Women's Foundation of Minnesota

Grantmaking: In FY24 (Apr. 1, 2023 - Mar. 31, 2024), the Foundation awarded $2.6 million in grants to support safety, leadership, holistic well-being, and economic justice for women, girls, and gender-expansive people in Minnesota. Because inequity looks different in every community, we use our Intersectional Equity Framework to look at how gender, race, place (geography), and additional identities (ethnicity, sovereignty, socioeconomic class, age, disability, LGBTQ+, immigration status) intersect to understand barriers and opportunities so we can invest in transformational change with communities who face the greatest barriers and disparities. All Women's Foundation grants support general operating expenses, which provide greater flexibility for organizations. Funding general operations over multiple years is crucial for organizations to build stability around community-sustaining programs.The Foundation's $4.3 million in community investments across Minnesota in FY24 included:* 280 grants to 185 nonprofit organizations* 140,422 people impacted through competitive grantmaking The Women's Foundation of Minnesota makes grants through the following funds: Community Response Fund, Fund for Safety, girlsBEST (girls Building Economic Success Together), We Thrive, and the Young Women's Initiative of Minnesota (YWI MN). A commitment to communities in Greater Minnesota and a value of inclusivity are reflected in the demographics of all the funds. 1. Community Response FundThrough the Community Response Fund, the Women's Foundation invests in organizations and programs that ensure women and their families are safer and healthier. This year, Community Response funding continues to support reproductive justice, healing justice, and emergent community needs, in response to limitations on reproductive rights and access to health care in Greater Minnesota and the increased demand faced by Minnesota health care providers. In the last year, WFM awarded $70,000 to seven organizations across the state to support reproductive justice, healing justice, and emergent community needs.In honor of our 40th anniversary in FY24, WFM made $10,000 grants to leaders of 40 grantee-partner organizations to use how they choose to cultivate care, joy, and healing for themselves and their teams. The Rest Up Awards were granted to leaders across all impact areas to cultivate rest and well-being with women leaders across the state. As core caretakers of their families and communities, women and gender-expansive people (specifically those who identify as Black, Indigenous, and people of color) have been leading organizations and movements that foster a culture of collective care. Investing in gender and racial justice includes supporting the sustainability of community leaders so they and their teams can show up and do their best work. 2. Fund for SafetySafety is the underpinning for equity and justice; it improves health outcomes for women, girls, and gender-expansive people; impacts their leadership; and increases their economic opportunity. WFM invests in the organizations, leaders, and the movement so that women, girls, and gender-expansive people in Minnesota are free from every form of violence and can experience their homes, schools, and communities as safe places. The Fund for Safety resources organizations and programs are working to keep our communities safer by addressing gender-based violence, trafficking, harassment, and other forms of systemic violence. During our last fiscal year, WFM renewed 19 grants and awarded 20 grants totaling $425,000. In addition to the organizations receiving a second year of funding through the Fund for Safety, WFM awarded a $50,000 grant to Minnesota Coalition Against Sexual Assault (MNCASA) to be a backbone support organization for the field. The fund resources organizations and programs working to keep our communities safer by addressing gender-based violence, including trafficking, harassment, sexual violence, intimate partner violence, and systemic violence. In this cohort, 42% are in rural and Greater Minnesota, and 58% are led by Black, Indigenous, and women of color. Funding a backbone organization to maintain strategic coherence in the field comes in response to listening sessions with grantee-partners, who also share a vision of a culture of healing, healthy relationships, inclusion, and community care. MNCASA will convene, facilitate, and build organizational resiliency with training and support for Fund for Safety grantee-partners. 3. girlsBEST (girls Building Economic Success Together)Shaped by research and listening in 14 communities around the state, girlsBEST was created to invest in girls as the best way to build opportunities and boost their future economic success. Launched in 2002, girlsBEST awards multi-year grants to programs that build the opportunity and future economic success of Minnesota's girls, ages 12-18. Priority is given to programs that include outreach to underserved, underrepresented populations of girls around the state, including low-income girls, Black, Indigenous, and girls of color, and girls from Greater Minnesota. Grantees are funded in one of four program tracks: Academic; Entrepreneurial; Employment Development & High-Paying/High-Skill Careers; and Public Education & Advocacy. Grantee-partners increase girls' awareness of systemic gender and racial inequities that affect economic potential, grow their sense of agency to influence change through leadership, and build their capacity for individual and collective activism and advocacy. As WFM's longest-running program girlsBEST is now funding the seventh multi-year cohort of grantee-partners across the state. Through these cohorts, WFM has provided planning and implementation grants totaling more than $5.1 million to 159 girl-led and girl-driven programs statewide and impacted more than 48,536 young women across Minnesota. In FY24, WFM awarded 18 multi-year grants and four planning grants totaling $330,000. The seventh cohort of girlsBEST grantee-partners are receiving the first year of funding a multi-year grant through girlsBEST. Multi-year grants are renewed for up to three years, based on an annual grant review and progress towards goals. Seed grants, awarded to support planning, are limited to one year. The grant period for this funding is July 1, 2023, to June 30, 2024. In the current cohort, 23% of partners are based in Greater Minnesota.In the seventh cohort of girlsBEST, grantees will focus on STEAME (Science, Technology, Engineering, Art, Math, and Entrepreneurship) to invest in girls as the best way to build opportunities and boost their future economic success. In response to the isolation many youth have been experiencing since the pandemic, partners have highlighted the need to focus on mental health and incorporate activities designed to build connections and decrease stress. For the cohort most recently completed, during 2020-2022, WFM awarded $300,000 annually to the sixth cohort of girlsBEST grant partners20 multi-year grants and three