Jacobs Foundation

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The Jacobs Foundation is a foundation based in Zurich . It was founded on May 16, 1989 by the German-Swiss entrepreneur Klaus J. Jacobs and his family.

The main purpose is to promote innovation in child and youth development.

background

The private foundation is active worldwide in the field of child and youth development. It is guided by the “vision” of its founder, according to which a society can only be successful in the long term if it gives all of its members the chance of good education.

The foundation supports research projects, scientific institutions and practical intervention programs with an annual budget of around 40 million francs. It supports and accompanies activities that promise answers to how the life and learning process of young people can be optimally designed and supported for successful participation in society.

Board of Trustees

  • Christian Jacobs , President of the Board of Trustees, investor; Hamburg , Germany
  • Hans Ambühl , Secretary General of the Swiss Conference of Cantonal Education Directors; Bern , Switzerland
  • Lavinia Jacobs, freelance art consultant; Zurich, Switzerland
  • Nathalie Jacobs, PR consultant; Zurich, Switzerland
  • Ulman Lindenberger, Director, Max Planck Institute for Human Development; Berlin, Germany
  • Auma Obama, initiator and chairwoman of the Sauti Kuu Foundation; Munich, Germany
  • Marta Tienda, professor at Princeton University; Princeton (NJ), USA
  • Laura Tyson, professor at the University of California's Haas School of Business; Berkeley (CA), USA
  • Olaf von Maydell, entrepreneur and lawyer; Berlin, Germany

executive Director

  • László Nagy (1989–1995)
  • Theo Brenner (1995-2006)
  • Bernd Ebersold (2006–2012)
  • Sandro Giuliani (since 2013)

history

In 2001 the founder transferred all shares in Jacobs Holding AG, which had a market value of 1.433 billion Swiss francs at the time, to the foundation. With a value of 4.55 billion Swiss francs (December 31, 2013) and an annual distribution of 35 to 40 million Swiss francs, the foundation is one of the largest private foundations in Europe.

In November 2006, the foundation decided to support the private International University Bremen with 200 million euros until 2011; then the university was renamed Jacobs University Bremen . The University of Zurich received CHF 10 million to set up a center for youth research, the "Jacobs Center for Productive Youth Development", founded in 2001. The foundation also supports the Johann Jacobs Museum in Zurich, founded in 1984 (formerly known as the Museum of the Cultural History of Coffee ), which has been dedicated to the history of global trade routes since it reopened in 2013 .

Klaus J. Jacobs Awards

In honor of its founder, the foundation has presented two awards every year since 2009 for achievements in research and practice in child and youth development:

The Klaus J. Jacobs Research Prize honors scientific work with high social relevance for the personal development of children and young people. The foundation attaches great importance to the fact that scientific findings from interdisciplinary research flow into practice. The prize is endowed with 1 million Swiss francs.

The Klaus J. Jacobs Best Practice Prize recognizes the commitment of institutions or personalities who implement innovative solutions for child and youth development in practice. The prize money (as of 2017) is 1,000,000 Swiss francs.

The awards take place every year at the beginning of December at the University of Zurich in the presence of around 270 invited international guests from science, business, politics and society.

In 2018, to celebrate the tenth award, ten prizes were given to “social innovators and pioneers of change in the field of child and youth development”. From 2019, the Research Prize and the Best Practice Award will alternate annually.

Nomination process

Professional societies and experts worldwide in the field of child and youth research are entitled to nominate for the Research Prize. Self-nominations are not accepted. An international committee of currently nine experts selects a prize winner with an excellent track record in a multi-stage process.
The winner of the Best Practice Prize is determined by the Board of Trustees of the Jacobs Foundation.

Jury for the Klaus J. Jacobs Research Prize

(As of 2017)

Award winners

year Research Prize Best Practice Prize
2019 Daphne Bavelier (University of Geneva) for her work on changing cognitive skills through action video games -
2018 Boris Bulayev (Educate !, East Africa), Rana Dajani (We Love Reading, Jordan), Luke Dowdney (Fight For Peace, Brazil), Noreen M. Huni (REPSSI, South Africa), Lucia Kossarova (BUDDY, Slovakia), Nathalia Mesa ( aeioTU, Colombia), Selcuk Sirin (New York University, USA), Judy Stuart (Future Farmers Foundation, South Africa), Agatha Thapa (Seto Guran's National Child Development Service, Nepal), James Urdang (Education Africa, South Africa)
2017 Paul Bloom (Yale University) for his work on the development of a moral sense and conception War Child "for her program that aims to improve the living conditions of children in war zones by enhancing their psychosocial wellbeing and developing emotional resilience for their future."
2016 Orazio P. Attanasio (University College London, UK) for his work that combines economic models with field tests. ICS-SP in Nairobi, Kenya for combining science-based training for parents with training for agricultural enterprises.
2015 Sarah-Jayne Blakemore (University College London, UK) for her research on understanding emotional and social brain development in adolescence. Gesamtschule Unterstrass (Zurich, Switzerland) for their innovative project on social and emotional learning, which has included social skills in the Swiss curriculum.
2014 Michael J. Meaney (McGill University, Montreal, Canada) for his research on the mechanisms by which parental care is embedded in child biology. Serenity Harm Reduction Program Zambia (SHARPZ) for their evidence-based cognitive behavioral therapy for traumatized children and their families in Zambia.
2013 Greg J. Duncan (School of Education, University of California, Irvine) for research on the long-term effects of early childhood poverty. ELTERN-AG from Germany for their early education prevention program for families in particularly stressful situations.
2012 Dante Cicchetti (University of Minnesota) for his research on children's resilience and the developmental consequences of stressful living conditions. Off Road Kids Foundation for their national street social work for the benefit of runaways and street children in Germany.
2011 Michael Tomasello (Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology) for his research on the identification of exclusively human forms of cooperation, communication and cultural learning. Christiane Daepp for developing the Ideenbüro, a program that helps schoolchildren to take on responsibility and learn to work together.
2010 Terrie E. Moffitt and Avshalom Caspi (Duke University and King's College London) for their research on the interplay of genetic and social influences on the development of children and adolescents. The organizations Opstapje Deutschland e. V. and a: primo for their commitment to the early support of socially disadvantaged children through the successful implementation of a play and support program in Germany and Switzerland.
2009 Laurence Steinberg (Temple University) for his research on psychopathology and risk and decision-making behavior in adolescents. Father Johann Casutt for successfully adapting the Swiss model for vocational training for young people in Indonesia.

JUVENIR: The Swiss youth study series from the Jacobs Foundation

Juvenir is a representative series of studies on current topics for young people in Switzerland. As the only Swiss study series, Juvenir speaks not only about young people, but with them. Juvenir uses social media for this. The young people can discuss the results on Facebook. All interested parties have the opportunity to evaluate the results and, if necessary, to distance themselves from majority opinions. The studies are collected annually; the first study was published in 2012.

Studies

  • JUVENIR 1.0: Our place - young people in public space (release date 2012)
  • JUVENIR 2.0: The first big decision. How young Swiss people choose (vocational) training. (Release date 2013)
  • JUVENIR 3.0: Money - (not) an issue. What about the finances of young Swiss people. (Release date 2014)
  • JUVENIR 4.0: Too much stress, too much pressure! How Swiss young people deal with stress and pressure to perform. (Release date 2015)

The studies are each available as a long version (overall study) and a short version on the Internet for download.

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ own description of Jacob Foundation