Economic Security

WJLA article highlights impact of local women's construction program.

Posted on by Lisa Kays

Many of our readers and community members remember the powerful story of Laceiy and Sharan, and how their lives were changed by a construction job training program, Washington Area Women in the Trades (WAWIT), that is supported by The Women’s Foundation’s Stepping Stones Initiative.

Now, you can learn even more about the program through a WJLA story, "Local Program Expands Career Choices for Women."  The article discusses the success stories of some recent graduates now with exciting careers in construction and other nontraditional fields.

Check it out and learn more about how nontraditional job training for women not only changes the lives of women and their families, but also our community as a whole!

View the WJLA article.
View the video about Laceiy and Sharan’s WAWIT success stories.
Learn more about WAWIT.
Learn more about Stepping Stones.
Learn more about Wider Opportunities for Women and the YWCA of the National Capital Area, two Grantee Partners of The Women’s Foundation who partner to implement WAWIT.

Lisa Kays is The Women’s Foundation’s Director of Communications.

New Leadership Awardee, Family PASS, cited as CNN Hero!

Posted on by Lisa Kays

Here at The Women’s Foundation, we consider all of our Grantee Partners heroes.

But it’s still exciting to see one formally recognized for it!  Like when we learned that one of our new 2009 Leadership Awardees, Family Preservation and Strengthening Services (Family PASS), and its founder, Suezette Steinhardt, has just been named as a CNN Hero!

You can check out the article, and a video of Suezette discussing her work, here.

Congrats, Suezette, on this honor from all of us at The Women’s Foundation.  We’re proud to have you as part of our community of outstanding Grantee Partners working every day to change the lives of our region’s women and girls. 

And thank you for all that you do for low-income families in Virginia!

Learn more about Family PASS here.

Lisa Kays is The Women’s Foundation’s Director of Communications. 

Weekly Round-Up: News and Analysis on Women and Poverty (Week ending April 10, 2009)

Posted on by The Spotlight and Opportunity Team

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.

DCWA: Empowering DC residents to cope with a rough economy.

Posted on by Carrie Shepard

Times are tough. We’ve all seen the headlines and heard the news reports, and most of us even have personal anecdotes that illustrate just how tough times have gotten.

The economic climate has people worried, but is there anything we, as advocates and stakeholders, can do about it?  That was the topic of the DC Women’s Agenda’s most recent Lunch and Learn forum for member organizations and interested parties.

Attendees met at Catholic Charities to hear from guest speakers Linda Stoman and Meg Newman from Capital Area Asset Builders (CAAB) on the organization’s educational outreach programs and the Earned Income Tax Credit Coalition.

The presentations empowered participants to feel that they can do something about the effects of the economy by educating and advising the public on ways to control their personal finances and become financially proactive and literate.  Some of the main points included:

  • Look at your expenses through the critical eye of “need” versus “want.”  Do you really need a texting plan on your phone or the sports package for cable or can you survive without it?
  • Guard your personal and financial information vigilantly—don’t share social security numbers or account information if you can avoid it. Identity theft is on the rise, and the victims usually know the thief.
  • More and more employers are running credit checks on potential employees to determine their character. If there is a significant life change that adversely affected your finances and credit, add a notation to your credit report explaining what happened.
  • While a lot of these tips are good sense, they need to become common sense. Organizations across the District have built curriculums and programs to encourage financial literacy amongst teens and adults. Some of the recommended resources highlighted at the event were Lady Legacy for teen girls, the Institution for Financial Literacy for adults, as well as the DC Saves Campaign, a program that provides savings matches to encourage D.C. residents to save money towards their education or home ownership. The flagship of finances itself, the FDIC, is also playing a key role in the field of financial education.

The Lunch and Learn was a tremendous success and characterized the benefits of bringing together D.C.- based organizations.  As a result, there is now a major partnership underway between the FDIC and D.C. public schools to integrate a financial literacy program into the city’s schools this summer.

Carrie Shepard is an intern at Wider Opportunities for Women, a Grantee Partner of The Women’s Foundation.

