June 27, 2023

Wintergreen Women Writers Collective Receives $150,000 Award from Mellon Foundation

By Kelly Pendergrast

The Wintergreen Women Writers Collective is pleased to announce that it has been awarded a $150,000 grant from the Mellon Foundation to support its mission of promoting the work of women writers. The grant will be administered by the Educopia Institute, the Collective’s fiscal sponsor, and supported by James Madison University Libraries.

Founded in 1987, the Wintergreen Women Writers Collective is dedicated to supporting and promoting women writers of all ages, backgrounds, and levels of experience. The organization offers workshops, retreats, and other opportunities for women writers to connect with one another, hone their craft, and gain exposure for their work.

The Wintergreen Women Writers Collective plans to use the grant funds to support a suite of activities under the project title Sacred Work. This includes the co-design of an organizational development roadmap for the Collective; in-person convening of the Collective’s members; video interviews with members of the Collective about their work and the role of the Collective in nurturing that work; and in partnership with James Madison University, the design of an undergraduate course focused on the individual artists of the Wintergreen Women Writers’ Collective, learning about the criticality of archives and archival collection practices to the preservation of literary history, and conducting original research in support of a future Wintergreen Women Writers’ Collective archival collection at JMU Special Collections.

“We are thrilled and honored to receive this grant from the Mellon Foundation,” said Joanne Gabbin, Co-Principal Investigator and the Collective’s founder and executive director. “This funding will allow us to expand our programming and document the work of more women writers than ever before. We are grateful to the Mellon Foundation for its support of our mission.”

“The Mellon Foundation’s support for Sacred Work will enable meaningful intergenerational knowledge exchange,” said Caitlin Birch, Co-Principal Investigator and JMU Libraries Director of Digital Scholarship and Distinctive Collections. “This funding will allow the Libraries, in partnership with members of the Collective, to create a path to preservation for the Collective’s records and legacy. Through a course led by Associate Professor of English Mollie Godfrey, the funding will also engage students in the process, offering a glimpse of the immense potential within the Collective’s records for research, teaching, and learning at JMU.”

The Educopia Institute, a non-profit organization that specializes in cultivating collaborative efforts in the information and cultural sectors, serves as the fiscal sponsor for the Wintergreen Women Writers Collective. “We are so grateful to be in partnership with the Wintergreen Women,” said Jessica Meyerson, Educopia Institute Co-Director. “Through this grant, the Mellon Foundation is supporting work that honors the past, present, and future of the Collective.”

For more information about the Wintergreen Women Writers Collective, please visit educopia.org/wintergreen-women-writers-collective.

Joanne Gabbin
Founder and executive director, Wintergreen Women Writers Collective
Professor of English, James Madison University
Co-Principal Investigator, Sacred Work: Wintergreen Women Writers Collective

Caitlin Birch
Assistant Professor and Director of Digital Scholarship and Distinctive Collections, James Madison University Libraries
Co-Principal Investigator, Sacred Work: Wintergreen Women Writers Collective

Jessica Meyerson
Co-Executive Director, Educopia Institute