On October 13, 2014, five Black women’s Reproductive Justice organizations came together to uplift the voices of Black women Reproductive Justice leaders on issues impacting the lives of Black women, girls and gender expansive people. Today, we’re proud to have grown to 12 partners including a nation-wide coalition state enhancement partners.

In our decade of work, we’ve been deepening our understanding of the needs of Black women, girls, and gender-expansive people to get a better sense of how Reproductive Justice can help us thrive. Just take a look at this past year:

• In 2023, we collaborated with over 40 Black women’s organizations and RJ activists to create our 2023 Black Reproductive Justice Policy Agenda. This agenda addresses issues intersections of race, gender, class, sexual orientation and gender identity within the situational impacts of economics, politics and culture. We have and continue to use this as our north star for policies that we continue to recommend and uplift to decision makers.
• We wanted to know what is moving our community to the ballot box and what politicians need to move on to get us there. That’s why this year, we polled Black women who are registered voters of reproductive age both nationally and in our nine partner states to find out what our priorities are for this election.
• We conducted research to understand the impact of the Dobbs decision on Black women with the National Partnership for Women & Families and found that nearly 7 million Black women live in states with abortion bans.
• We celebrated another graduation for our Next Generation Leadership Institute fellows this past year and welcomed our most diverse class of Fellows to our 2024-2026 class! We’ve even expanded our reach to 14 HBCUs nationwide, continuing our investment into the next generation of RJ leaders.
• And we partnered with NAPAWF and the National Latina Institute to poll women of color voters for Intersections of Our Lives to see what issues are top of mind for our communities in this critical election year.

As we plan for our future, we are thrilled to announce our new strategic plan, informed by all of the thorough, incredible research done by the In Our Own Voice team and our unwavering partners, that will help us plan for the next year, the next ten years, and beyond.

From all of us here at In Our Own Voice, we want to thank you for supporting us and for supporting Reproductive Justice. We do this work for YOU and for a future where Reproductive Justice is codified and protected. And if you’re ready to keep In Our Own Voice moving forward, make your donation to fight for RJ today!