Heartfelt Thanks to Our Grants Team
The old adage that "it takes a village" is certainly apt for our work in getting us to this exciting point, starting with the many women who lifted our membership above 100 in our first year so that we could make a $105,000 grant award a reality in 2021. The heavy lifting for the grants work was done by a small but powerful cadre of superstars. Special thanks goes out to the chairwomen of our focus area and finance committees: Arts & Culture, Janelle Haskell; Health & Wellness, Vivian Aguayo; Family, Bonnie Harkness; Education, Dorothy Durden; Environment, Sharon Dennis; and Finance, Latina Fauconier. And of course, the woman behind everything we do -- Ann Vaughn.
Likewise, we are so proud of our 60+ volunteer members who took on the work and responsibility of implementing the grants process. Together, we reviewed dozens of applications, deliberated thoughtfully on each, conducted site visits for a group of 15 semi-finalist organizations (you will hear more about these organizations below), and then came together one last time for the very hard job of selecting a single finalist for each focus area committee. This work allowed us to forge new relationships within the chapter (or strengthen existing ones), and to learn more about each other's professional and lived experiences. It also introduced us to the compassionate, committed and tenacious people inside these nonprofits who are providing essential services to our our region.
We are confident that any one of these five finalist organizations will do the chapter proud as our inaugural grant recipient come September.
The 2021 Impact100 DC Semifinalists
As noted above, each focus area committee struggled with its decision to pick a single finalist to move forward. Our decisions were complicated by the fact that each of the 15 semi-finalist organizations had developed a very promising proposal, and their staffs had dedicated a great deal of time to the site visit process. Members of every single focus area committee asked that we as a chapter continue to follow the following ten organizations that did not make it to being a finalist this year, but whose work certainly deserves our continuing support.
City Kids Wilderness Project
Food Rescue US-DC
Community Youth Advance
Life Pieces to Masterpieces
Montgomery Coalition for Adult English Literacy
Beacon House Community Ministry
Friends of Guest House
Healthy Babies Project
Tenants and Workers United
Fihankra Akoma Ntoaso (FAN)