Common Good Grant Ceremony Recognizes Student Involvement in Nonprofit Sector

The Common Good Grant program is one of the McKeen Center's most popular initiatives, as it allows students to gain real-world experience in the nonprofit sector while also supporting essential community organizations. 

Early in the year, students admitted into the program split into two groups: the grant committee and the development committee.

The grant committee receives applications from community partners and evaluates them to determine which will receive funding. Meanwhile, the development committee connects with potential donors to solicit additional resources to increase the amount of money students can award. 

The program began in 2001, when an anonymous donor committed to contributing $10,000 to go toward the grants each year. Since its inception, the program has awarded over 200 grants totalling over $490,000.

This year, the students received forty-four letters of intent from organizations. In the end, they awarded $36,000 in grants to ten organizations in the greater-Brunswick area.

Samantha Cogswell ’11, who serves as associate director of the McKeen Center and oversees the program, opened the Wednesday event by describing what the ceremony means to her, having served on a committee herself during her time as a student at Bowdoin.

“Participating in the program transformed my understanding of the nonprofit sector and made me critically reflect on the way that philanthropy shapes the sector. I feel incredibly lucky to share the passion I feel for this impactful program with the Bowdoin student community, our local community partners, and everyone in attendance tonight,” Cogswell said.

The committee’s two student leaders this year, Pranav Vadlamudi ’26 and Kavi Sarna ’25, followed by speaking about the importance of the grant program to the College and the community.

“The Common Good Grant program has not only given Bowdoin students the opportunity to gain experience with grant writing, fundraising, and nonprofit operations, but has also allowed them to connect with their community and each other while sitting in on panels about current issues in Midcoast Maine and conducting site visits with organizations,” Valdamudi said. 

Jiahn Son ’25, who sat on the development committee, thanked the program’s supporters for their donations, highlighting the impact of each dollar.

“Thank you so much to all our donors,” Son said. “The funds you’ve contributed this year will have a significant impact within the organizations that have received tonight’s grants and on the community at large.”

Students from the program spotlighted the grant recipients. The ten organizations span many areas, including environmental advocacy, English language education, and hunger prevention for children. These groups also serve many communities around Bowdoin, from Brunswick to Lewiston and Portland.

2025 Common Good Grant Recipients

• Bath Area BackPack Program: Working to help children struggling with food insecurity at home, the Bath Area BackPack Program distributes food to families, provides snacks in school, and supplies food to community centers. The Common Good Grant will help stock the Bath YMCA Veggie Van, which dispenses food from local grocery stores to families.
• Children’s Oral Health Network of Maine: This program works to improve children’s oral health across the state, especially by promoting healthy habits from a young age. The grant will help support the Dental Health Project, which provides oral care kits to low-income families, as well as dental hygiene education.
• Friends of Casco Bay: Friends of Casco Bay is an environmental group that combines science, community engagement, and advocacy to protect the health of Casco Bay. The grant funds the Seagrass Snapshot project to train volunteers to monitor the condition of seagrass in the bay.
• Home to Home: Based in Brunswick, Home to Home mitigates the impacts of intimate partner violence and abuse by providing supervised visitation services for custodial and noncustodial parents and their children. The grant will fund the project Hope for Lisa to provide visitation services, transportation scholarships, and court advocacy.
• Maine Access Points: Throughout the state, Maine Access Points works to recognize the resiliency of people who use drugs and works to provides harm reduction and public health services, including syringe services, overdose prevention, infectious disease testing and more. The grant will support their wound care program, which offers supplies and health education for participants. 
• Midcoast Literacy: Headquartered in Bath, Midcoast Literacy offers English language learning and literacy programs for families, adults, and children. The grant will help them develop their programs, including workplace literacy classes and read-together programs for children.
• Portland Housing Authority: Together with its community partners, Portland Housing Authority provides and expands affordable public housing and services in Portland. The grant will help to fund its youth-designed and youth-led Community Hope through Education Empowerment Training and Action (CHEETA) program to develop leadership skills in teens while helping them improve their communities.
• Sanctuary Baking: This organization, based in Harpswell, prepares high-quality meals and baked goods to deliver to people in need throughout the Midcoast. The grant will help Sanctuary Baking start a new program to provide healthy cooking classes to elementary school students, at-risk seniors, and new Mainers.
• Trinity Jubilee Center: Headquartered in Lewiston, Trinity Jubilee Center focuses on integrating refugees into Maine’s society, assisting with everything from housing to job applications to education. The grant will help the organization continue their essential work.
• Veggies to Table: Veggies to Table is a nonprofit that combats food insecurity in the Midcoast by growing and donating fresh organic produce and flowers. The grant will support the group’s Grow To Donate program, helping to fund the purchase of materials like seeds and equipment while ensuring the harvest is effective and sustainable.

Sarah Seames, director of the McKeen Center, concluded the event by saying that although the problems nonprofits face are daunting, the Common Good Grant program teaches students that there is always a way to create change.

“What moves me most about this evening is really getting to see the impact of what our students learn,” she said. “They learn most from this program that…even when we see really challenging times, there is hope, there is determination, there is perseverance.”