Thank you for helping us promote our "Give Monthly, Change the World" campaign to grow and strengthen our community of monthly donors. With your efforts, we were able to add 62 new recurring donors! In addition, 25 donors increased their existing recurring gifts. This supports our plans to expand our grantmaking by 75% over the next three years -- these campaign results will bring in more than $30,000 more in donations per year. Even small increases can really add up with our collective giving model!
While our campaign has ended, please continue to remind your members about the benefits of monthly giving and how they can sign up any time throughout the year, or increase their monthly gifts by emailing donations@togetherwomenrise.org.
Chapter Leader Need to Know
1. Volunteer Appreciation Month Feedback -- Thank you to everyone for participating in our Volunteer Appreciation Month activities! We had a great time at our Chapter Leader Coffee Chat and UN Women's History event. We believe that our volunteers deserve recognition for all your donated time, talents, and contributions. We'd love your feedback: please answer these three questions!
2. Special Mini Grants Selected by Volunteers-- Thank you to everyone who voted to award two former Rise grantees with $500 mini grants. There were 83 votes cast and the winners were Fistula Foundation (35 votes) and the The Center for Victims of Torture(23 votes). The funds have been sent to these two organizations informing them that this is a special gift from our wonderful volunteers.
3. Monthly Chapter Reports -- Unfortunately, we are continuing to identify and work through various kinks with our new online payment system. As a result, you may have noticed some donations missing from your latest monthly chapter report that was sent to you around May 10th, primarily recurring donations that are not connecting properly to their chapter. We plan to resend new, corrected chapter reports for April on Thursday, May 21 and Friday May, 22.
We apologize for the inconvenience and confusion this has caused and appreciate your ongoing patience as we work to ensure that we can avoid this issue in the future. If you have any questions about your monthly report, please email donations@togetherwomenrise.org.
Your June Chapter Meeting
June Featured Grantee:
Growing Opportunity for Women Farmers in Nepal
Our Featured Grantee for June is dZi Foundation (pronounced ‘zee’). Together, we will fund the MaUKa Initiative that addresses persistent gender-based economic disparities in Nepal, where women farmers play vital agricultural roles yet face limited access to financial skills, basic knowledge, and markets.
The easiest and fastest way to find the Featured Grants education materials on our website is by using the top menu bar "For Chapters" and clicking on "Monthly Grantee Materials."
By Vinola Vincent-Munyon, Together Women Rise Recipe Co-Curator
This dish, from the Palpa region of West Nepal, is similar to a potato salad but with a far more complex and interesting flavor profile and no mayo. PROVEN PLATTER RECIPE.
Please share these important updates with your chapter members:
1. Leave a Legacy with Together Women Rise--Over the next several weeks, we'll be sending communications to all Rise members about legacy giving (also called planned giving) and how they can continue supporting gender equality beyond their lifetimes. As chapter leaders, you can help reinforce that message by sharing our Legacy Giving Fact Sheet at your June meeting — you can either print it off or share it digitally. For additional questions or support, contact Kaitlyn Grigsby-Hall at kaitlyn@togetherwomenrise.org.
On June 22nd at 12 pm ET / 9 am PT, we are holding an informational session on legacy giving, with financial advisor Anne Marie Ashworth of Abacus Planning Group as our featured speaker. Learn more and register here.
2. New Giving Options Available -- We're making it easier than ever to donate to Rise and support women and girls in the Global South! You can now use Venmo and Zelle, both of which are great options due to their low processing fees. We have also made it easier to set up a monthly recurring donation through your bank account. You can now set up your monthly bank drafts online -- no more paper forms and voided checks to mail in to us!
Movie Screening Rita Delgado, leader of the CT, Salisbury-1 chapter and longtime Rise volunteer, recently hosted a screening of the documentary Between the Mountain and the Sky in partnership with the local Moviehouse. Rita also hosted a Q&A after the screening for participants. This was a great opportunity to introduce Together Women Rise to her local community and promote one of our former grantees, Blink Now.
Connecting Your Members Through a Monthly Newsletter Some of our chapter leaders create a monthly newsletter to send to their members. Recently, Maryanne Schiller, co-chapter leader of the PA, Philadelphia - 8 chapter, was inspired by Mary Gibson and her FL, Venice - 2 chapter to start a monthly newsletter for her chapter members. Maryanne is using a platform called MailChimp, which has a free version. She promotes her chapter's next meeting time and location, shares updates about donations, special events, and shoutouts to new members. There is even a feature to "spotlight" individual members and their biographies.
Connections Between Chapters In May, our FL, Gainesville - 2 chapter had a joint meeting with FL, Cedar Key - 1. This is not the first time that Gainesville joined forces with another Together Women Rise chapter. Twice a year, our FL, Gainesville - 2 and FL, Gainesville - 1 chapters have a joint picnic. The FL, Gainesville - 2 chapter was a spin off of the FL, Gainesville - 1 chapter and their bi-annual picnics allow members to stay connected. We love to see chapters meeting up and building community! If this is something you would like to do in your area, contact your Chapter Support Liaison (CSL) who can help you coordinate this. Don't have or know your CSL? Contact kia@togetherwomenrise.org.
