Keep up with what’s new in 2025. Read our most recent newsletter here – Spring 2025 Circular
Annual Grant Awards Gala
Highlights from the 18th Annual Grant Awards Celebration June 18, 2025 at Temple Sinai
This year’s Gala, held on what will be remembered as one of Rochester’s stormiest evenings, was a true celebration of people making a positive difference in all of our lives. Twinkle lights glowed, a pianist was playing, and there was delicious food and drink. The centerpiece on each table was an arbor vitae, tree of life, a veritable ‘mother tree’. Our circle began with our founding ‘mothers’ Alyce VanPatten, Shirley
King and Paula Carter, who with their deeply rooted convictions, planted seeds to grow an organization with its mission to enrich and support the girls and women of our community. More than 140 RWGC
members, their guests, and representatives from this year’s eight selected grantee organizations, came to Temple Sinai to celebrate the hard and vital work being done each day so that our Rochester
community’s girls and women may lead healthy and fulfilling lives.
Melinda Andolina, Chair of RWGC’s Leadership Team warmly welcomed everyone and described to us the grantmaking and intensive grantee vetting processes. Linda Josephs, Partner Committee Chair, offered inspiring descriptions of this year’s eight grantee organizations who received Circle funding in 2025.
This evening, filled with laughter, the pride of accomplishment, and the feeling of real hope for the future, was uplifting. Nancy Hessler and Teri Davis, Co-Chairs of the Membership Committee, really know
how to throw a party and we are so grateful to them and their 2025 Grants Event Committee members.
If you were not able to attend this year’s celebration, we look forward to seeing you next year – you will leave smiling, maybe even joyful.
In its 18 years of making grants, the Rochester Women’s Giving Circle has distributed more than $2.6 million to nonprofit organizations in our community whose work is aligned with the RWGC’s mission.
The 2025 Grantees are: Agape Haven of Abundance: Urban and Youth Empowerment Program, Center for Teen Empowerment: Young Women’s Leadership and Employment Project, Center for Youth: Flower City Change Makers – Young Women at Promise, Flower City Noire Collective, Inc.: Petals Mentoring Program, Foundation for Women’s Financial Education: Financial Coaching for Social Service Organizations, Goodwill of the Finger Lakes: Good Will Learning Academy, Unity Hospital of Rochester: Project Independence at Healthy Moms, and YWCA – Rochester and Monroe County: Equity Through Development Project
