Our Mission
YW Boston is dedicated to eliminating racism, empowering women, and promoting peace, justice, freedom, and dignity for all.
YW Boston is proud to share a mission statement with YWCA USA and all other YWCA affiliates nationwide.
Our Vision
YW Boston is a thought leader on issues at the intersection of race and gender, and helps individuals and institutions create more inclusive environments where women, people of color, and in particular women of color, can succeed.
About YW Boston
As the first YWCA in the nation, YW Boston has been at the forefront of advancing equity for over 150 years. Through our DEI Services—such as InclusionBoston and LeadBoston—as well as our advocacy work and F.Y.R.E. Initiative, we help individuals and organizations change policies, practices, attitudes, and behaviors with a goal of creating more inclusive environments where women, people of color, and especially women of color can succeed.
Our Impact
Within institutions in Boston, there are intersectional systems of oppression, including racism and sexism that everyone plays a part in reinforcing. These systems, through adverse policies, practices, behaviors, and attitudes, have negative impacts on many groups, especially women, people of color, and women of color, which prevent them from inclusion at every level in institutions in Boston— particularly leadership.​ By targeting organizational and systemic change, YW Boston strives to have the following impact:
- Participating individuals and institutions will change policies, practices, behaviors, and attitudes to be more inclusive;
- The demographic structure of partner organizations will shift toward greater diversity and inclusion at all levels.
As the first YWCA in the nation, we are proud of our history of leadership in the causes of eliminating racism and empowering women.
On March 3, 1866, thirty women met in Boston at the home of civic reformer Pauline Durant to adopt a constitution for the Boston Young Women’s Christian Association. It was the first time in the United States the name – YWCA – was used. Their objective: “The temporal, moral, and religious welfare of young women who are dependent upon their own exertions for support.” What followed was 150 years of YWCA Boston catalyzing unprecedented advances in women’s empowerment and social justice in the city.