Dear Strategy Partners and Community Leaders of the Saint Luke’s Foundation,
Since April 2025, Saint Luke’s Foundation has engaged in a strategic refinement process to ensure our grantmaking remains responsive, focused, and community centered. This work included a partnership with The Engagement Group, peer learning with like minded foundations, internal evaluation and learning, community listening across our footprint, and a comprehensive review of our grantmaking strategies and applications.
Informed by community voice, we refined our strategies to better align with lived experience and the conditions that support belonging, well being, and long term vitality, drawing inspiration from the Vital Conditions for Health and Well Being Framework. While our goals and strategic direction remain the same, the language has been updated to more accurately reflect the needs and voices of the communities we serve.
Throughout this process, strategy partners remained central to our thinking. These refinements reaffirm our commitment to community centered efforts that advance health equity and are guided by community and strategy partners closest to the work.
As a result of this work, we have done the following:
- Transitioned away from the language of social determinants of health and adopted the Vital Conditions for Health and Well Being Framework.
- We have also introduced refined strategies shaped by evaluation and learning, including Placemaking and Placekeeping, Belonging and People Power, Economic Vitality, Holistic Well Being, and Lifelong Learning.
To support a seamless transition, strategy partners are encouraged to connect with their respective program officers to discuss how these refinements align with current and future work. We also invite you to visit our website to learn more about our updated strategies at saintlukesfoundation.org.
Thank you for your partnership and for your transformative work to strengthen the social and physical well being of individuals and families in the Buckeye Shaker, Woodhill, and Mount Pleasant communities surrounding Saint Luke’s, and throughout Cuyahoga County.
Thank you for your trust, your partnership, and your shared commitment to our mission.
Yours in Partnership,
Saint Luke’s Foundation Board and Staff