planning grants per year. In total, this $900,000 investment helped organizations reach nearly 6,600 youth, with more than 2,800 core participants engaged in career training, support programs, and STEM education; identity development and cultural education programs; leadership skills development; entrepreneurial and other activities to set them up to thrive economically as adults. Key outcomes from our program evaluation of this cohort helps illustrate the model's effectiveness: High School Graduation: Across girlsBEST programs, 87% of seniors are on-track to graduate from high school. This is higher than the 2023 Minnesota graduation rate of 83.3%. Post-Secondary Enrollment: Among graduates, 80% of girlsBEST seniors are on track to pursue post-secondary education, higher than the 61% Minnesota rate, based on 2022 high school graduates who enrolled in higher education within 16 months.4. We ThriveIn our second year of grants through We Thrive, a program in our economic justice impact area, WFM awarded $700,000 to support wealth-building through education and entrepreneurship. We Thrive invests in strategies to close the gap in generational wealth-building for BIPOC, low-wealth, and rural women and gender-expansive people across Minnesota. In addition to renewing two grants in higher education, WFM awarded two $150,000 grants to support women entering high-wage, high-demand fields, and roles through investment in educational institutions.

Building Philanthropy for Gender & Racial JusticeA critical part of the Foundation's work is helping people and organizations understand the power they have to change the world through philanthropy. Our donor-partners and donor advisors are encouraged to embrace their philanthropic leadership by participating in donor workshops, sharing community and grantee connections, and engaging in giving opportunities, such as donor advised funds and legacy and planned giving. Additional donor engagement opportunities building philanthropy for gender and racial justice include:* In FY24, WFM held our 40th anniversary celebration, bringing together corporate, philanthropic, and individual donor-partners with policymakers, young women leaders, and statewide grantee-partners to celebrate WFM's history of investing in gender and racial justice, and the power that lives within our state's communities. A keynote address from Rep. Leigh Finke spoke to our transformative era, from the political victories and threats at the legislature to the potential we hold for change. A panel conversation with grantee-partner leaders shared what it means to grow a culture of collective care, and WFM honored the recipients of our Rest Up Awards, which invest in rest and wellness for local leaders from 40 organizations.*Participatory Grantmaking: WFM democratizes philanthropy and infuses equity and justice into the design of its processes through participatory grantmaking that engages individuals most impacted by gender and racial injustice in funding decisions that affect their communities. In FY24, we continued using participatory grantmaking committee to determine all competitive grantmaking distributions. Two grantmaking committees bring together the Women's Foundation's community of stakeholders across race and ethnicity, geography, and socioeconomic status to support and invest in a shared vision of gender and racial justice in Minnesota. Members are appointed for a two-year term and each group convenes for training and orientation, followed by virtual site visits and grantmaking days. New participatory grantmaking committees will be selected in FY25.* Donor-Centered Grantmaking: Ripley Memorial Foundation, a donor advised fund of the Women's Foundation of Minnesota, awarded $117,000 in grants to 12 organizations focused on teen pregnancy prevention in Ramsey and Hennepin counties. In this second year of funding efforts to prevent teen pregnancy, organizations will build on current work to promote access to women's health education and services using cultural and community strengths so that young women and gender-expansive youth know about their bodies and can make healthy, informed choices as they grow. Ripley Memorial Advisors has increased its responsive support for the health and well-being of adolescents and aligned its strategies with the Young Women's Initiative of Minnesota (YWI MN) to engage with Recommendation #15 of the YWI MN's Blueprint for Action: to promote access to women's health education and services built on cultural and community strengths so that young women know about their bodies and can make appropriate and healthy choices as they grow and age. In their first year of Ripley funding, organizations shared that general operating support created opportunities for success during challenges faced such as staffing transitions, the pandemic, and the need to increase education on reproductive justice as a result of Roe v. Wade's reversal.* Engaged a paid Wenda Weekes Moore Intern and Dr. Reatha Clark King Fellow as we invest in building a pipeline of leadership opportunities for Black, Indigenous, and women of color a value to philanthropy, nonprofits, and communities. Through the program to date, WFM has engaged 50 Black, Indigenous, and women of color in all aspects of its operations, including evaluation, fundraising, grantmaking, and administration. The program also provides rigorous training and professional development opportunities.* As of 3/31/24, the Foundation has 77 active donor advised funds. The combined assets of our donor advised funds totals: $8,386,288. * In FY24, WFM provided expanded virtual and in-person opportunities for donors, stakeholders, and institutional partners to engage with research, listening, and policy actions, including the importance of holistic well-being and reproductive justice. After the conclusion of a historic legislative session, WFM hosted a virtual recap about the progress of our policy agenda. Beginning with Pride Month in June, WFM hosted a three-session conversation series with OutFront Minnesota on gender-expansive communities across the state, the intersections of trans rights and reproductive rights, and growing our collective understanding on what it means to pay attention to and support our LGBTQ+ communities. To further our narrative priorities, WFM hosted a summer series with the Coven for discussions about feminist ways of challenging the status quo on abundance and growth, in partnership with board leaders and grantee-partners. To deepen understanding about the important of rest and well-being for nonprofit leaders, we hosted the In Rest We Trust conversation series to supplement the Rest Up Awards grantmaking for Minnesota leaders. In 2024, we marked International Women's Day by hosting a panel discussion about the importance of growing investments in women and girls, as a preview of the first-ever statewide Feminist Giving Day in FY25. With the Governor-appointed Young Women's Cabinet, WFM hosted a Young Women's Day at the Capitol, inviting all partners, including donors and donor advised holders, to attend.

