I spent week 5 at the Women’s Fund editing, reviewing, discussing, contacting, and planning. Even though this week was short, I made steady progress (hint: ‘progress’ is my word of the week).

I spent the first few days of the work week editing the summer party interviews for 25th anniversary social media and website content. It took me much longer than expected. I had to cut each interview into multiple lengths and I also ran into some issues with sound and color when exporting. I figured things out, though, and I got faster as I went. Having learned many lessons, I now feel ready to take on my bigger project: conducting, filming, and editing interviews for the “Women in the Social Sector” project.

Yesterday, Jenna and I met with The Columbus Foundation to discuss interview plans for the project. We confirmed the list of people we wanted to reach out to, discussed the four interview lenses I had developed, talked about the filming concept, and set some tentative deadlines. Right after this meeting, both The Columbus Foundation and the Women’s Fund team started reaching out to interviewees. Two out of four have already said yes! This forward momentum after weeks of slow but steady work felt exhilarating. I have begun further tailoring my interview questions for the confirmed interviewees and am beginning to think about filming setups and editing plans. Matthew Martin, the director of community research, and Chelsea Kiene, the director of communications and marketing, are working on this project from The Columbus Foundation side. Their generosity, insight, and mentoring have been invaluable; they both offered to give me feedback on my interview questions and help with facilitation and behind-the-scenes work during the interviews. Jenna has been mentoring me throughout this process as well, and has been a constant inspiration for me. I feel so lucky to experience such support from both sides.

Although this project has been occupying much of my brain space, I have also been working on some other exciting things. This week, the Women’s Fund’s programs manager, Arielle Scott, graciously let me review the letters of intent that have been coming in for the 2027 grant cycle. Reviewing these letters, I put what I had been learning about the grant making process into practice. I was so happy to be able to give a second opinion on some of the letters she had already reviewed.

Working on all of these various projects meant I spent a lot of time on the computer. When I experienced blue light overload, I worked on hand writing thank you cards to the Women’s Fund’s donors.

This week, I made progress in many different ways, even if there were mistakes and moments of reflection in between. I can’t wait to make more progress in the next five weeks!

~Eva