International Women’s Day (March 8) is a special day for impact partner Rose Haven. It’s the one-year anniversary of the grand opening for their new space, and the date they welcomed guests back indoors after two long pandemic years. Celebrate with Rose Haven on the evening of March 8 – either at their beautiful NW Portland space or the 10 Barrel Brewing after-party featuring a special-release pale ale. Bonus: It’s an opportunity to congratulate ninety-nine girlfriends Fellow Liz Starke, Rose Haven’s Development Director. Free to attend. RSVP here!
Fellows Program Changes for 23-24
The ninety-nine girlfriends’ Fellows Program currently includes 13 younger members in their 20s and 30s. Three of them will “graduate” this spring – Rebecca Goldcrump, Van Pham, and Kathleen Porcello. A huge thank-you to the members who’ve served as these Fellows’ mentors – including Deborah Edward, Michelle Hynes, Diane McCartney, Gina Riley, and Agnes Zach.
Exciting New Learning Resource and a Friendly Invitation
Your Racial Equity Committee is excited to begin our second year working together and we welcome Girlfriends interested in this work to join us as we continue our journey of embedding racial equity in all that we do. We meet virtually on the first Monday of the month for 60-90 minutes. If you are interested in learning more, please contact Barbara Hilyer.
We are pleased to share a compilation of Racial Equity Resources that we have curated for you on our website under the Education tab and linked here. We hope you find this material interesting and valuable. This offers great information at your fingertips, including the Reducing Racial Disparities Spotlight Report which is focused on our local community.
Volunteer Opportunities Abound
It’s a new year at ninety-nine girlfriends and that means lots of volunteer opportunities are opening up as Girlfriends move around or move on. There are one-time opportunities and short-term task forces, and longer-term team and committee positions available. Ready to pitch in and want to learn more about what might be the right fit for you? Schedule a call or coffee date with Tammy and she’ll help you learn about the options.
2023 Membership is Open
If you haven't renewed yet for 2023, we invite you to join today. Joining early helps us plan for our grantmaking and more! This year’s deadline is 5:00 pm PST on May 1. No matter when you give your 2023 contribution, your membership will be good through April 30, 2024.
LEARNING LINK: ARE YOU REALLY SEEING PEOPLE?
“All my life I have been mistaken for other people of my race…People look at us without really seeing us. Instead they simply see our race. Psychologists call it the “cross-race effect.”
Are you REALLY SEEING people? Learn more here via The Washington Post.
Volunteer Spotlight: Kaye O'Kearny
What brought you to ninety-nine girlfriends?
Linda Williams, a dear friend and amazing human, introduced me to ninety-nine girlfriends. At the time, I was working with the Intel Foundation and had become curious about approaches to giving. I also wanted to learn more about the Portland non-profit ecosystem and meet people, particularly women, who were outside the tech industry. I had been talking to Linda about all of that and she said “I think you’d really like ninety-nine girlfriends. She was right.
Grantee Partner Update: Adelante Mujeres
Congratulations to past Impact Partner Adelante Mujeres’ staff member, Itzel Chávez Gómez, who was awarded the Give!Guide’s Skidmore Prize! The prize is an annual award from the Willamette Week that honors four young Portlanders who work every day to make Portland a better place. Check out the Give!Guide for more information on Itzel and the other awesome recipients of the Skidmore Prize, as well as the many organizations seeking your support this holiday season! You can check out a list of past impact partners and finalists featured in the Give!Guide here!
Grantee Partner Update: BRAVO Youth Orchestra
BRAVO Youth Orchestra had their first choir performance December 9 at PSU for their Community Sing event. They reported that their students did a fantastic job that garnered a standing ovation! BRAVO’s in-school Preschool Program is up and running at Clarendon Learning Center, and going well. The organization is serving around 60 preschool-aged children by teaching them general music education. Up next is the BRAVO Community Orchestra concert at University of Portland's Buckley Auditorium TODAY, Friday, December 16th at 7PM (ninety-nine girlfriends Liaison, Anne Castleton has joined their ranks and will be performing with them!).
Grantee Partner Update: POIC + RAHS
Beginning December 11th, The Oregonian is doing a four-part series on our partner POIC+RAHS and its students, who are finding a safe space from gun violence at their school. Tragically, each school year many students lose their lives to guns – you can learn more and experience community stories through the Oregonian series here.
