Action Plan

Strategic Priorities: 2013-2017

• Be a go-to source of news and information about Alzheimer’s disease, glaucoma, and macular degeneration.
• Identify and fund the highest impact research.
• Mobilize individual and community action to improve lives.
• Increase our investment in research and education while strengthening operational efficiency.

Goals

• Disseminate important breakthroughs and milestone findings about the diseases we fund and communicate results in real-time.
• Propel research innovation and understanding to eradicate Alzheimer’s disease, glaucoma, and macular degeneration by increasing our financial commitment to new research awards by 75%.
• Provide tools and resources designed to enhance the lives of people impacted by Alzheimer’s disease, glaucoma, and macular degeneration by empowering them to discover and use health information, and effect changes in attitudes and policy through their actions.
• Diversify and balance revenue sources to decrease reliance on any one stream of income, and manage operational efficiencies to limit management and fundraising expenses.

Initiatives & Strategies

• Engage in and forge new coalitions with like-minded organizations to draw attention to our diseases of focus and advocate for increased allocations for research funding and private sector investments.
• Expand current research portfolio and increase pace of investment by designing and implementing new grant programs.
• Convene Scientific Review Committees to select research that is most likely to advance the field.
• Motivate action in government and with other influential decision makers to increase resources addressing sight and mind by increasing involvement of advocates and supporters for these efforts.
• Increase the number of people who are empowered to take action against these diseases, especially through engagement in traditional and social media. 
• Increase funds available for research and education by implementing new campaigns and building new sources of revenue.

Organizational Capacity

• We have a long-standing track record of fiscal conservatism, which has helped us weather the recent recession without reducing our commitment to funding research.  The following organizational assets are instrumental in accomplishing this and will help us continue to advance toward our goals:
• Our executive team brings decades of experience, and we pride ourselves on the commitment and energy of our employees.
• Our Scientific Review Committees comprise respected leaders in our focus research fields and are key partners in selecting and recommending the most promising research.
• It will take a movement of like-minded groups attacking the diseases from all angles to save sight and mind; the partnerships and collaborations we participate in, such as the 21st Century Brain Trust, the Leaders Engaged on
• Alzheimer’s Disease Coalition, and the National Alliance for Eye and Vision Research, eliminate the duplication of effort and maximize each partner’s resources.
• We receive and process all contributions on site rather than outsourcing to a third party, which provides cost control and ensures confidentiality.