A group of volunteers in Park Ridge, Ill., has launched Pennies for Pennyville, a nonprofit dedicated to helping families in need, supporting struggling local nonprofits and promoting youth volunteerism. The organization has already assisted a family facing financial hardship and plans to raise funds for the Park Ridge Historical Society and the Park Ridge Fine Arts Society.

More than 300 foster youth in Alabama are eligible to receive up to $5,000 annually to help cover trade school or college expenses. The funding is provided through a federal grant and is distributed by the nonprofit Embrace Alabama Kids as part of the Support for Success Program.

Create aligned autonomy within your teams by combining transparency, alignment to shared goals and iterative feedback, so they can make decisions confidently while staying coordinated with organizational objectives, writes startup advisor Keith Lucas. "Competent leaders of intrinsically motivated teams build systems optimized for team-based creativity, innovation and problem-solving -- systems defined by practices, principles and feedback loops," Lucas writes.

Concise, open-ended questions that end cleanly at the question mark and refrain from adding extra ideas or choices are key to eliciting valuable and unexpected insights, writes Shane Snow, an author and leadership expert. We ask wordy questions that suggest answers as a way to make ourselves and others more comfortable, Snow notes, but it reduces the possibility of learning something new.

The Illinois Institute of Technology's AI-driven fundraising avatar Scarlet has raised $2 million across 50 institutions in less than a year by interacting with donors through text, email and video. The success of the avatar, now called a virtual engagement officer, demonstrates that donors are willing to engage with AI for fundraising purposes.

Bernard Gallagher has been appointed executive director of the Keystone Research Center, a nonprofit think tank in Harrisburg, Pa. Gallagher brings 20 years of experience in fiscal analysis and public policy, having previously worked with the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities, the Pennsylvania House of Representatives and the Colorado General Assembly.