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2008 Grantees
The Maine Women's Fund awarded $130,000 in social change grants to 11 organizations in Maine promoting lasting social change in Maine. The Fund intends to triple grantmaking over the next three years and use collaborative approaches to bring more community resources to strengthen these efforts.
Cobscook Community Center, $5000 The Passages program at Cobscook Community Center serves out-of-school pregnant and parenting young women in Washington County through a home-based, self-paced high school diploma program. Each year, in Washington County, approximately 45 children are born to young women who range in age from twelve to eighteen. Offering these young women a way to complete high school, without compromising their ability to be parents at the same time, is a critical way to tap into the high motivation they experience during this period of their lives, bolstering their ability to enter post-secondary education, the workplace and adulthood in general.
Dress for Success $5000 Dress for Success is a critical intervention, enabling women to get access to, and win, better jobs. Getting that job and retaining it, is an important first step towards self-sufficiency and building a career. Dress for Success serves a critical market - 80% of their clients have an income of less than $12,000 a year. Most are young, single mothers who have not previously held full time jobs.
Girl Scouts of Maine $5,000 Girls Investing in their Future Today (GIFT) is a comprehensive Girl Scout Program that teaches girls ages 9-11 the basics of financial literacy. Beginning with a mother-daughter overnight, the GIFT program will provide girls with the basic knowledge and skills they need to budget, earn, save, spend and invest. Involving mothers will foster open communications within family about money and economic security. Mothers often oversee household spending, but are often under-educated when it comes to financial literacy; GIFT will be as much a learning experience for them as it is for their daughters. It also ensures that lessons learned during the weekend will extend into an ongoing conversation at home.
Hardy Girls, Healthy Women $20,000 Through direct service programming, education and leadership development HGHW is creating environments and building the skills girls need to aspire to independent, secure futures. This grant will help HGHW expand into Somerset, Franklin, Oxford, and Aroostook counties, as well as Portland and Bangor. This grant will also set the stage for HGHW's national expansion.
Maine Equal Justice Partners $20,000 Access to affordable health care means that a mother can be assured that her child will get the medical care that he or she needs. Targeted supports for families who leave welfare can help them make ends meet as they transition to employment. Food assistance for low-wage families can mean the difference between a hungry child and putting food on the table. Post-secondary training and education opportunities can help women compete in the job market and achieve economic security. Maine Equal Justice Partners is advocating for policies and programs that provide opportunities to improve a family s circumstances, creating pathways out of a lifetime of dependence and into economic security. Their aim is to shape policies that bring about this systemic change such that low-income women and their families can leave poverty behind.
Maine Women's Policy Center $20,000 Because women are disproportionately and chronically trapped in low-wage jobs, comprise the majority of seasonal and par time workers, are paid lower wages than men in comparable occupations, and carry the primary responsibilities for the care of children, home, and elders, we believe the most effective and substantive economic security initiatives must target women's employment to the benefit of all families. The Maine Women's Policy Center is championing a multi-year strategic effort to bolster women's status in the economy and to create replicable solutions by increasing women's wages and addressing the work and family bind.
Penquis Cap, $5000 Penquis and WomenCare will partner to bring together middle and high school girls from Greenville to increase their financial literacy and help them aspire towards education and better futures.
Sexual Assault Services Southern Maine $5000 Create stability in the lives of women who are homeless or economically marginalized so they can take steps toward economic independence. This is achieved by increasing opportunities for women to expand their options for achieving safety, assisting women in understanding the dynamics of sexual violence and how it affects their lives and providing opportunities for women to pursue legal action, obtain medical care and/or access other support to heal from experiences of sexual violence.
Volunteers of America Northern New England $20,000 Volunteers of America Northern New England supports two projects serving incarcerated women, Transforming A$$ets: Women in Transition to Financial Independence and Women Building Futures. Transforming A$$ets addresses the high incidence of women released from prison having difficulty finding work that provides a livable wage and economic security. Services include employment training, job fairs, financial literacy training, and asset building. Women Building Futures teaches job skills to women returning to the community, enables women to learn non-traditional employment skills that will help them earn a livable wage, and provides women with a valuable construction education and the ability to earn a nationally accredited certification. The project also assists the participants in job placement upon release.
Wage Project $5000 Negotiating salaries is a challenge for women at all stages of their careers, as women are less likely than men to ask for what they deserve. Recognizing that the greatest long-term benefits will be achieved by working with young women just entering the workforce, the Wage Project has developed $tart $mart Campus Workshops that train college graduating women how to avoid the wage gap. Through this grant, the Wage Project's All Maine Women $mart $mart Initiative will work through Maine's public institutions (University of Maine, Community College system) to help young women gain skills and learn resources and information that will enable them to negotiate equitable salaries.
Women, Work and Community $20,000 The Kennebec Corridor Creative Enterprise Project targets the needs of low-to-moderate income women artisans and emerging entrepreneurs in communities along the Kennebec Corridor that includes the towns of Augusta, Waterville, Skowhegan, Gardiner, Richmond, and Bath. The project addresses the importance of the Creative Economy in revitalizing local communities in Maine and increases opportunities for women to contribute their talents to community development. The project will increase business management and technology skills, improve marketing success, link entrepreneurs and catalyze networks and shared action through mini-grants which will be matched by the entrepreneurs.
Past Grantees
Check out the work of past MWF grantees by visiting our Grantee Community Montage Gallery.