Graduation Year

2026

Document Type

Dissertation

Degree

Ed.D.

Degree Name

Doctor of Education (Ed.D.)

Degree Granting Department

Educational Leadership

Major Professor

Sarah Kiefer, Ph.D.

Committee Member

Veselina Lambrev, Ph.D.

Committee Member

Bárbara Cruz, Ed.D.

Committee Member

Candice L. Staples, Ph.D.

Keywords

higher education reform, organizational change, strategic philanthropy, systems change

Abstract

Philanthropic foundations have become influential actors in higher education reform, often supporting initiatives to improve student success, advance equity, and promote systemic change. Yet limited research has examined how philanthropic grantmakers understand and navigate their roles in shaping long-term change across the higher education field. This narrative inquiry explored the personal and professional experiences of eight philanthropic grantmakers working across different foundations, roles, and organizational contexts in the United States. Guided by organizational change theory, Strategic Action Fields theory, and sustainability planning in dynamic systems, the study examined how grantmakers made sense of their responsibilities, influence, and contributions to systemic change.

Data were collected through semi-structured interviews and analyzed using a hybrid thematic approach that combined inductive and deductive coding. Three themes emerged. First, participants’ lived experiences shaped their motivation, sense of purpose, and commitment to paying forward what they had learned. Second, participants viewed grantmaking as relational work grounded in humility and awareness of power dynamics. Third, participants navigated systems change through strategic focus and shared learning. Across the findings, grantmakers described influence as extending beyond funding alone. Their work involved interpreting strategy, building relationships, navigating power, supporting grantees and partners, and disseminating knowledge across the field.

The findings suggest that philanthropic grantmakers can help shape conditions for change, but they do not own the change itself. Systems change in higher education depends on the people and organizations closest to implementation, as well as the relationships, strategies, and learning processes that help ideas move across institutions and sectors. This study contributes to scholarship on higher education reform, philanthropy, and systemic change by centering grantmakers' perspectives as actors within a broader ecosystem of change. It also offers implications for practice, including the importance of humility, trust-building, strategic focus, and knowledge dissemination in supporting long-term change.

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