Grants
Women's Funding Alliance Grants Program
The Women's Funding Alliance granting program supports non-profit organizations throughout the Puget Sound region in Washington State that promote positive social change for women and girls. While we support a broad spectrum of social change efforts, we place particular emphasis on Economic Security, Civic Engagement and Leadership Development. Grants are awarded throughout the year in the following areas: general operating support, capacity building, project specific and population specific.
CURRENT
GRANT CYCLES
Economic
Opportunity Funding The next grant cycle will begin in January, 2009 (postponed
from original November timeline) and full criteria will be
posted on the website. At that time, Women’s Funding Alliance
will be accepting project narratives from applicants interested
in applying for Economic Opportunity grants.
Economic Opportunity grants support efforts focused on increasing
wages, assets and overall economic well-being of low-income
and underemployed women, particularly single female heads
of households and women from marginalized communities. Grants
in this category might fund programs, policy, and/or social
change awareness building activities in the areas of:
1.
Creating Better Jobs - Strategies to improve women’s
wages, working conditions, labor standards, benefits, and
training opportunities for women workers. Particular priority
will be given to programs that help women access non-traditional
jobs that have a higher wage potential and on increasing
wages in sectors that typically have lower wages and are
heavily populated by women.
Examples of potential funding areas: training and apprenticeships
for women in skilled trades (particularly green jobs), efforts
to increase wages of child care workers or other service
providers, advocating for family friendly policies in the
work place.
2.
Building Entrepreneurship – Programs that promote women’s
business ownership, microfinance efforts, and/or ways to
provide women with access to credit, financial markets and
business training.
3.
Increasing Assets and Financial Literacy – Increasing
women’s financial empowerment through asset building efforts
(home, education, business), matched savings programs, debt
reduction, financial literacy and training.
4.
Investing in Girls – We know that investing in girls
is the first step in ensuring they grow up to be economically
secure women. Therefore, WFA may support programs that promote
girls’ education in fields that have the potential to provide
higher wages and/or where women are not as represented.
5.
Providing a Solid Foundation – In order to be fully economically
secure, a woman and her children need stable housing, a safe
environment, adequate health care, transportation, and affordable
and quality child care. As such, grants may fund efforts
that ensure that women have access to these supports. Emphasis
will be on supporting systemic change efforts and applicants
must show the direct correlation with increasing women’s
economic status.
6.
Other Policy, Advocacy or Media Activities – There may
be other policy, advocacy, research, or media activities
that support our overall goal of increasing the economic
power of low-income and underemployed women that don’t fit
into the five categories above. These might include advocating
for better tax policies or policies that focus on the economic
health of refugee and immigrant women.
Community Response Funding
Through its Community Response Fund, WFA addresses key issue
areas identified through the study we conducted in 2007 called
A Closer Look. The study examines the realities for
women and girls living in the Puget Sound region. Through this
fund, non-profit
organizations serving women and girls in the region may apply
for general operating or project funds under any one of these
areas: economic security, education, health and well-being, leadership
and giving, or safety and violence.
Maximum
grants awarded in this fund are $10,000.
The
2008 submission deadline for Letters of Inquiry to the Community
Response Fund
was September 23rd. Grants will be
awarded and
announced in the spring of 2009.
RECENT GRANTEES
2008 Civic Engagement & Leadership Development Grantees
This spring, Women’s Funding Alliance awarded
grants to four organizations for their efforts focused on one
or both of the following:
- Developing women who are marginalized to be leaders within their own communities through their involvement in the political process
- Voter registration efforts coupled with additional efforts to increase female voter turnout in marginalized communities
Grantees include:
Hate Free Zone - $25,000:
- The WFA grant will support Hate Free Zone’s civic engagement program which will result in increasing engagement in the political process among refugee and immigrant women.
- During 2008, this civic engagement program will reach thousands of refugee and immigrant individuals and focus on year-round efforts with newly registered women voters, out of which, at least 10 new women leaders will emerge.
Parents Organizing for Welfare and Economic Rights (POWER) - $15,000:
- POWER will lead civic engagement efforts to educate and register new women voters and develop low-income, politically involved female leaders within WA State.
- With this WFA grant, POWER plans to register approximately 300 new voters and involve up to 100 new individuals in ongoing civic engagement work.
Statewide Poverty Action Network, a program of Solid Ground - $10,000:
- The grant from WFA will be used to fund their Vote for a Change campaign in order to increase voter turnout and participation among low-income citizens in WA State, nearly 60% of which are women.
- Through this project, Poverty Action aims to increase voter turnout in target districts by 10%, contact 30,000 low-income voters through calls and direct mail, and provide training and leadership opportunities for up to 40 Poverty Action members with specific leadership development efforts focused on women.
Equal Rights Washington (ERW) - $25,000:
- Equal Rights Washington will use WFA funding to build leadership and civic engagement skills in lesbian, bisexual, transgender and queer (LBTQ) women in order to create social change and eliminate heterosexism and homophobia throughout health care and public health systems.
- As part of this project ERW will engage in voter registration outreach and education and will reach a minimum of 7,500 LBTQ women.
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