This International Women’s Day, we celebrate the support we’re seeing for women and girls’ causes. Get ideas from these 10 initiatives from companies and foundations investing in a future where every girl has the chance to realize her full potential.
Are you looking to make an impact on the futures of women and girls? These corporate social responsibility programs can inspire your effort.
Founded by female entrepreneur and returning CEO Whitney Wolfe Herd, Bumble invests in gender equity as a dating app designed with women at the center. As part of its commitment to building healthy and equitable relationships, Bumble supports the National Domestic Violence Hotline through a robust partnership, including donations, volunteer opportunities, and innovative programs. In recent years, Bumble has also sponsored college women athletes and partnered with the WNBA to promote gender equality in sports.
The Nike Foundation and the NoVo Foundation launched the Girl Effect in 2008 to bring visibility to issues that impact women and girls. Kickstarted by a viral video shared at the World Economic Forum, the world’s most influential leaders were inspired to get girls’ issues on the global development agenda. One component of the effort was a multi-year GlobalGiving crowdfunding campaign. Since the crowdfunding campaign ended in 2016, the Girl Effect transitioned to championing its mission as its own nonprofit.
Through the P.A.C.E. (Personal Advancement & Career Enhancement) program launched in 2007, Gap Inc. sought to bring opportunity to the women who make their clothes. Gap is helping them gain skills and confidence both at work and in their personal lives. Since the program’s launch, they’ve expanded it to include girls, and to collaborate with new partners. So far, they’ve reached 1.4 million women and girls. Next up, they aim to have 100% of their core factories investing in women’s empowerment through participation in these programs by this year.
Through the Cummins Powers Women program, the company gives to a network of global nonprofits with proven programs and impact metric measurement. They have also advocated for policy change around the world. Along the way, they’ve influenced 47 laws and policies supporting gender equality.
The Girls Opportunity Alliance, a program by the Obama Foundation, helps adolescent girls around the world achieve their full potential through education. The program also aims to provide the girls with the resources and encouragement to, in turn, take action in their communities. By partnering with GlobalGiving, the Obama Foundation could include more than 20 vetted international organizations in their global crowdfunding campaign for girls.
CHIME FOR CHANGE is a campaign founded by Gucci in 2013 to advocate for women and girls around the world. They’ve raised more than $21 million in support of gender equality work in 92 countries. Part of their movement-building has included a crowdfunding campaign powered by GlobalGiving that used innovative approaches to promote gender equity.
Recognizing that women and girls’ are underrepresented in scientific fields, L’Oréal supports women and girls with science Ph.D. fellowships, grants for postdoctoral scientists, and more. Their goal is to achieve equity in this discipline and to create a community for women in science to inspire and support one another. GlobalGiving is proud to support L’Oréal’s grantmaking.
Goldman Sachs 10,000 Women initiative fosters economic growth by supporting women entrepreneurs around the globe. They provide training, mentoring, networking, and access to capital. Together with the International Finance Corporation, Goldman Sachs has also provided more than $1.45 billion in capital to women entrepreneurs in emerging markets. But most unique among its programs is the free online business course, which has brought the training to many more women.
Coca-Cola’s ambitious 5by20 program, which aimed to improve the lives of five million women across the company’s value chain, concluded in 2020. Since then, they launched Change Make Her, a five-year commitment to lend to under-represented entrepreneurs around the world.
When the Girl Effect Fund retired in December 2016, GlobalGiving launched our own GlobalGiving Girl Fund to continue to support women and girls globally. Hundreds of individual donors and companies like Warner Music Group and Google have supported the fund. Each year new nonprofits around the world receive support. [Read more about our Girl Fund organizations here.]
Your company can accelerate women’s equality in partnership with GlobalGiving. Contact our team to learn more.
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