What are the opening hours?

Monday 9am - 5pm Tuesday 9am - 5pm Wednesday 9am - 5pm Thursday 9am - 5pm Friday 9am - 5pm

Woods Fund Chicago

Home
United States
Chicago, IL
Woods Fund Chicago

Woods Fund Chicago is a bold grant-maker that draws on the power of communities to fight the brutality of poverty and structural racism.

Vision

The Woods Fund of Chicago seeks to help create a society where people of all racial and ethnic groups, across all levels of social and economic status, are empowered and have a voice to influence policies that impact their lives, and where all communities are free of poverty and racism. Core Principles

The Woods Fund strongly believes in the need for and effectiveness of including communi

ties that are most impacted by economic and racial injustice in the entire process of addressing issues that affect them. To this end, the Woods Fund encourages and supports organizations and initiatives that promote community driven solutions. Woods Fund values:
Community organizing and public policy advocacy efforts that lead to comprehensive, authentic, relevant, and sustainable solutions. Woods Fund believes:
Systemic change is the only way to eradicate poverty and structural racism. People most affected by economic and racial inequity should be the leaders and participants in the process of addressing issues that impact them. Woods Fund asserts:
Communities have greater strength, authority, and power through collaborative practice and collective voice. Woods Fund commits:
To be an active partner and catalyst with organizations that share our mission and values. Woods Fund recognizes:
Structural racism is a root cause of many challenges facing communities and serves as a significant barrier to eradicating poverty. Dismantling structural racism in society is a means to right social and economic injustices. This page is for anyone interested in learning more about the work that we fund, and sharing information on how others are working to eradicate poverty and structural racism. To that end, we will not allow derogatory comments, insulting language, and/or otherwise offensive communication. We will monitor this page for misuse, and bar anyone deemed to have violated what we consider reasonable conduct.

06/04/2026

The Chicago Racial Justice Pooled Fund (CRJPF) launched in 2020 as a shared project from Woods Fund Chicago and over a dozen other Chicago-area foundations. In 2025, we re-upped that commitment, with a shared goal of raising $15 million.

In our latest newsletter, the Pooled Fund’s inaugural Executive Director, Katelyn Johnson, calls funders in on resourcing Black organizing now.

Read it at https://t.e2ma.net/webview/9e8zlk/bdf29866e806d37b87bdcc28cf7f0776 or our link in bio!

06/01/2026

Woods Fund Chicago is excited to support It's On Us: A Day of Art and Action — a celebration of Chicago freedom struggles with performances and art programming by Jamila Woods, Taína Asili, Damon Williams, Kristiana Rae Colón, and Maria Gaspar. There will be workshops and soapbox speeches across the city, and a free concert from 4:00-8:00 PM at the Dusable Museum.

This festival asks "What blooms when ICE melts?" It's on us to manifest our response. Instead of desensitizing ourselves during times of repression, this festival instead invites you to engage the senses and imagine with us how freedom might look, feel, sound, smell, and taste. Join us: June 13, 9AM - 8PM. RSVP at Go.UIC.edu/IOU!

UIC Social Justice Initiative

05/29/2026

Our grantee partners and peers are hiring!

Learn more about open opportunities to join organizations, coalitions, and nonprofit sector peers that are making an impact, including Alliance of the Southeast - ASE, Centro de Trabajadores Unidos, The Chicago Community Trust, Faith in Place, HANA Center, Housing Action Illinois, Mujeres Latinas en Accion, PASO - West Suburban Action Project, The People's Lobby, and Woodstock Institute.

Learn more about job opportunities with our grantee partners and peers at linktr.ee/woodsfundchicago or the link in bio.

05/18/2026

This March, the Chicago Racial Justice Pooled Fund (CRJPF), of which Woods Fund Chicago is a steering committee member, announced its inaugural executive director. Katelyn Johnson brings more than 20 years of experience in social justice leadership, community organizing, nonprofit management, and movement building across Chicago. We're thrilled to have her at the helm of this collaboration!

