Donate
Women’s Economic Empowerment:
Women United in Philanthropy
As our membership grows, so does our impact on
the lives of women around us.
Women United in Philanthropy (WUIP) is our premier women’s giving circle. While its members are from many different walks of life, they share a common goal: To empower women by investing in innovative solutions to the burden poverty and financial instability places on them and their families.
Based in Bergen County, New Jersey, the founding members of WUIP created the circle as a new philanthropic vehicle for women–one that enables them to collectively invest in big ideas to change the trajectory of poverty for women in Bergen County. Since 2004, the women-focused giving circle has awarded $1.2 million in grants that continue to help hundreds of women and families through its funded programs today.
How Giving Circles Work
- Members of giving circles decide upon a minimum financial contribution, requirements for membership, and a process for grantmaking.
- They are committed to collective giving, creating a grant fund from which they award grants to causes that mean the most to them.
- They are democratic, affording all members an equal vote in decisions regardless of their gift level.
- Traditionally, their grant focus is local—seeking to strengthen their own communities and help local people in need.
WUIP members of all ages come together throughout the New Jersey/New York metropolitan area to:
- Learn about the needs of women and girls in Northern New Jersey
- Make informed, strategic, large-impact charitable investments together
- Build a membership community of like-hearted philanthropic women.
Interested in forming
a giving circle in
your community?
Membership is extended to any woman who contributes $1,000 or more annually to the circle’s pooled grant fund. Each year, members vote to award one large impact grant to an organization helping women in need. With a focus on economic empowerment and listing women from poverty, WUIP grants seek to ensure all women have access to:
- Affordable Health Care
- Safe, Affordable Housing
- Nutritious Food
- The Means to Earn a Living Wage (Job Training and Placement)
- Affordable Childcare; and
- A place to turn in times of unexpected crisis
Not ready to join as a member? Support our mission with a gift to the Women’s Foundation of New Jersey Annual Fund.
Your support will help to make our work possible.