Spotlight on Poverty and Opportunity, a national foundation-led initiative, is excited to collaborate with Washington Area Women’s Foundation to bring you the latest news and analysis on women and poverty.

Spotlight is the go-to site for news and ideas about fighting poverty.

For daily updates and links to past articles, check out “Women and Poverty.” It’s a new section of our site with a comprehensive collection of recent news and analysis on women and poverty.

Along with these daily updates, continue to visit Washington Area Women’s Foundation for our weekly rundown of the top news stories on women and poverty every Friday.

Here’s this week’s news:

• In an op-ed for the Atlanta Journal Constitution, Christine Grumm, CEO of the Women’s Funding Network, and Barbara Mosacchio, CEO of the Atlanta Women’s Foundation, call attention to the disproportionate poverty faced by women and call for action to address it

• A Boston Globe piece on local efforts to replicate the Harlem Children’s Zone, an antipoverty program touted by President Obama, notes that the Children’s Zone performs outreach to pregnant young women to offer parenting education.

• In an op-ed for the Deseret Morning News, George Mason professor Walter Williams criticizes what he calls permissive attitudes toward unwed pregnancy and young women who behave sexually in public, which he blames in part for the poverty and other problems faced by many African-American communities.

• The Louisville Courier Journal reports on an effort to encourage women participating in the Women, Infants, and Children program to breastfeed their children.

• Among the students interviewed in a Chicago Tribune piece on a local culinary school, which provides new opportunities to high school dropouts, is a young woman who left high school after becoming pregnant her junior year.

• The Greensboro News and Record focuses on the antipoverty efforts of several local young women.

To learn more about Spotlight, visit www.spotlightonpoverty.org.  To sign up for our weekly updates with the latest news, opinion and research from around the country, click here.

The Spotlight on Poverty and Opportunity Team

Spotlight on Poverty and Opportunity is a foundation-led, non-partisan initiative aimed at ensuring that our political leaders take significant actions to reduce poverty and increase opportunity in the United States. We bring together diverse perspectives from the political, policy, advocacy and foundation communities to engage in an ongoing dialogue focused on finding genuine solutions to the economic hardship confronting millions of Americans.

Spotlight on Poverty and Opportunity, a national foundation-led initiative, is excited to collaborate with The Women’s Foundation to bring you the latest news and analysis on women and poverty.

Spotlight is the go-to site for news and ideas about fighting poverty.

For daily updates and links to past articles, check out “Women and Poverty.” It’s a new section of our site with a comprehensive collection of recent news and analysis on women and poverty.

Along with these daily updates, continue to visit TheWomensFoundation.org for our weekly rundown of the top news stories on women and poverty every Friday.

Here’s this week’s news:

• The Chicago Sun Times reports on a charity that provides gowns to help low-income girls attend prom.

• A Miami Herald story on local African-American leaders highlights a minister who, herself having once been a homeless mother, has started an organization helping struggling women.

• The Boston Globe tells the story of a breast cancer survivor who received early detection because of a state insurance program for the poor.

• In a story on the troubled lives of Hispanic teenagers in a low-income suburb, the New York Times focuses on a young woman who has tried to reform herself after being a member of a local gang.

• The Pittsburgh Post Gazette profiles a young woman with an Ivy League education who will devote her first year out of college to serving the poor with AmeriCorps.

• Among the questions surrounding a law that could limit health care for illegal immigrants are its effects on screenings for breast and cervical cancer for low-income women, according to the Salt Lake Tribune.

• The St. Petersburg Times runs a story on a clinic that has provided free cancer screening for hundreds of low-income women.

• The Associated Press reports that federal stimulus funds will allow New Mexico’s Women, Infants, and Children supplemental food program to serve 1,600 additional low-income women and their children.

To learn more about Spotlight, visit www.spotlightonpoverty.org.  To sign up for our weekly updates with the latest news, opinion and research from around the country, click here.

The Spotlight on Poverty and Opportunity Team

Spotlight on Poverty and Opportunity is a foundation-led, non-partisan initiative aimed at ensuring that our political leaders take significant actions to reduce poverty and increase opportunity in the United States. We bring together diverse perspectives from the political, policy, advocacy and foundation communities to engage in an ongoing dialogue focused on finding genuine solutions to the economic hardship confronting millions of Americans.

