Connecting Women.
Strengthening Communities.
Impact100 Essex is a giving circle founded and funded by women in Essex County.
Our mission is to engage women in collective giving, to provide transformative grants to organizations that serve underrepresented communities in Essex County, NJ, and to spur local non-profits to dream big – and succeed!
Each year, Impact100 Essex awards a grant of $100,000 to support an important, innovative project managed by a local non-profit organization addressing the needs of historically underrepresented communities.
Our Commitment to Diversity, Equity and Inclusion
Impact100 Essex’s DEI Action Committee serves as a change agent to ensure that diversity, equity and inclusion are fully integrated in all aspects of our work. See the DEI tab for more detailed information.
The Impact100 Essex Process
Together we can do more, and there is much to do here in Essex County. Impact100 Essex creates the opportunity to empower local organizations to dream bigger, reach higher, grow stronger and do more good in our community. Members from a wide range of backgrounds and experience create connections, share knowledge and gain insight to optimize our contributions through Impact100 Essex, and beyond.
Membership is composed of 100+ women from Essex County.
Each member contributes $1,000 to the giving circle and an additional $100 to support our operational costs.
Contributions fund an annual Impact Grant of $100,000, as well as additional grants as our membership grows.
Local non-profits apply for the Impact100 Essex grant.
Grant committee members review proposals and choose finalists.
Finalists present their proposals to all members
Members vote and the grant recipient is announced at the Annual Meeting.
Piloted in 2021 to increase equity in grantmaking, additional Equity Grants provide direct, unrestricted support to local non-profits led by Black, Indigenous and People of Color (BIPOC). Click here for more information on our Equity Grants.
“Women give differently than men. We’re not just about giving, but about relationships with the organizations we support. Women don’t just write checks, we are hands on!”
— Sarah Rosen, Women@NJPAC
Our Origin Story
Impact100 founder Wendy Steele discusses the impact of generosity
On Martin Luther King Day in January 2017, twenty-three women gathered in an East Orange apartment to discuss how collective giving could be used to support local non-profits addressing the needs of historically underrepresented communities.
We followed the Impact100 model, initiated in 2001, with a simple but effective concept: to engage women in the power of collective giving to fund transformative grants to local non-profits seeking to broaden or deepen their programs.
In New Jersey, some 2,400 women in four Impact100 chapters have granted over $4 million to local nonprofits since 2013.
Nationwide, 30,000 women in over 60 Impact100 groups have granted over $100 million to local non-profits since 2001.
New Jersey Impact100 groups partner with the Community Foundation of New Jersey for technical and administrative support and to benefit from their deep experience with New Jersey nonprofits.
Become a powerful agent of change alongside other women in your community by joining Impact100 Essex today.
When you become a member of Impact100 Essex, you join a unique group of philanthropic women who collectively fund high-impact grants to help historically underrepresented populations in Essex County, New Jersey. The grants are provided to non-profit organizations that complete a rigorous application process and are selected through a membership vote.
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