Stay tuned for a Q&A with Katelyn on the critical need to fund Black-led organizations, and what's next for CRJPF, in our May newsletter.

05/14/2026

What We're Reading: While precarity is felt across the nonprofit world, the feast and famine dynamic has been particularly painful for Black-led organizations in the six years spanning the 2020 killing of George Floyd — and the protests and surge in support that followed. That support has not held, and amid drastic cuts to social services alongside legal challenges to DEI, Black-led organizations are forced to fight mounting threats with scarce resources.

Read a deep dive from The Chronicle of Philanthropy:

https://www.philanthropy.com/news/black-led-nonprofits-didnt-see-the-lasting-funding-boosts-promised-after-2020/

05/07/2026

Amisha Patel was a brilliant leader and a fierce, empathetic organizer: a giant in the fight to make Chicago a place where everybody could thrive. In a final public gift, an op-ed written a month before her passing, she drew from her life-long battle with cancer to urge us to embrace moving from a place of uncertainty, to stay open and committed to holding one another, and to keep one eye on a long arc forward.

We mourn Amisha, and our hearts are with all who loved her: we fight to honor her vision for a better world. Read her piece in Truthout: https://truthout.org/articles/fighting-cancer-has-given-me-new-insights-on-the-anti-fascist-challenge-we-face/

📸: Truthout; Naomi Ishisaka

05/01/2026

Amid slashed benefits and work requirements, organizing has never been more critical — in a moment of urgent need, we have to think expansively and work creatively. Our April newsletter lifts up organizers lobbying for fair legislation, crafting and advancing progressive revenue strategies, and taking the fight to private landlords and companies.

04/30/2026

Our grantee partners and peers are hiring!

Learn more about open opportunities to join organizations, coalitions, and nonprofit sector peers that are making an impact, including Alliance of the Southeast - ASE, Asian Americans Advancing Justice-Chicago, Brave Space Alliance, Brighton Park Neighborhood Council, Centro de Trabajadores Unidos, Chicago Foundation for Women, Chicago Workers' Collaborative, Community Organizing and Family Issues (COFI), Enlace Chicago, Illinois Coalition for Immigrant and Refugee Rights, Latino Policy Forum, Mujeres Latinas en Accion, and Raise the Floor Alliance.

Learn more about job opportunities with our grantee partners and peers at linktr.ee/woodsfundchicago

04/29/2026

What We're Reading: This thoughtful inquiry from In These Times uses weapons shipments travelling through Oakland, CA, to analyze the levers of power at play and explore interventions. Hundreds of thousands of local union workers have demanded that Oakland's airport refuse to transport weapons from the US to Israel. “If our city says it supports human rights, but still lets this go through,” said one worker, “then what does that actually mean?”

Read more: https://inthesetimes.com/article/logistics-workers-public-airports-world-goods-weapons-oakland

04/28/2026

What we're reading: As spring continues to unfold, Chicago has launched the most extensive air quality monitoring network of any city in the country — and it was modeled on the ad hoc networks groups like Little Village Environmental Justice Organization (LVEJO) have built for over a decade. The network means that any Chicagoan now has access to real-time, neighborhood-level air quality information, to put in service of their health and to back efforts to hold polluters accountable.

Read it now from The Chicago Reporter: https://www.chicagoreporter.com/chicago-air-pollution-map-shows-neighborhood-air-quality-across-the-city/

Address

200 West Madison Street, 3rd Floor
Chicago, IL
60601

Opening Hours

Monday	9am - 5pm
Tuesday	9am - 5pm
Wednesday	9am - 5pm
Thursday	9am - 5pm
Friday	9am - 5pm

Telephone

(312) 600-0948

Website

http://www.woodsfund.org/

Alerts

Be the first to know and let us send you an email when Woods Fund Chicago posts news and promotions. Your email address will not be used for any other purpose, and you can unsubscribe at any time.

Contact The Organization

Send a message to Woods Fund Chicago:

Shortcuts

Address
Telephone
Opening Hours
Alerts
Contact The Organization
Claim ownership or report listing

Want your organization to be the top-listed Non Profit Organization in Chicago?