We invest in smart and bold ideas.

The Rauch Foundation is a Long Island-based family foundation that invests in ideas and organizations that spark and sustain early success in children and systemic change in our communities.

We focus on areas that are of fundamental importance to human development and sustainability: children and families, environmental work on two treasured parts of the East Coast – Long Island and the Chesapeake Bay – and regional leadership through new ways of working together. We support research that provides a vital understanding of challenges, initiatives that respond to research results, and comprehensive approaches to problem-solving. We pursue projects that have the potential to be transformative, and we are willing to be bold in advancing initiatives that might otherwise be overlooked. 

In all our work we are guided by our entrepreneurial roots. Philip Rauch Sr. was an automotive engineer and the inventor of the hose clamp, a small part that played a big role in the growth of the auto industry. His two sons, Philip Rauch Jr. and Louis Rauch, created the Foundation in 1961 to support a wide range of educational and social causes.

Nancy Rauch Douzinas became President of the Foundation in 1990 after a 20-year career as a psychologist and family therapist. During her tenure, the Foundation has played catalytic roles in numerous landmark initiatives on Long Island and in Maryland. Through the Long Island Index, for instance, the Foundation provided – for 15 years – objective data to inform regional decisions, a responsibility that has now been transferred to nextLI, an initiative of Newsday. The Foundation has advanced public transit by championing the Third Track on the Long Island Rail Road, and it has helped create new regional institutions such as the Energeia Partnership, Long Island Clean Water Partnership, and Blue Water Baltimore. Through its early and long-term funding of the Parent-Child Home Program, the Foundation has helped this innovative program intervention become research-proven, nationally recognized, and widely replicated.