people from every corner of the Institute—from the main campus in Cambridge, to Lincoln Laboratory in Lexington, and beyond. It’s proof positive that when all of us work together and apply that special brand of MIT know-how, great things are possible.

All give. No take.

100% of every dollar that staff and faculty contribute to CSF goes directly to our volunteer and nonprofit grantees. CSF pools those funds and maximizes our impact by giving together in support of specific MIT-involved projects all over Cambridge and Greater Boston.

That includes ideas and service initiatives developed by MIT community members, which is great in a couple of ways: it creates mission- and service-based learning opportunities for our students, celebrates the efforts of our colleagues, and ensures that MIT-style problem solving is being applied to challenges big and small. 

Putting the “trust” in trustees.

CSF grants are awarded, disbursed, and carefully managed by a volunteer board of trustees from across  the MIT community—including faculty, staff from campus and Lincoln Laboratory staff, alumni and graduate and undergraduate students. The board accepts applications two times a year, and makes three kinds of allocations:

  • Grants to MIT students, faculty, staff, and retirees for their community service initiatives.
  • Support for the work of local nonprofits through an allocation distributed and overseen by the MIT Office of Government and Community Relations.
  • Support for MIT students working on mutually-beneficial projects with local community organizations through an allocation to the MIT PKG Public Service Center.

Trustees engage with both emerging and longstanding community partners of the CSF, providing valuable guidance and oversight that ensures meaningful outcomes for each contribution. 

Stable resources. Community-led change.

While many giving platforms focus on seasonal, disaster response, or other one-time gifts, the CSF is structured to provide ongoing resources for initiatives and organizations that support our neighbors. So instead of relying on occasional and potentially inadequate or inconsistent funding around the holidays, nonprofit organizations receive seed funding distributed on a predictable, regular basis —making it easier for them to do things like buy materials or coach and oversee MIT volunteers.

Ultimately, our model gives great organizations the consistent financial resources they need to do the greatest possible good today, and make plans to do even better tomorrow.