Grants That Make a Difference
"Grants that Make a Difference" highlights grants given to Southeastern organizations that have helped make a difference in people's lives. Getting the grant is only the beginning of the story. At least once a month, "Grants That Make a Difference" will profile these important grants and what their recipients are doing with them.
Last year, the Women’s Sports Foundation released “The Status of Female Youth Health and Physical Activity in the Atlanta
Metropolitan Area”, which showed that DeKalb County and Georgia’s girls are below the national average on nine out of 16
health indicators, including nutrition, teen pregnancy and sport team participation. In partnership with the Atlanta
Women’s Foundation, the Women’s Sports Foundation announced the launch of
GoGirlGo! Atlanta, a three-year
community campaign aimed at getting 200,000 of Atlanta’s girls moving, 8,000 of those by June 1, 2005.
Sport and physical activity participation is a fundamental intervention that addresses health risks with research
demonstrating that girls who play sports or engage in physical activity are lower risk for heart disease, breast cancer,
diabetes, teen pregnancy, smoking and drug use. Physical education classes and recess are being cut out of the daily
curriculum across the United States, essentially lessening exposure to sports and physical activity.
This unfortunate reality is all too familiar for girls living in the Metro Atlanta area because the state of Georgia no
longer mandates physical education classes in grades 6 and above. Only about one-quarter of Georgia female high school
students attend physical education class one or more days a week. Girls do not receive the same encouragement, opportunities
or support to participate in sports as boys. Georgia ranks 41 out of 50 states in high school sports opportunities for girls
compared to their enrollment in the general student body (females are 49.5% of high school students and only 37.7% of high
school athletes).
The Women’s Sports Foundation has selected Atlanta as a pilot community to demonstrate how a community can get inactive
girls to become physically active and stop the drop-out rate among currently active girls. GoGirlGo! Atlanta, a three-year
initiative, has five components that will increase the physical activity rates of young girls throughout the metro area:
- Peer-to-peer and adult-to-youth mentoring: Atlanta adults and active girls will be asked to pledge to get one
inactive girl physically active each year and help support Atlanta girl-serving organizations’ efforts to provide them with
physical activity programs. Pledges will be recorded and information on how to get girls active is available on
www.GoGirlGo.com. A comprehensive listing of programs eager to motivate and encourage girls to become active has been
established there and will continue to grow.
- Community-based activation: GoGirlGo! Week was conducted throughout Atlanta during the week of January 31 through
February 6, 2005, where active adults and girls brought inactive girls to free “open houses” offered by girl-serving
agencies to introduce them to various activity programs. GoGirlGo! Atlanta organizes annual leadership summits for
interested nonprofits to share ideas and receive training, and it will establish the Atlanta Girls' Coalition, which will
serve as a collaborative network for girl-serving programs once the three-year initiatve ends.
- Public Education and Awareness Campaign: GoGirlGo! Atlanta media partners, such as Atlanta Woman Magazine
and WSB-TV’s Family2Family program, will assist in educating the public about the importance of physical activity for girls
and how to participate in GoGirlGo! Atlanta.
- Award-Winning Education Kits: A free, National Health Information Award-winning, curriculum-based educational
program created for girls, coaches and parents to reinforce positive behaviors and to educate girls about how inactivity and
negative habits can adversely affect health. The Women’s Sports Foundation will provide these materials for free to metro
Atlanta girl-serving organizations on GoGirlGo! Atlanta's website and through participating in the campaign. Materials are
designed for ages 8-12, 13-18 and adults. Interested organizations and individuals should visit the
Web site for more information.
- Grants: The Women’s Sports Foundation, in partnership with the Atlanta Women’s Foundation and Kaiser Permanente
Georgia, will provide $500,000 in cash grants, awarded annually, over a three-year period for Atlanta-area programs to
enable new sport and physical activity opportunities; half of the total amount has been earmarked for technical assistance.
A national list of 2005 recipients is available at the Women's Sports Foundation's
Web site.
