Women

In nearly 90 percent of high net worth households, women are either the sole decision maker or an equal partner in decisions about charitable giving, according to the Bank of America Merrill Lynch 2011 Study of High Net Worth Women’s Philanthropy.

Wal-Mart has committed $100-million in grants to nonprofit groups that provide job training to women as part of a $20-billion campaign to boost female economic development, according to The New York Times and the Associated Press.

The grants will support development of work and financial skills for hundreds of thousands of women in the United States and abroad, including female employees at Wal-Mart’s suppliers.

The NoVo Foundation kicks off its Move to End Violence initiative, a groundbreaking, 10-year, $80 million initiative designed to strengthen the movement to end violence against girls and women in the United States. The program is designed as a series of five cohorts, each on a two-year cycle. Over the life of the initiative, Move to End Violence will engage over 100 individuals and as many organizations, establishing a powerful infrastructure of sophisticated leaders and organizations to lead the effort to end violence against girls and women in the United States.

To Mama With Love is a collaborative online art project that honors moms across the globe and raises funds to invest in remarkable women who are transforming our world.

A new research and community awareness project set to kick off next week will aim to zero in on the gender gap in the nonprofit sector — particularly why women nonprofit executives trail men in salaries.

The effort, called "74 percent: Exploring the Lives of Women in Nonprofits," is being launched by the Bayer Center for Nonprofit Management at Robert Morris University with funding from the Bayer USA and Eden Hall foundations.

In April, a panel of experts gathered at Spelman to address how women are leveraging this economic power to redefine philanthropy in the 21st century. "Funding the Future: How Women are Shaping Philanthropy" honed in on how women are changing philan
thropy as heads of foundations, individual donors and major supporters of a variety of institutions and projects.

Next time you're out raising money for your favorite charity, you would do best to first hit up your female friends — or perhaps the wives of your male ones. Women, it appears, are much better givers.

According to a recent study by the Women's Philanthropy Institute at the University of Indiana, women are as much as 40% more likely to donate than men. What's more, women at nearly every income level are better givers. Not only do they give more often; they also tend to donate more.

Do men and women give to different types of causes?

It turns out that women are just as likely, if not more likely, as men to give to every kind of cause, according to a study released this week.

But some charities do have an edge when it comes to seeking gifts from women. The largest gender difference the study found was in church giving: A third of women said they were more likely to support religious institutions over other causes, while only a quarter of men shared that view.

Amy Heller has found the answer to the question on every charity executive and board member's mind: How do nonprofits engage the next generation of donors?

"It's about making philanthropy fun, social, relevant and transparent to donors," says Heller.

WGIRLS, which works to provide underprivileged women and children with a quality education, financial independence and self-sufficiency, was started by Heller and a group of other professional women in New York who initially came together to socialize, with a bent on doing something good for their community.

MUNCIE -- Local non-profit fundraising staff, get your pencils and pads and write this down. You've been missing out on a large number of people, right here in Delaware County, who want to give to your organizations. In fact, they can't wait to give to your agencies. All you have to do is ask.Who are these hidden gems in our community? Women. That's right, half of the area's population."The biggest external contributor to female giving is that they're just not asked," said Andrea Pactor, associate director from the Women's Philanthropy Institute. "Up until now, philanthropy has been seen as