WHO WE ARE

In 2005, a group of us women participated in a series of conversations and debates in response to the following questions:

"Why does the Philippines remain poor and becoming poorer despite of years of development initiatives?"
"How come many of us-social activists, NGO workers, professionals in service-oriented organizations-feel either dissatisfied, alienated or exploited in doing what we believed as service to the country yet not wanting to give up hope in our people?"
"Why are we not giving up hope?
"In what way can we better serve the country that contributes in creating a world where societies promote a culture of peace, justice, equality in rights, integrity of oneself and respect for the environment?"

The responses to these questions challenged us to commit ourselves to engage in a process of searching for answers and verifying the ones we have articulated.

Speaking of initiatives, therefore, we mean attempts to respond to the questions we posed ourselves and to those who are willing to join us in this process, both women and men.

On March 8, 2006, we agreed to organize ourselves into a group to facilitate this process of engagement and named ourselves "WISE" as an abbreviation for Women's Initiatives for Society, Culture, and Environment and as a description of what we aspire to become in a common journey together as women.

You can call us WISE Inc., or WISEwomen.