The power of a women’s collective, driving change

May 11, 2025

For many years, advocates for women in the Jewish community focused on securing them executive opportunities and a voice at the table, on a panel, or in negotiating rooms. And the Jewish community always asked, but where are the women, or advanced a minority few needed to fit into a structure set through a primarily male perspective.

Elluminate took a different approach. After 25 years of supporting programs to empower women and girls, we knew where the women were — they were running nonprofits focused on bringing to life their values of Tikkun Olam, repairing the world.

These women are inspiring, motivating, and taking risks, yet often feel alone and under-resourced. Elluminate pivoted to fill a void in the Jewish community, supporting the visionary nonprofit leaders working on emergent issues and devising solutions to benefit all people through a gender and Jewish lens.

Almost seven years ago, Elluminate (then the Jewish Women’s Foundation of New York) created The Collective, an innovative and singular leadership program enhancing the impact, support, and visibility of Jewish women leaders taking on some of our most challenging societal issues through a gender lens, meaning that the solutions devised and applied take into account how they will help both men and women recognizing their historical roles, experiences, and perspectives. It was the first fellowship of its kind in the Jewish community.

The program — now finishing its sixth year — has so far supported 60 women, ten women a year, driving change in the US, Israel and Africa. A recently completed, five-year independent evaluation underscored the impact of The Collective. It revealed that being in a cohort and environment focused on social change helped our women leaders move toward new and deeper successes, and increased their confidence and practices in areas such as leading with a gender lens, leading with a Jewish lens, and most importantly, taking risks with support and moral courage.

The evaluation also found that The Collective strengthened the management and leadership skills of high-level, high-achieving women, and gave them new perspectives on their work, including learning from each other. It also created a much needed Global Jewish Women’s Leadership Network, which had not existed before, to elevate, support, and make visible women leaders and connect them with each other, donors, and advocates.

Many of the women leaders who apply to The Collective came to their positions as advocates, or through personal experiences that exposed them to a societal void needing to be addressed. They were and are motivated by the Jewish value of Tikkun Olam, setting out to change the world with passion and conviction for their cause.

It is important that these women remain in the Jewish world, and are seen as leaders within it. While the mainstream Jewish community builds consensus from legacy public affairs organizations, Elluminate has a database of over 500 women CEOs running organizations, most not included in established spaces or receiving resources from them.

With our gender lens, looking at where Jewish women spend their time, resources, and convictions, we know they care about ending poverty and supporting vulnerable populations; ensuring that the Jewish community is inclusive and diverse; advancing women’s equality in the US and Israel; and, advocating for gender justice, reproductive rights and women’s safety.

Jewish women do not see these issues as left or right, and do not want to be lumped into current politics around social justice. Their work is rooted in the teachings of our shared Judaism however and wherever they were raised, be it Orthodox or Reform, or in Israel, the US or Africa.

As the Jewish community becomes more polarized around some of these concerns, and the government lessens or halts funding and support to nonprofits and the causes we champion, it makes the need and purpose of Elluminate’s work that much more imperative.

There needs to be a home for women to come together, and through a Jewish and gender lens re-envision a world and devise solutions for social change that ensures the advancement of women in all sectors of society.

At this time of peril and assault on basic rights and assumptions, we need bold and visionary new thinking and promising leadership — that which lives in the Jewish women leaders who we seek to elevate, empower and resource. Our growing Collective is a tangible and measurable outgrowth of this belief, and Elluminate will continue to support and advocate for change making through our dual lenses.

To read the blog post on the Times of Israel click here.