Spotlight on Poverty and Opportunity, a national foundation-led initiative, is excited to collaborate with The Women’s Foundation to bring you the latest news and analysis on women and poverty.

Spotlight is the go-to site for news and ideas about fighting poverty.

For daily updates and links to past articles, check out “Women and Poverty.”  It’s a new section of our site with a comprehensive collection of recent news and analysis on women and poverty.

Along with these daily updates, continue to visit TheWomensFoundation.org for our weekly rundown of the top news stories on women and poverty every Friday.

Here’s this week’s news:

• The nation’s First Lady, Michelle Obama, uses an op-ed in USA Today to call for youth service.

• A Knoxville News Sentinel columnist criticizes the “free love” revolution and calls unwed motherhood a “moral crisis” that produces poverty and suffering for mothers and their kids.

• In a column for the Chicago Sun Times, Mary Mitchell calls attention to the danger of breast cancer, including its disproportionate effect on low-income women.

• The New York Times profiles a 16-year-old girl with musical talent, but with difficult circumstances in a low-income Ohio community.

• In a Washington Post op-ed, education columnist Jay Mathews focuses on a young girl and her mother who have questioned whether accelerated classes, a popular solution to educating low-income students, are always the best option.

• In a piece on the danger of AIDS in the American South, the Chicago Tribune tells the story of a woman struggling with the disease in rural North Carolina.

• In an op-ed in the Philadelphia Inquirer, columnist Annette John-Hall supports a local program that helps homeless teen girls enjoy a day of free shopping.

• The Kansas City Star reports on a woman who once gave to charity while employed in the corporate world, but who has lost her savings in the recession and is now relying on United Way to make ends meet.

To learn more about Spotlight visit www.spotlightonpoverty.org.  sign up for our weekly updates with the latest news, opinion and research from around the country, click here.

The Spotlight on Poverty and Opportunity Team

Spotlight on Poverty and Opportunity is a foundation-led, non-partisan initiative aimed at ensuring that our political leaders take significant actions to reduce poverty and increase opportunity in the United States. We bring together diverse perspectives from the political, policy, advocacy and foundation communities to engage in an ongoing dialogue focused on finding genuine solutions to the economic hardship confronting millions of Americans.

Spotlight on Poverty and Opportunity, a national foundation-led initiative, is excited to collaborate with The Women’s Foundation to bring you the latest news and analysis on women and poverty.

Spotlight is the go-to site for news and ideas about fighting poverty.

Starting next week, check out “Women and Poverty,” a new section of our site that will feature a comprehensive daily collection of all the news and analysis on women and poverty.

Along with these daily updates, continue to visit Washington Area Women’s Foundation for our weekly rundown of the top news stories on women and poverty every Friday.

Here’s this week’s news:

• In an op-ed in the Atlanta Journal Constitution arguing against new, harsher penalties for speeders, the author cites the example of a single mother losing her license after getting pulled over on the way to work and to drop her kids off at day care.

• As noted in a McClatchy report carried in the Miami Herald, 50 advocacy organizations have come together to ask President Obama to support the hiring and training of women, minorities, and the poor to work on new federal construction projects.

• The Arizona Republic reports that a college scholarship fund for single moms has seen its applications jump from 40 to almost 300 within the past year.

• A South Florida Sun Sentinel article on a new program helping low- and moderate-income residents move into foreclosed housing focuses on a single mother excited to own her first home.

To learn more about Spotlight, visit www.spotlightonpoverty.org.  To sign up for our weekly updates with the latest news, opinion and research from around the country, click here.

The Spotlight on Poverty and Opportunity Team

Spotlight on Poverty and Opportunity is a foundation-led, non-partisan initiative aimed at ensuring that our political leaders take significant actions to reduce poverty and increase opportunity in the United States. We bring together diverse perspectives from the political, policy, advocacy and foundation communities to engage in an ongoing dialogue focused on finding genuine solutions to the economic hardship confronting millions of Americans.

Spotlight on Poverty and Opportunity, a national foundation-led initiative, is excited to collaborate with The Women’s Foundation to bring you the latest news and analysis on women and poverty.

Spotlight is the go-to site for news and ideas about fighting poverty.  And every Friday, look for our weekly rundown of the top news stories on women and poverty.

Here’s this week’s news:

• The New York Times profiles a 28-year-old woman running a class that offers advice to low-income teens on avoiding dating violence.

• The Chicago Tribune covers a local group that helps teen mothers avoid poverty.

