The Women’s Foundation of Greater Kansas City is the result of the vision and hard work of two organizations: the Metropolitan Women’s Roundtable, a consortium of more than 20 local women’s organizations; and the Central Exchange, a professional women’s organization. Representatives of these two organizations began discussions in May 1989. The dream was a new foundation for women of all ages, created, supported and managed by women in Kansas City.
- To promote the long-term stability of organizations serving women and girls in our community.
- To fund innovative programs addressing key issues facing women and girls.
- To think strategically with other community leaders about the importance of women’s issues, and to increase support from other funders for those issues.
- To encourage women to recognize “the power of their purses,” to be thoughtful givers putting their dollars where their values are.
- More than 1 in 8 women in the U.S., over 15 million, lived in poverty in 2008. Over 1/3 of these women lived in extreme poverty, defined as income below 50% of the Federal Poverty level.
- Two-thirds of children denied primary education are girls
- 75% of the world’s 876 million illiterate adults are women, reported the Millennium Campaign in 2007.
- Worldwide, women constitute about 70 percent of the absolute poor—those living on less than a dollar a day.
- Seventy-five percent of all poor Americans over age 65 are women.
- Although more adult women live in married-couple families than in any other living arrangement, an ever-growing number of women are raising children without a spouse.
- Women are more likely to live in poverty than are adult men. Single-mother families face particularly high poverty rates, often because of the lower wages earned by women in these families.
- A college-educated woman earns an annual median income of $51,000 compared to $61,000 for a college-educated man.
- A girl who doesn’t graduate from high school has a 90 percent chance of being poor and of passing the “legacy” of poverty to her children.
- Battery is the single major cause of injury to women; a woman is battered every 10 seconds.
Facts as of July 2009
Today The Women’s Foundation of Greater Kansas City is the only local organization working to enhance and improve economic self-sufficiency as it relates to financial literacy, career advancement and support for working women, in a comprehensive way for women and girls in Kansas City. The Foundation brings together and invests in local organizations that make women and girls more successful. What makes WFGKC different is focus: they do research in Kansas City to uncover women’s biggest barriers to success and greatest needs. Then target grants, education and advocacy where they can do the most good.
Over the past 20 years, more than 2.5 million has been awarded to organizations to improve the lives of Kansas City’s women and girls. Help The Women’s Foundation make the next 20 years even brighter by donating now.