MUSCATINE, Iowa–Five years ago, when Charla Schafer got the chance to serve as president of the Community Foundation of Greater Muscatine, she embraced it. “The opportunity the Community Foundation provides to improve the quality of life in Muscatine and Louisa counties attracted me,” she reflected. “The Community Foundation works to engage people, leverage resources, and inspire solutions to address the community’s biggest challenges with upstream thinking.”
As president of the Community Foundation, Schafer enjoys the variety of what she does and her ability to support her colleagues in making measurable differences in people’s lives. “I am privileged to work alongside an outstanding team of mission-aligned, committed individuals and an amazing board,” she said. “I am proud of how we, with our donors at the center, catalyze ideas and collectively create capital mechanisms to achieve lofty goals, for instance, improving health care through the building of the new $20 million clinic or trialing new supplemental housing development options through 3D printing, but at the core, I am most proud every time an individual or child’s life is improved through work we are connected to, which is rooted from a charitable gift.”
This summer, Schafer has received an additional opportunity to use the skills she has honed at the Community Foundation to benefit others. She now serves on the board of the Iowa Council of Foundations, addressing important areas, such as increasing the amount of affordable housing, ensuring all students get a good education, and that people in both urban and rural areas have access to quality healthcare at the state level.
Charla Schafer, president of the Community Foundation of Greater Muscatine and member of the Iowa Council of Foundations board. Photo courtesy of the Community Foundation of Greater Muscatine.
The largest association in Iowa for philanthropic and granting bodies, community foundations, corporate foundations, individual and family foundations, and operating foundations all belong to the Iowa Council of Foundations. The council works to benefit all of its members by connecting them to resources that can further their missions in their communities. It also promotes a variety of causes, including increasing equity for all, encouraging disaster preparedness, supporting education, and encouraging youth to get involved with philanthropy. Schafer elaborated, “The Iowa Council of Foundations proactively and responsively provides an arrayed network of resources, advocacy, and dialogue for our community foundation and community’s success.”
By assisting with the activities and initiatives of the Iowa Council of Foundations, Schafer believes she can support the work of the Community Foundation of Greater Muscatine further and help spread some of its goals and initiatives across the state. “They focus on a state-wide level serving to improve communities,” explained Schafer: “This aligns with our local collective approach and philanthropic community development vision. I hope to support their work in achieving this.”
With her time on the Iowa Council of Foundations board just beginning, Schafer feels honored to take on this additional duty. “I am humbled to be asked and to participate on the Iowa Council of Foundation Board. I am excited to support their vision of a vibrant philanthropic ecosystem contributing to a thriving, equitable Iowa.”
