Rest in Power, Dolores Huerta

We’ve lost a giant in the movement for justice with the passing of legendary organizer and activist Dolores Huerta.

Dolores worked tirelessly throughout her life to improve conditions for women, children, immigrants, and laborers across the U.S. As co-founder of United Farm Workers, she led a movement that garnered historic, life-changing wins for migrant farmworkers, workers that people in power had sidelined for too long.

She knew that systems upholding racism, sexism, and other injustices must be challenged. She knew that those closest to the pain must have a say in the shape of change. And she spent her life betting on the power of the people.

Dolores stood up when the world asked women to be quiet. All her life, she put her people over the noise of precedent, expectations, and doubt.

Dolores’ legacy is the picture of leadership and a timeless inspiration to the Boston Women’s Fund.

Rest in Power.

When Women Change the Rules: Rethinking Power in Philanthropy

Philanthropy presents itself as a mechanism for solving inequality. But the structure through which philanthropic money moves can reproduce a familiar hierarchy: People with resources decide which problems deserve attention, organizations compete for funding according to those priorities, and communities affected by the resulting decisions are asked to prove that they can deliver someone else’s definition of impact.

While the problem is often framed in terms of who gets funded and who doesn’t, a growing group of feminist funds and women-led philanthropic organizations argue that this is not simply a funding gap. It is a power gap, and closing it requires changing not just what gets funded, but who decides.

That is the thesis this essay sets out to test: Across four organizations—two in the United States, one global, and one multilateral—feminist philanthropy has treated “who decides” as a design question, not a courtesy. A courtesy is something a funder extends at their own discretion and can withdraw. By attending to design, the decision structure itself is built to share power. What follows is a look at what happens once that question moves from a mission statement into an operating system.

“The Boston Women’s Fund‘s Allocations Committee is one of the clearest US examples of this shift in practice. Rather than leaving grant decisions entirely to professional staff, the fund convenes community members—including people from both inside and outside philanthropy—to decide directly which organizations receive funding."

Continue reading the full article here

Dec 1: "Illuminating Ill Erotics: An Evening of Song, Storytelling, and Liberated Futures in the HIV/AIDS Movement.”

The Boston Women’s Fund is proud to present “Illuminating Ill Erotics: An evening of Song, Storytelling, and Liberated Futures in the HIV/AIDS Movement.”

Join us on World AIDS Day, Tuesday, December 1, in Cambridge, MA, to celebrate Dr. Jallicia Jolly’s new book, Ill Erotics: Black Jamaican Women and Self-Making in Times of HIV/AIDS, an in-depth study of Black girls and women living with HIV in the Caribbean, and the indispensable role community-care and grassroots networks play in sustaining human well-being.

Together, we’ll honor the many women of the movement through songs, stories, and scholarship. Professor and beatboxer Chesney Snow will open the night accompanied by pianist AJ Khaw. Author Dr. Jallicia Jolly will share her journey to this work and insights from Ill Erotics, before joining Dr. Jo-Anna Rorie and Dr. Ndidimaka Amutah-Onukagha in a dynamic conversation about the HIV/AIDS and reproductive justice movements today. Renowned poet Staceyann Chin will close the evening with a spoken word performance. Book signing to follow. 

Tuesday, December 1, 2026

At Street Theory Collective,

541 Massachusetts Ave. Cambridge, MA 02139

5:30-8:30 pm

Sliding Scale Tickets Available *No one will be turned away for lack of funds*

Get Your Tickets

More about Ill Erotics 

Through nearly a decade of research with Black Jamaican women living with HIV, Ill Erotics reveals how, despite popular narratives declaring the “end of AIDS,” communities continue to confront illness, stigma, and inequality while also creating extraordinary forms of community care, pleasure, collective survival, and political action.

Black girls and women living with HIV are not simply surviving inequality — they are architects of life-affirming care and community-rooted support structures. Medicine alone cannot sustain human well-being. Communities and grassroots networks do, and these women’s organizing is proof. Ill Erotics is about whether a person living with HIV can imagine a future for herself after diagnosis. It is about the indispensable role community-care and grassroots networks play in sustaining human well-being. It is about asking ourselves whose experiences remain marginalized, whose labor made survival possible, and what forms of care and infrastructure are still needed.

Get Tickets