Grant Partners (2007-2009)

The Race, Gender and Human Rights Donor Circle supports organizations working to address the significant roles racism and sexism play in determining women’s quality of life and how these forces converge to impact low-income women of color and their families. This circle strategically supports organizations working to promote human rights within the criminal justice system in California. Since its inception, the Circle has made more than $1M in grants to organizations focused on issues of reform and re-entry, funded research on the criminal justice system to influence greater investment in this area and launched a criminal justice cohort within the Foundation’s Women’s Policy Institute in order to engage advocates and formerly incarcerated women in public policymaking.

The Women of Color Donor Circle invests resources in San Francisco Bay Area organizations that address the health and economic well being of young women and girls of color. Circle members are themselves women of color who are motivated to increase the number of women of color philanthropists investing in innovative and effective strategies for long-term change. This circle will administer its first round of grants in winter 2008.

The Women of Silicon Valley Donor Circle promotes the economic self-sufficiency of low-income women and families in San Mateo and Santa Clara Counties. Since 2006, the circle has made grants of more than $350,000 to organizations focused on providing education or academic enrichment to see that more young women, particularly Latinas, complete high school and go on to college, building the skills of low-income and immigrant women to develop their voice and take leadership in solving community-wide problems and supporting nonprofit staff to strengthen their leadership within their own organization, within the nonprofit sector or within the community at large.

Building on its history, the vision of its foremothers, and its long-standing principles, the YWCA of the Mid-Peninsula Donor Advised Fund seeks to create opportunities for women’s growth, leadership and power in order to attain a common vision: peace, justice, freedom and dignity. The Fund believes that both service and advocacy projects, those bringing about systemic change, those primarily committed to bettering women’s and girls’ lives, and those which break racial and ethnic barriers in scope, leadership, and participation will best achieve this goal.