From Third Wave Fund: There is too much at stake right now. Every day there are escalating political attacks and legislative curtailing of bodily autonomy and human rights. It is critical that gender justice movements are able to focus on the work ahead, instead of jumping through hoops and bureaucracy in philanthropy.  

Organizations that make up these powerful movements need and deserve consistent support to build new skills, to build power, to grow their own vision, and to experiment, fail, iterate, and try again. And they need this space without the risk of losing their institutional partners or funding. That’s why in 2016 Third Wave started the Grow Power Fund, our long-term support fund that awards six-year grants meeting youth-led grassroots gender justice organizations wherever they’re at in support of their sustainability and long haul visions for community liberation. 

In our new report, Resourcing Movements for the Long Haul: Lessons from the Grow Power Fund’s First Six Years, we document key lessons from the Grow Power Fund’s first cycle of long-term funding. 

This report is an invitation to all funders to shift and transform your grantmaking practice to meet the needs that youth-led movement leaders are naming. We hope you’ll join us in evolving your funding, and transforming your relationship with movements to be enriched by mutual trust as we listen to our grantee partners to meet them where we’re needed the most.