Research, Education, and Public PolicyStatus of Women and Girls in MinnesotaIn 2009, the Foundation launched the Status of Women & Girls in Minnesota (Status) research project in partnership with the University of Minnesota's Humphrey School's Center on Gender, Women, and Public Policy. Data specific to Minnesota women and girls has been gathered, analyzed, and published in economics, safety, health, and leadership. The Status research and community input expands the available data on women and girls, provides ongoing trend analysis, informs the Foundation's annual grantmaking and policy agenda, identifies new areas where research is needed, and raises public awareness about the needs of women and girls in Minnesota. Every two years, the Foundation releases the most comprehensive data in the state on women, girls, and gender-expansive people as well as recommendations for policy solutions that could advance systemic change. The 2024 Status of Women and Girls+ in Minnesota was released in March of FY24 in a public presentation with Dr. Christina Ewig, lead researcher and director of the Center on Women, Gender and Public Policy at the University of Minnesota's Humphrey School of Public Affairs; WFM President & CEO Gloria Perez; and Ruth Richardson, CEO, Planned Parenthood North Central States.WFM leverages listening, research, and convening to inform the field, cross-sector engagement, policy advocacy, and investments. In addition to producing research reports, we invest in listening to grantee-partners, advocates, and community leaders to better understand how disparities and solutions are experienced in distinct communities around the state, and to inform our investments in policy, future research, and philanthropy. In FY24, WFM staff traveled to northwest and southwest Minnesota to meet with grantee-partners and community-based organizations to deepen community connections, share research and updates, and learn more about the perspectives, challenges, and solutions of partners in greater and rural Minnesota.Public PolicyAs a systems-change community foundation, WFM invests in policies and narratives that transform our state with gender and racial justice. In alignment with our strategic plan, WFM has increased investments in advocacy and policy as a lever for changing inequitable systems. We are committed to policies that remove barriers and increase access for women, girls, and gender-expansive people across Minnesota, by addressing racism, gender-based violence, and gaps in leadership and representation. WFM's legislative agenda advances public policy in partnership with young women, gender-expansive people, and grantee-partner organizations. Research in our Status of Women & Girls+ in Minnesota was in the spotlight throughout the session, including as fuel for new legislation requiring salary transparency as a tool to advance pay equity. In the last fiscal year, WFM advanced a robust policy agenda at the Capitol, working with a hired lobbyist to carry a legislative agenda, mobilize the public, and increase the visibility and priorities of women, girls, gender-expansive people. WFM leaders, Dr. Reatha Clark King Fellow, and Young Women's Cabinet members testified and submitted letters on behalf of the WFM policy agenda for issues central to economic justice, safety, and reproductive justice, including creating a statewide health education standard; an inclusive ERA for Minnesota; a task force on preventing violence against Latinas; expanding coverage for abortions, pre- and post-natal healthcare; coverage for gender-affirming care; and supporting better outcomes for Black and Native births and pregnancies.The Governor-appointed Young Women's Cabinet created a comprehensive policy agenda and elected policy leaders to advance bills affecting their lives. To prepare for their advocacy, young women received rigorous policy training using a curriculum that centers people of color to engage in policy for systems change. Cabinet members were active in testifying, writing letters of support, and increasing awareness of their policy agenda issues.State & National PartnershipsWFM engages in collaborative partnerships within Minnesota and the national foundation community. To continue making an impact in social change grantmaking in Minnesota and in the national and global women's funding movement, we participate as a member in collaboratives including the National Philanthropic Collaborative of Young Women's Initiatives, Women's Funding Network, Minnesota Council of Foundations, Minnesota Council of Nonprofits, Grantmakers for Effective Organizations, and Mission Investors Exchange.