For Immediate Release:
Yolanda Raine
Senior Director, Marketing and Communications
yraine@ywca.org
202-524-5331
Washington, D.C., July 13, 2020 – Google.org has awarded $5 million dollars to YWCA USA, as part of the organization’s larger $10 million-dollar commitment to help nonprofits improve their job training programs and to increase access to digital skills for women and underserved Americans. As part of YWCA USA’s ongoing mission to eliminate racism and empower women, YWCA local associations will utilize the grant to develop programming that reaches over 10,000 women in three years through workforce development and digital skills programs that are focused on a pathway to good jobs. As part of this effort, YWCA will also offer 525 scholarships to Google IT Support Professional Certificates, a program designed to start or advance careers in IT.
“Providing pathways for women to receive the necessary workforce training and digital skills to access competitive jobs in the digital economy is more important now than ever,” said Jacquelline Fuller, President of Google.org. “We are proud to stand with the YWCA USA’s mission to eliminate racism and empower women.”
“YWCA is thrilled to partner with Google.org as we work to create innovative approaches to workforce development and forge new ways to bring the future of work and skills development to women and communities of color across the country, said Alejandra Y. Castillo, CEO, YWCA USA. “The greater goal of the partnership surpasses well beyond the scope of the grant. We are breaking down barriers and creating a path to success for women and people of color that may not have been available without these new programs and initiatives.”
YWCA’s programming has launched at 12 local associations in six states and will eventually expand to 30 local associations across the United States over the next three years. Through this grant, YWCA USA will work to scale two promising job training programs, YWeb Career Academy and STRIVE.
YWeb Career Academy is a workforce development program created by YWCA Madison (Madison, WI), that trains women and people of color to become web developers or designers and places them in family-sustaining jobs. Through this grant, YWCA will scale YWeb Career Academy to 15 new locations across the United States over the next three years. The first five sites will be: YWCA South Florida (Miami, FL); YWCA Evanston/North Shore (Evanston, IL); YWCA Quad Cities (Rock Island, IL); YWCA Allentown (Allentown, PA); YWCA Rhode Island (Woonsocket, RI).
STRIVE is a workforce development program created by YWCA McLean County (Bloomington, IL), that focuses on digital skills training for women and people of color, with the goal of increasing vocational opportunities by providing essential digital and workforce skills. Through this grant, YWCA will scale STRIVE to 15 new locations across the United States over the next three years. The first five sites will be: YWCA Greater Lafayette (Lafayette, IN); YWCA University of Illinois (Champaign, IL); YWCA Southeast Wisconsin (Milwaukee, WI); YWCA Lower Cape Fear (Wilmington, NC); and YWCA Oklahoma City (Oklahoma City, OK).
Both programs are focused on providing digital skills to women or traditionally underserved populations and are often coupled with wrap-around and barrier-reduction services such as child care, stipends, rent assistance, transportation, case management, and job coaching and placement to ensure each participant’s success.
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About YWCA USA
YWCA is on a mission to eliminate racism, empower women, stand up for social justice, help families, and strengthen communities. We are one of the oldest and largest women’s organizations in the nation, serving over 2 million women, girls, and their families.
YWCA has been at the forefront of the most pressing social movements for 160 years — from voting rights to civil rights, from affordable housing to pay equity, from violence prevention to health care reform. Today, we combine programming and advocacy to generate institutional change in three key areas: racial justice and civil rights, empowerment and economic advancement of women and girls, and health and safety of women and girls. Learn more at www.ywca.org.
About Google.org
Google.org, Google’s philanthropy, supports nonprofits that address humanitarian issues and apply scalable, data-driven innovation to solving the world’s biggest challenges. We accelerate their progress by connecting them with a unique blend of support that includes funding, products, and technical expertise from Google volunteers. We engage with these believers-turned-doers who make a significant impact on the communities they represent, and whose work has the potential to produce meaningful change. We want a world that works for everyone—and we believe technology and innovation can move the needle in four key areas: education, economic opportunity, inclusion and crisis response.