Our 2025 Year in Review

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It was poet Gwendolyn Brooks who declared we are each other’s harvest: we are each other’s business: we are each other’s magnitude and bond. Her declaration has remained the call reverberating through our movements for more than five decades—urging us towards each other, ringing as a sacred incantation. As we reflect on 2025, a year shaped by transition and transformation, this wisdom has felt especially resonant. We invite you to take a moment and learn about Third Wave Fund's journey over the last year by exploring the PDF version of our 2025 Year in Review.

In a year that marked a time of great political upheaval, we dug our heels deeper.  We asked ourselves what it meant to be radically committed in the face of blatant fascists and authoritarian threats. We invited you, our dear comrades, committed individual and institutional donors, and friends, to join us in matching the radical energy of our gender justice movements by resourcing the true capacity it takes to build the world anew. 

Alongside you, we continued the critical work of mobilizing resources to sustain grassroots organizers on the frontlines, thwarting attacks on bodily autonomy against people of all genders. In 2025, we redistributed over $4 million to grassroots, gender justice groups across every region of the U.S. and “Territories.” Through 144 grants to 130 grantee partners, we proudly moved more money than ever before to organizers largely overlooked or deemed “too risky” by traditional philanthropy.

From grantee partners securing sacred community space as disabled, queer, and trans organizers in Puerto Rico, to being able to expand geographical reach and train 80+ youth as restorative justice circle keepers in the South, to reclaiming public space through cultural organizing in the Midwest, we have witnessed the wins that take shape when we pour our energy into funding organizers deeply rooted in their communities.

Collectively, we contributed our dollars, organized others to give more deeply, and shared our skills to fortify movements that cannot and will not be easily dismantled. With the support of hundreds of individual donors and multi-year commitments from institutional donors, we were able to respond with strategic urgency and clarity, deepening our rapid response and long-term funding, and trusted the guidance of partners to inform our responsive grantmaking. 

Friends—there’s so much more work to do to fortify the roots of our work towards a more liberating present. Our organizations continue to face the retrenchment of philanthropy as institutions buckle under increasing political pressure. Meeting this moment and sustaining beyond it means resourcing the work it takes to make it happen. We’re calling on you to live into the call Gwendolyn Brooks put forth so many years ago: 

• Organize your friends, family, and community. Engage in political education and dialogue. The first point of contact in changing the narrative of gender justice takes shape in our interpersonal relationships. 
• Trust movements, trust us. Grassroots groups require time and space to build skills and infrastructures that work. When you trust us to redistribute the resources it takes to strengthen community power and self-determination, we build towards our full, abundant, and liberated futures.
• Continue to give. Funding IS POWER BUILDING! Supporting grassroots organizations means sustaining and empowering those most impacted by oppression to be the ones leading the way towards justice. No amount is too small, and no amount is too big. 

The roots of our movements run deep. Now is the time to fortify those roots so they can be sustained well beyond the moment we’re in today. We’re ready to continue funding this work for the long haul. We hope to continue seeing you with us for the duration of this journey. 

Towards a More Liberated Now, 

MARS. Beard and Morgan M. Willis 

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