MISSOULA — The Women’s Giving Circle has awarded Empower MT with a $5,000 grant to expand its youth BIPOC (Black, Indigenous and people of color) after school programs which provide local BIPOC students an opportunity to connect with one another in a safe setting.
Every year the Women’s Giving Circle chooses one cause to donate thousands in grant funding -- and this year’s cause was social and racial justice in our area.
Steering Committee member Katjana Stutzer says there were three finalists for the grant award and while the decision was difficult the proven success of Empower MT’s program provided them with the edge over the other two finalists.
“Just has a really solid plan for how they are going to administer the program and so they had a really compelling application,” Stutzer said. “So not only is it addressing a really pertinent timely issue in our community but also they have really good evidence that they have a solution that is going to be impactful.”
Stutzer stressed they had a multitude of extremely strong applications that all addressed racial injustice in our area and that the decision was difficult.
