A Home for News and Conversation on Women Donors
The leadership of philanthropy is still very male-dominated at the top. In this video, I discuss reasons why gender equality has not penetrated high level leadership in the nonprofit sector.
I made this video to participate in the Feminist Leadership Project’s series. If you’d like to participate in this project, you can go here for more details.
On June 25, 2019, Mayo Clinic announced its upcoming grant from The George Family Foundation to fund the all-new Center for Women’s Health. The center aims to combat some of the problems women face in receiving adequate healthcare, offering tailored health services for women of all ages.
Penny George, board chair of the George Family Foundation, accomplished psychologist, and renowned philanthropist, has spent her career championing reform for women’s healthcare.
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An excellent new development in the giving circle realm: The H100 Latina Giving Circle recently launched at the Texas Women’s Foundation (TWF). It was formed by the Hispanic 100 Network to further engage Latinas in philanthropy, and expand resources for local organizations empowering, educating and supporting Latinas.
H100 joins three other TWF hosted giving circles: Orchid Giving Circle, HERitage Giving Fund and The Village Giving Circle. The Hispanic 100 Network—founded in 1996 by prominent Dallas/Fort Worth area Latinas in business, education, arts, health, politics and community leadership—is helping launch the Circle by providing $50,000 in matching funds.
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“The pay gap is an issue, and that issue will go on,” said U.S. Soccer Foundation President and CEO, Ed Foster-Simeon in a recent article discussing the lawsuit filed by the U.S. Women’s Soccer team for pay equity. This is an important point for women donors to pay attention to, since funding for legal defense to get the pay issue for women’s soccer rectified is, in some ways, the cutting edge of feminism, and might be an issue more donors want to move to the front burner, at least temporarily.
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A powerful tool to increase gender equity and strengthen families is to expand paternity leave, giving men greater attachment and involvement with their young children, and lessening the burden on women.
Dove Men+Care, in partnership with the global gender justice organization Promundo, is studying the impact of paternity leave on gender equality, and revealing the many benefits that accrue to employers, parents and society when men have greater access to paid leave and participate more fully in child rearing. (The article “Why championing paternity leave empowers men, women and business,” appearing on the Unilever website, summarizes some of these findings).
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Being a working artist is demanding. Most artists hold other jobs to support themselves, which limits their studio time.
“It’s a cycle. You don’t have the time to create the work, so you can’t create enough work to sell to support yourself financially, so you need to have the job, which takes up your time. It’s hard to get out of that loop,” says Rhode Island artist Kathy Hodge. Hodge is an award-winning artist with many exhibitions and shows to her name who also served as the Artist in Residence at multiple U.S. national parks. Because the gender gap is still prevalent in the art world, as in many sectors and professions, women artists like Hodge are in particular need of support.
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The U.S. Soccer Foundation’s recently announced a new initiative called United for Girls, which aims to increase soccer opportunities for young girls and women from underserved communities.
United for Girls has an ambitious goal over the next three years: double both the number of girls impacted by the Foundation’s programs, and the number of U.S. Soccer Foundation female coach-mentors. Adidas, the initiative’s founding partner, is working with the Foundation to get more girls on the field, and combat their high athletics drop-out rate.
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From whip-smart dino doctor Ellie Satler to tech-savvy businesswoman Renata Klein, Laura Dern’s passion shines through in her roles on screen. Behind the scenes, Dern’s commitment to philanthropy, empowerment, and equality for all add up to something just shy of a revolution — and the tech industry is her next target.
As part of Booking.com’s first Women in Tech Code-a-thon, Dern announced $350,000 in grants that will benefit STEM education for young women and girls.
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Editor’s Note: Women’s Funding Network Chief Strategist Marcia Coné is passionate about the Two-Generation (2Gen) Approach to breaking the cycle of poverty for women and their families. Here, she talks about WFN’s efforts to support its members in implementing the 2Gen philosophy and theoretical framework, as well as the work of the 2Gen Advocacy Cohort and their recent wins.
What is a 2Gen Approach?
When we think about poverty, programs are typically targeted to the needs of different members within the family. For example, you might have a child in a Head Start Program, while the parent is getting job training. This is helpful, but the 2Gen approach—which was developed by the Aspen Institute—looks at ways of addressing the family as a whole system and meeting their individual needs simultaneously, through multi-generational programming and policies. Two-generation approaches draw from findings that the well-being of parents is crucial to their children’s well-being and conversely, parents’ ability to succeed in school and in the workplace is substantially affected by how well their children are doing.
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Yesterday was a very big day for the feminist community in Rhode Island. With votes of 21-17 in the Senate and 45-29 in the House, last night Rhode Island passed the Reproductive Privacy Act, guaranteeing all people access to reproductive rights as defined by Roe v. Wade, no matter what the Federal Government does.
There were many women’s funds leaders, volunteers and donors who helped make this happen, including Kelly Nevins, Executive Director of the Women’s Fund of Rhode Island. In an email to her constituents, Nevins offered extra special thanks to our women legislators who fought this battle to the finish. “An extra special thank you to our elected officials who worked tirelessly to make this happen, including House Sponsor Representative Anastasia Williams, Senate Sponsor Senator Gayle Goldin and Senator Erin Lynch Prata who worked to ensure the bill made it to the Senate floor for a full vote.”
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