A carpentry program for homeless, former convicts in Providence. A school for Native Americans in Exeter. New technology for patients in a Providence hospital.

These are just a few of the 95 organizations and projects financed by the $4.4 million in “strategy grants” announced this month by the Rhode Island Foundation, a Providence-based charitable organization.

For each of the recipients, the grant money provides an important source of revenue, oftentimes for new initiatives or projects that would otherwise go unfinanced.

“These dollars will make it possible for us to help more teens make a smooth transition from foster care to other networks of support so that they don’t fall through the cracks,” says Julie DiBari, deputy director of Rhode Island Foster Parents Association, which received $40,000 this year.

The announcement of this year’s strategy grants, which are the largest competitive grants the Foundation awards, brings the total amount of grant money distributed by the organization to nearly $27 million this year, the highest annual amount in organization’s 93-year history.

“We hope to focus attention on the increasingly important role philanthropy plays in strengthening, sustaining and changing organizations over time,” says Foundation president and CEO Neil Steinberg. “Our grants also serve as a lever for other funding sources, from national foundations to generous individuals here in Rhode Island.”

More than a thousand state organizations that seek to address systemic issues such as poverty and under-education benefit from the money the Foundation gives out each year.

They include Providence’s Amos House, which is using its $65,000 grant for its carpentry training program, designed to provide Occupational Safety and Health Administration certification in carpentry to homeless ex-offenders, so that they can reenter the workforce.

Central Falls’ Learning Community Charter School received $50,000 to finance their “Whole-Child, Whole-Family Services,” a program that provides additional assistance beyond the classroom to the families of its students.

The Rhode Island Zoological Society is using its $15,658 grant to develop a proposed Teacher Institute Field Study Program, which will be a professional development program for science educators in Rhode Island public schools.

Butler Hospital, in Providence, received a $50,000 grant to buy new touch-screen kiosks to provide patients with specific information about their diagnosis, prescriptions, and general health and lifestyle questions.

And the Tomaquag Indian Memorial Museum’s Nuweetooun School, in Exeter, received a $45,000 grant to keep its programs for Native American children running.

And the list of programs receiving the strategy grants, which ranged from $13,500 to $75,000, goes on.

Earlier this month, the Foundation announced an additional, one-time emergency community grant of $500,000 to be shared by three organizations: Crossroads RI, the Rhode Island Community Food Bank, and the Salvation Army Good Neighbors Energy Fund.

In the past decade, the Foundation has invested more than $220 million in Rhode Island through grants; during that same period, the Foundation accepted gifts of more than $240 million. Approximately, 60 percent of the Foundation’s grants are donor-directed; the remaining 40 percent is at the Foundation’s discretion.

The Rhode Island Foundation breaks down the total $4.4 million grant package as follows:

•Arts and culture groups: $472, 350 in total grants

•Community and economic development: $1.2 million

•Education: $858,183

•Environment: $355,000

•Health: $803,912

•Human services: $797, 200

pmarcelo@projo.com