The Boston Women’s Fund, Inc.

“Philanthropy’s Promise” Statement

The Boston Women’s Fund (BWF) is a progressive foundation that supports community based organizations and grassroots initiatives run by women and girls in order to create a society based on racial, economic and social justice. We strive for a world free of racism, sexism, poverty and other oppressions.

At least 95% of our grants support low-income women; women of color; women with disabilities; lgbtq community; immigrant women; elder women and girls who are working to create a society based on racial, economic, and social justice. The Boston Women’s Fund raises money from a broad base of donors across economic backgrounds to provide grants and develop programs that strengthen the grassroots initiatives and leadership of women and girls.

BWF Core Values

• We believe that change starts at the grassroots level, and systemic change is necessary to achieve racial, economic and social justice.
• We believe that power and wealth must be redistributed to attain equity and systemic change.
• We believe that the fight for women’s rights is an integral part of a larger struggle to end oppression based on race, class, gender, age, religion, ability, or sexual orientation.
• We believe that all movements must combat racism by being racially and culturally diverse in both membership and leadership if progressive change is to occur.
• We believe that women and girls of color as well as those of extremely low-income must and can be leaders within all movements if progressive change is to occur.
• We believe that educating and organizing a diverse donor base is a critical strategy for amassing broad support for social-change movements.
• We strive to reflect our commitment to shared leadership, equity, and cultural diversity in all aspects of our organization’s operations.

The Boston Women’s Fund supports the principles of the Philanthropies Promise initiative of the National Committee for Responsive Philanthropy. The Boston Women’s Fund will continue to exceed the grantmaking goals by ensuring that no less than 95 percent of our grant dollars benefit underserved communities through social justice grantmaking. We support women and girls-led efforts in advocacy, organizing, movement building and other social and public policy strategies to empower themselves and their communities.

Publicly available data at the Foundation Center will verify fulfillment of these goals. The Boston Women’s Fund will take appropriate steps to ensure that these data accurately reflect our grantmaking. As strong believers in social change philanthropy, we also hope that this statement will contribute to the discussion within philanthropy about how we, as a sector, can best promote social justice.

Signed on behalf of the Boston Women’s Fund,

 

Josefina Vázquez
Executive Director

For more information on Philanthropy’s Promise, check out their website: www.philanthropyspromise.org