Exciting news! Our #WomenAndClimate Communications Program has been awarded the Council on Foundations’ 2016 Wilmer Shields Rich Award for Excellence in Communications!
The program crystallizes the inextricable link between women and climate change, amplifies voices of grassroots change makers, and builds funders’ capacity to support grassroots women’s action.
“Thank you to the Council on Foundations and the selection committee for this incredible honor,” said Katy Neusteter, Director of Communications at Global Greengrants. “The goal of #WomenAndClimate is to show that solutions to climate change exist on the front lines of the battle to save our planet. Grassroots leaders—like Berta Cáceres in Honduras, Mama Aleta Baun in Indonesia, Caroline Npaotane in South Africa, and Suryamani Bhagat in India—are already stepping up to the challenge. It is time to invest in the people who have the most to lose and who are acting now.”
Most funders lack adequate programs to support grassroots women and their climate change solutions. Only .01 percent of all worldwide grant dollars support projects that address both climate change and women’s rights.
To bridge this critical funding gap, we co-hosted the 2014 Summit on Women and Climate, attended by leading grassroots activists and environmental and women’s rights funders, to strategize ways to get more grantmaking dollars to women on the frontlines of climate change. We published the learnings in Climate Justice and Women’s Rights: A Guide to Supporting Grassroots Action. It is the only funders’ resource guide to offer practical guidance on how to support grassroots work at the nexus of climate change and women’s rights.
“Global Greengrants Fund is receiving this award because it recognized a previously overlooked problem and used creative communications to solve it,” said Vikki Spruill, President and CEO of the Council on Foundations. “Global Greengrants successfully focused on convincing select audiences of the importance of funding climate change and women’s rights together, and in the process created a model of excellence in philanthropy for others to follow.”
Created in 1984 and named in honor of the first executive director of the National Council on Community Foundations (now the Council on Foundations), The Wilmer Shields Rich Award for Excellence in Communications is bestowed upon an organization that has creatively and effectively used strategic communications to further its mission and goals.
Thank you to the Council on Foundations—and all of our staff and board members, advisors, grantees, partners, and allies who contributed their time and energy toward making this program a success. May we continue to open eyes and hearts together!
Download Climate Justice & Women’s Rights, case studies, and supporting materials for free at www.WomenAndClimate.org. And tweet with us at #WomenAndClimate.