News from Grants Steering Committee
We are so grateful to you, our members, our volunteers, and our nonprofit community for countless hours of hard work and endless amount of grace it takes to get to this point each year.
We're streamlining our grantmaking process for 2023 to make it easier for our non-profit community and ourselves, and so that more of our members can engage and learn through our work in the future. We are centering trust-based philanthropy as we retool and reimagine how best to bring funds to our community, and to learn while we do it. We can't wait to show you what we come up with - stay tuned!
A Wonderful Time was had by All
It was such a gift to be able to gather together to celebrate our Impact Partners and our 2022 work. The music was lively, the food was yummy, and the opportunity to be together in real life was wonderful. Here is the link to the photos from the event for your enjoyment. The password is Greatroom.
Please credit Andrea Lonas Photography if you choose to share them on social media.
Join Us For 2023
We know many members want to contribute before the end of the year for tax purposes or for employee matching programs. If that is you, or you just want to get it done, you can renew here. Employer matching programs have helped us increase our grant pool and have funded important educational opportunities. We encourage you to select ninety-nine girlfriends as your match recipient and we appreciate your generosity. If you need any help with receipts, please let us know.
Volunteer Spotlight: Pip Meagher (Copy)
Briana Babbit
What brought you to ninety-nine girlfriends?
I first learned of ninety-nine girlfriends several years ago when a nonprofit I worked for applied for a grant. I am interested in systems change and collective impact work and so it seemed like a natural fit to get involved. I was particularly drawn to the Fellows program to have a space to connect with other young women and nonbinary folks and carve out a sense of community.
Looking Ahead
We are excited to announce that we have begun partnering with Propeller through their pro bono program “Uplift” to strategically plan for our next 3-5 years. Watch for more in upcoming Member Updates about an opportunity to participate in interview focus groups for much-valued input to be used in our planning.
Join for 2023
As the calendar year comes to a close, we encourage you to make your membership contribution for 2023. Check out our Join or Renew 2023 page for all the details.
We are excited to begin our eighth year of collective giving, learning, and impact and we hope you will join us!
Volunteer Spotlight: Pip Meagher
Pip Meagher
What brought you to ninety-nine girlfriends?
I was invited to join by my amazing mother-in-law, Gun Denhart. Gun has connected me with many wonderful, community based organizations over the last few decades so I always pay attention when she recommends anything new. Being involved in a volunteer capacity within the community is not new to me so I was immediately curious to learn more as I didn’t know much at all about the model of collective giving that ninety-nine girlfriends was focused on. I met with co-founder Eileen Brady shortly thereafter and before you knew it I was co-leading a grant review team with Maura Koehler-Hanlon. That was in 2016 and I have never looked back.
Urban Gleaners
One of our 2017 Impact Partners, Urban Gleaners, is seeking a new Executive Director! In their own words, “Urban Gleaners has a 16-year history of feeding children and families who are food-insecure in Multnomah and Washington Counties. Our mission is to collect delicious, fresh food before it can go to waste and get it to food-insecure children and families. Pure and simple. We see healthy food as a fundamental right in a just society.” They prefer to receive applications by 5p on Wednesday, November 30, 2022, and will start
scheduling interviews soon after that (position will remain open until filled). Learn More
Membership for 2023 Opens December 1!
Girlfriends will be able to renew or join for 2023 beginning December 1, 2022!
Start thinking about who you know that might want to learn more about ninety-nine girlfriends and invite them to the Awards Celebration happening on Tuesday, December 13. This event is a great way - on a fun and celebratory evening - to learn about our incredible Impact Partners and to meet some of the amazing Girlfriends who fuel this community.
The Girlfriends will Test a Hybrid Model at the Awards Celebration
In the interest of inclusion and taking what we’ve learned in the pandemic and carrying that forward, while honoring the wonderful live event experiences we enjoy sharing, we will be testing the hybrid event model at our Awards Celebration on Tuesday, December 13. The event will be in-person and we encourage you to register and join us for a wonderful evening of celebration of our new Impact Partners and the work we’ve done over the past year, while we welcome new friends and colleagues who want to learn more about ninety-nine girlfriends by attending this event. If it doesn’t work for you to attend in person, please register for the virtual event and you can log onto zoom and watch the event from home. The virtual option will be free and the in-person option will offer a sliding scale that will help us recoup a small portion of the cost of the event. Be sure to register for the option that works best for you HERE.