Competitive Grant Programs: Women and Girls Fund

STATUS: By-Invitation

The Women and Girls Fund has adapted its grantmaking process from reactive and open-applications toward a proactive and by-invitation process for 2025. This new approach centers relationship-building to combine strategic community leadership with thoughtful planning and intentional Fund investment—ultimately leading to a more streamlined, inclusive, and effective process. To better understand the needs of the community and build deeper, longer-term relationships, the Fund’s Committee and Foundation staff conduct research 

through needs assessments and hold listening sessions with local organizations and groups. This ongoing engagement helps The Women and Girls Fund discover organizations, groups, and corresponding projects aligned with our mission, grantmaking criteria, values, and priority community served, while reciprocally striving to meet the needs of our community and the organizations and groups with whom we partner. Based on this learning, the Fund will approach organizations and groups whose needs and goals we believe may be well-matched with The Women and Girls Fund to craft projects for funding consideration.

DESCRIPTION:
Launched in 2022, The Women and Girls Fund of The Cape Cod Foundation was developed to strengthen the lives of women and girls in our region. The primary purpose of the Fund is to build resources and provide grants for initiatives that empower women and girls across Barnstable County. The Fund has identified the following key priorities to be addressed through grantmaking to programs and organizations:

• Breaking the cycle of poverty by increasing economic opportunity and self-sufficiency for women through trainings and educational opportunities
• Breaking down barriers for girls by providing new, expanded, or more accessible educational opportunities, out-of-school programs, and mentorship opportunities

Grants from The Women and Girls Fund are intended to support all women and girls in Barnstable County, with a particular focus on work that supports BIPOC (Black, Indigenous, and People of Color), low-income, and historically marginalized and traditionally underrepresented women and girls. The Fund works to prioritize support to organizations whose leadership and staff reflect these priority communities.

Projects that incorporate these values are also prioritized:

• Accessibility: proposals that increase access to services or that ensure services are accessible to all (for example: transportation and financial barriers are considered and addressed).
• Cultural Responsibility: proposals that include culturally competent and responsive care, such as material translation or that provide services/outreach in multiple languages.
• Collaboration: partnerships with peer agencies and across sectors to leverage strengths and streamline services.

PRIOR GRANT RECIPIENTS

FUND BACKGROUND: History and resources, including links to our Community Forum Video, Data, and Brochure