The DC Women’s Agenda is a broad-based coalition that promotes women and girls’ equality, advancement, safety, and well-being through advocacy, education, and community input. DC Women’s Agenda is a project of Wider Opportunities for Women.  For more information, please contact Debbie Billet-Roumell, Coordinator, DC Women’s Agenda at DBRoumell@wowonline.org or 202-464-1596.

CAAB is also a Grantee Partner of The Women’s Foundation.

Weekly Round-Up: Women and Poverty (Week ending March 27, 2009)

Posted on by The Spotlight and Opportunity Team

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.

Resources for homeless single women-headed families don't match need.

Posted on by Heather Thompson

According to an annual survey conducted by the Community Partnership for the Prevention of Homelessness in the District, the number of homeless people in the district has increased 3 percent over last year to 6,228.

What’s most alarming is the increase in homeless families, up nearly 25 percent, most of which are headed by single women. Serving this need is a limited number of resources that cater to women and children.

There is no turnkey solution to addressing homelessness. However, in a city where nearly one in five women is living below the poverty line, we all need to advocate for measures to aid this vulnerable population

Heather Thompson is a member of Soroptimist International of Washington DC, the local chapter of an international organization for professional women, with the aim of improving the lives of women and girls.

Weekly Round-Up: News and Analysis on Women and Poverty (Week ending March 13, 2009)

Posted on by The Spotlight and Opportunity Team

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.

Link to The Women's Funding Network and The Women's Foundation on CNN!

Posted on by Lisa Kays

Earlier today, I wrote about how The Women’s Foundation and The Women’s Funding Network were featured on a story on CNN about how investing in women is one the best strategies for fostering economic recovery.

As promised, here is the link to the CNN clip of Linda’s Butler sharing her amazing story of how a jobs training program at Northern Virginia Family Services, which is supported by The Women’s Foundation, changed her life.

Lisa Kays is The Women’s Foundation’s Director of Communications.

New Stepping Stones RFP focuses on increasing and preserving women's economic security in difficult times.

Posted on by Gwen Rubinstein

These are hard times for many, but especially for women-headed families.

Much has been written about the overall U.S. unemployment rate, which rose to 8.1 percent in February 2009, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics.

But did you know that unemployment among women-headed families was even higher at 10.3 percent?

To help community-based organizations in our region respond to the very human challenges behind these numbers, The Women’s Foundation today released a Request for Proposals under the Stepping Stones Initiative.

We hope the work supported by the RFP – through the Financial Education and Wealth Creation Fund and Jobs Fund – will help low-income, women-headed families in our region weather the recession and emerge ready to take best advantage of an eventual recovery.

To respond to the recession, The Women’s Foundation has made several changes to expand the reach of Stepping Stones. Specifically, we:

  • Expanded the target population to women-headed families earning between $0-$40,000;
  • Widened the scope of work to include projects focused on work supports that help promote job retention (such as transportation) and public benefits that serve as a safety net (such as Food Stamps and Unemployment Insurance);
  • Emphasized our intention to deepen our investment in advocacy; and,
  • Encouraged strategic collaborations among community-based organizations to work as long and as holistically as possible with the low-income, women-headed families they are serving.

Here at The Women’s Foundation, we are acutely aware that hard times require us to be wise in our investments. 

And that’s our commitment – to our donors, to our Grantee Partners, to Stepping Stones participants and to our community.

Click here to download the RFP.

Gwen Rubinstein is a Program Officer at The Women’s Foundation.

Weekly Round-Up: News and Analysis on Women and Poverty (Week ending March 13, 2009)

Posted on by The Spotlight and Opportunity Team

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 covers a New York City public school that is part of a trend, especially among schools serving low-income students, toward single-sex classrooms.

• As part of a profile of young Evangelicals offering services to the poor, the Christian Science Monitor focuses on several young women who have moved into struggling neighborhoods to be closer to those they serve.

• The Atlanta Journal Constitution notes that low-income workers, especially women and people with part-time jobs, have a hard time qualifying for unemployment insurance in Georgia.

• A column in the Philadelphia Daily News focuses on the struggles of low-income women aspiring to be nurses, some of whom cannot obtain the training they need.

• A new $1.3 million grant will be used to help low-income, first-time mothers and their children in Horry County, South Carolina, according to the Myrtle Beach Sun News.

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.