Why Grandmothers
What do we mean by “grandmothers”?
To us, "grandmother" is more than a family title. It describes a vital role in communities and a guiding approach to leadership found among elder women in nearly every culture—leadership grounded in wisdom, purpose, and care for the generations that follow. Some of the women in our community are biological grandmothers; others are not—they are the aunties, elders, and mentors every community depends on.
Across cultures and communities, we've seen the same attributes again and again:
Grandmothers care for and connect their communities and the next generations.
Grandmothers bring deep practical knowledge and lived experience to real-world challenges.
Grandmothers act with purpose and vision to shape a better world for those who come next.
Grandmothers can be fearless leaders and strong advocates.
Experience, purpose, connection, and care—these are the resources that drive lasting, community-led change. In many societies, elder women take on the role of community steward at the stage of life when they can turn their attention beyond home and work to the broader good.
Our Origins
Grandmother Collective began with a simple recognition: grandmothers and elder women hold power and possibility the world has largely overlooked. That recognition was sparked by the work of Dr. Judi Aubel whose research in Senegal showed what becomes possible when elder women are engaged as leaders within their own cultural context and provided evidence that communities achieve deep, lasting improvements in the well-being of women and girls that no outside intervention had achieved alone.
That evidence raised a compelling question: where else is this kind of grandmother leadership already at work?
The answer was everywhere. In Zimbabwe, the Friendship Bench trains grandmothers as front-line mental health counselors, delivering life-saving care from benches in their own communities. Barefoot College International—now in over 90 countries—trains elder women as solar engineers who return home to power and teach their villages. Grandmas2Go in Oregon pairs experienced elder women with young families who need steady support.
As Grandmother Collective started dialogues with these organizations, it became clear that there were unique and distinct strengths and skills that elder women held that could be engaged in powerful ways for communities and development in the world.
Grandmother Collective put that insight into practice. Working alongside like-minded organizations, we began piloting new forms of grandmother-led development—asking, in each place, where the wisdom and skills of local culturally-grounded grandmothers could meet a need being overlooked. In Chicago, that meant partnering with the Juvenile Protective Association, whose Grandparent Circle brings elder mentors into public schools. In Central Appalachia, it meant working with the women of the Hemphill Community Center as they built programs around mental health and economic opportunity.
Today, Grandmother Collective brings grandmother-centered organizations together for peer support, new ideas, and collaboration—and continues to seek out, elevate, and celebrate the elder women who are healing, teaching, and leading their communities toward a more just and resilient future.
Interested in stepping into your wisdom and power, the grandmother way?