A WGA HISTORY:
The Founders… proposed an organization in which each member would contribute the same annual amount, the bulk of which was designated for grants, but set proportions also went to pay operating expenses and to contribute to an endowment. They were far thinking. They were also women with many friends. By 2002, when WGA made its first grants, the five women had recruited not 50, but 163 founding members.
From the very beginning, twenty-five years ago, the women who founded the Women’s Giving Alliance understood the power of endowment.
The five leaders were all knowledgeable about nonprofit operations, and they had served
as trustees at The Community Foundation—which gave them an insider’s view of the prudent investment of resources that fuels grantmaking in perpetuity. They also knew that services for women and girls were woefully under-resourced, only recently surpassing 2 percent of philanthropic funding, according to the Indiana University Lilly Family School of Philanthropy.
“It was a bold move to include endowment as part of the original model of WGA, but the founders knew they had an idea that would take off,” said Wanda Willis, Vice President of Civic Leadership at the Foundation and longtime WGA member.
In 2011, as WGA prepared to celebrate its 10th anniversary, then-WGA President Barbara Harrell worked with Foundation staff to create a new opportunity to support women and girls. They conceived of a $25,000 membership that would allow women to create designated endowed funds supporting WGA in their own names at The Community Foundation.
The WGA Legacy Membership was born.
Part of WGA’s mission is to support women to become strategic philanthropists. The Legacy Membership was another tool for women to do that. – Sabeen Perwaiz, President, WGA
Julia Taylor, a past president of WGA and former trustee of the Foundation, endowed her membership the first year it was available, and she recalled that the late Helen Lane and others hosted small house parties to talk about the idea with long-time WGA members. By 2025, more than 90 women had become Legacy Members, and endowments contributed one-third of WGA’s total grants of $612,500 in 2025.
“I felt from the beginning that it would be successful, but you never know. Now to hear the results—it’s so wonderful.” – Julia Taylor, Past WGA President & Former Trustee of The Community Foundation
A HISTORIC MILESTONE REACHED:
Since inception, WGA has made more than $10 million in grants—a milestone achieved in
2025 through the annual contributions of members as well as spend-out from endowments.
“When I first joined WGA, I was inspired by the idea of women coming together to support other women and children. That’s why I chose to become a Legacy Member: to make sure this collective giving circle continues to change lives for women and girls, forever.”
– Nancy Chartrand, WGA Legacy Member
This article was originally published in our 2025 Annual Report to the Community. Read the full report.