• The Indianapolis Star, in a story on local health coverage options, cites a clinic that provides free or low-cost mammograms to 2,000 women in the Indianapolis area each year.

• The Omaha World Herald notes that due to lack of funding, less than 30 percent of the 33,000 women eligible for a Nebraska cancer screening program receive services.

• The Anderson Independent Mail reports on a charity sponsoring healthcare services for low-income women.

To learn more about Spotlight, visit www.spotlightonpoverty.org.  To sign up for our weekly updates with the latest news, opinion and research from around the country, click here.

The Spotlight on Poverty and Opportunity Team

Spotlight on Poverty and Opportunity is a foundation-led, non-partisan initiative aimed at ensuring that our political leaders take significant actions to reduce poverty and increase opportunity in the United States. We bring together diverse perspectives from the political, policy, advocacy and foundation communities to engage in an ongoing dialogue focused on finding genuine solutions to the economic hardship confronting millions of Americans.

Spotlight on Poverty and Opportunity, a national foundation-led initiative, is excited to collaborate with The Women’s Foundation to bring you the latest news and analysis on women and poverty.

Spotlight is the go-to site for news and ideas about fighting poverty. And every Friday, look for our weekly rundown of the top news stories on women and poverty.

Here’s this week’s news:

• The Christian Science Monitor profiles a Boston-area theater troupe composed of marginalized women.

• In an op-ed in the Baltimore Sun, Baltimore Medical System President and CEO Jay Wolvovsky advocates for comprehensive prenatal care for low-income women.

• In a call for increased parental participation in children’s education, Milwaukee Journal Sentinel columnist James E. Causey cites a program that offers assistance to low-income families, many led by single mothers.

• A Lowell Sun editorial argues that much of the current baby boom is attributable to teen pregnancy and single-mother homes, both of which are associated with poverty.

• In a Myrtle Beach Sun News op-ed calling on women to help empower one another, Sheryl McAlister, executive director of the South Carolina Alliance for Women, notes that women are more likely to live in poverty than men.

• The Cherry Hill Courier Post reports on a local effort to get prom clothes to girls who need financial assistance.

• The Norfolk Virginian Pilot covers a local branch of an international charity providing low-income women professional attire for job interviews.

To learn more about Spotlight, visit www.spotlightonpoverty.org.  To sign up for our weekly updates with the latest news, opinion and research from around the country, click here.

The Spotlight on Poverty and Opportunity Team

Spotlight on Poverty and Opportunity is a foundation-led, non-partisan initiative aimed at ensuring that our political leaders take significant actions to reduce poverty and increase opportunity in the United States. We bring together diverse perspectives from the political, policy, advocacy and foundation communities to engage in an ongoing dialogue focused on finding genuine solutions to the economic hardship confronting millions of Americans.

Spotlight on Poverty and Opportunity, a national foundation-led initiative, is excited to collaborate with The Women’s Foundation to bring you the latest news and analysis on women and poverty.

Spotlight is the go-to site for news and ideas about fighting poverty. And every Friday, look for our weekly rundown of the top news stories on women and poverty.

Here’s this week’s news:

• The New York Times editorializes on a small provision in the recent spending bill that will make contraception more affordable for low-income women.

• Chicago’s Columbia College includes classes that target some practical needs for low-income women, reports the Chicago Tribune.

• The New York Times writes that the age of steady annual decreases in unplanned pregnancies may be over.

• Cynthia Tucker argues in the Atlanta Journal-Constitution that it’s time to adapt public policy to support children born out-of-wedlock .

• Pennsylvania’s Girard College is about to have its first black woman president, according to the Philadelphia Inquirer.

• The Staten Island Advance reports that delinquent or failed child support payments have become a local epidemic.

• The Wichita Eagle notes a new Kansas program that helps men navigate the child welfare system.

To learn more about Spotlight, visit www.spotlightonpoverty.org.  To sign up for our weekly updates with the latest news, opinion and research from around the country, click here.

The Spotlight on Poverty and Opportunity Team

Spotlight on Poverty and Opportunity is a foundation-led, non-partisan initiative aimed at ensuring that our political leaders take significant actions to reduce poverty and increase opportunity in the United States. We bring together diverse perspectives from the political, policy, advocacy and foundation communities to engage in an ongoing dialogue focused on finding genuine solutions to the economic hardship confronting millions of Americans.