Requirements for 2006 awards will be released in Fall 2005.
“GoGirlGo! Atlanta brings together an entire community to encourage, activate and aid in the overall well-being of Atlanta’s
girls. We must counteract the 250,000 television commercials a girl sees by the time she is 17 that tell her to be a
decorative object or a sex object rather than strong, healthy and active. By the age of 17, 78% of all girls are unhappy
with their bodies. We must make sure that there’s a sport and physical activity program for every girl regardless of her
size or ability, especially those who are underserved or from lower socio-economic level environments who cannot afford
access, ” stated Dominique Dawes, Women’s Sports Foundation President-elect.
Dominique Wilkins, nine-time NBA All-Star and Atlanta Hawks Vice President, is chairing the GoGirlGo! Atlanta campaign.
Wilkins stated, “Many parents like me can afford to buy the gift of sports and physical activity participation for our
daughters. Too many others cannot. If we don’t change the nutrition and physical activity habits of our children, one of
every three children born in the year 2000 will become a Type II diabetic. We must invest in youth physical activity now or
be prepared to bankrupt our economy later paying for their healthcare costs. Every boy grows up with society expecting and
encouraging him to play sports. Our daughters must receive the same messages.”
Other metro Atlanta leaders and celebrities who are acting as spokespersons for the program include Josh Childress of the
Atlanta Hawks; former University of Georgia football coach Vince Dooley and his wife, Barbara; Sally Weaver, CEO of the
Atlanta Women’s Foundation; WSB-TV news anchor Monica Kaufman; among others.
GoGirlGo! national sponsors Advanta, Gatorade, Moving Comfort, a division of the Russell Corporation, and the William
Wrigley Jr. Company are joined by Kaiser Permanente, GoGirlGo! Atlanta's Champion Sponsor, and Atlanta Woman Magazine,
BellSouth, Hope-Beckham, and WSB TV - Family 2 Family, GoGirlGo! Atlanta's Patron Sponsors. All of these corporate sponsors
are critical in providing support for girls’ programming throughout the Atlanta area.
Founded in 1974 by Billie Jean King, the
Women’s Sports Foundation is a
national charitable educational organization based in Nassau County, NY, which seeks to advance the lives of girls and women
through sport and physical activity. The Foundation’s Participation, Education, Advocacy, Research and Leadership programs
are made possible by gifts from individuals, foundations and corporations.
For almost two decades, the
Atlanta Women’s Foundation has been a catalyst for change
in the lives of women and girls. We combine our passion for creating positive change with the knowledge and expertise
necessary to translate this passion into action. Through strategic grant-making, capacity building, advocacy and education
efforts, AWF encourages women and girls to use their voices to create powerful social change.
Contacts:
For girl-serving organizations: Cicley Gay, GoGirlGo! Atlanta Project Leader, (770) 256-1858 or
CicleyG@aol.com
For foundation, corporate and individual supporters: Donna Lopiano, Ph.D., Chief Executive Officer of the Women’s Sports Foundation, (516) 542-4700
The selection of organizations for the "Grants that Make a Difference" is based on criteria such as programmatic interests, geographic focus, and size of funding programs to ensure the broadest possible representation of the region's nonprofit sector.
If you'd like to see support for your organization featured in "Grants that Make a Difference," e-mail a detailed description of the grant, including the name and contact information of the funder and of your organization, the amount given, and how the grant made a difference. For your convenience, we have provided a template to follow. We welcome press releases in addition to, or as a substitute for, the information in the template.
Email the description or press release to
atweb@foundationcenter.org, with "Grants that Make a Difference" in the subject line.
Recipient Name:
Project Name:
Organization Mission and how it relates to the project:
Beneficiaries or Community Impact:
Funding Partner(s): (Grantmaker Names)
Grant Amount:
Recipient Contact: Name, Address, Phone, Fax, E-mail, URL
Grantmaker Contact: Name, Address, Phone, Fax, E-mail, URL
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