"Social Change" is the work of eliminating and/or dismantling the structures and/or policies that limit equality for women and girls. To better focus our grantmaking process, we implement a Social Impact Evaluation Framework with the Indicators of Social Change listed below, to help applicants identify the kind of social change they intend to achieve. Using this framework the Women's Fund considers social change is successfully achieved, when one or more of the following shifts occur:
Indicators of Social Change
1) Shifts in definition or reframing of issues:
The issue is defined differently in the community or larger society.
2) Shifts in individual or community behavior:
Change in individual behavior that leads to increased community capacity to organize for social change.
3) Shifts in critical mass or engagement:
People in the community or larger society are more engaged.
4) Shifts in institutions or policies:
An institutional policy or practice has changed.
5) Maintaining or holding the line:
Earlier progress has been maintained in the face of opposition.
Grant applicants will be asked to describe how the above indicators of social change apply to their proposed project.
Theory of Social Change
The overall goal of Women's Fund grantmaking is economic self sufficiency for women and girls in Mississippi. If a woman is economically secure, her family will also be economically secure. And if her family is economically secure her community and state will be economically secure. We believe that a woman's economic security is directly impacted by her child care choices, her reproductive health, and her ability to remain free from violence.
THE WOMEN'S FUND OF MISSISSIPPI