PRINCETON—When deciding whether to invest in a new idea, concept or product, it takes more than trusting the innovation will lead to discoveries that promote the public good. It’s about taking a comfortable risk to find out.
“Smart risk begins with investing in the right people and getting to know them very well and hopefully sticking with them,” Elizabeth Christopherson told of room full of business officials at a Princeton Regional Chamber of Commerce breakfast Wednesday morning at the Nassau Club.
Christopherson assumed her current role as president and CEO of the Rita Allen Foundation in 2009. Based in Princeton on Nassau Street and established about 60 years ago, the foundation has supported many scientists in the early stages of their careers and has grown to fund various other fields.
For more than 30 years, the organization has sponsored a scholars program that’s supported more than 100 scientists and researchers who made important advances in medical research, she said.
One of the problems about scientific investment is the public’s understanding of science and garnering its support, Christopherson said. But research can help better measure success and progress when people get on board, she said.
“We’re finding a movement right now that some of the private philanthropic dollars want to go toward results. Don’t we all want results?” she said. “But we also need to know that there’s a food chain of things and chain of events that we need that basic research to get those results.”
Jim Waltman, executive director of the Stony Brook-Millstone Watershed Association, asked Christopherson if she’s seen any trends or progress in trying to rally other funders to “take a risk on philanthropy” and other ideas, such as wastewater management and treatment.
“Nonprofits have a very complicated life. Most of them don’t have endowments, so that means every year, they start with a zero base again, having to build those relationships all again,” she said. “There is lots of work and energy around how to both articulate what their results are in the short-term and longer.”
Despite funding that has gone toward “transformative ideas,” federal dollars are “still the most important and largest source of funding for our scientists,” Christopherson said.
She also said the foundation is working on developing strategies to take what is learned about a new idea, share it and present it in ways that are meaningful to the public.
“If all of us continue to ask, ‘What if?’ in smart ways, then we can turn it into better ‘Guess what’s’ — innovations, discoveries, changes for the public good,” Christopherson said. “There’s a role for all of us to be thought leaders together.”
Nicole Mulvaney may be reached at nmulvaney@njtimes.com. Follow her on Twitter @NicoleMulvaney. Find The Times of Trenton on Facebook.