Our Work

The Education Fund conducts research, carries out policy analysis and provides a variety of education, training and outreach programs. The Fund produces educational materials including fact sheets, newsletters, articles, guides, reports and videos. The staff of the Education Fund conduct informational workshops and training sessions; serve as speakers and panelists for regional, state and national conferences; respond to requests for information and provide technical assistance to communities.

Current projects

The Immigrant Women’s Health Initiative is dedicated to strengthening reproductive health care for immigrant women by developing effective partnerships between immigrant women's organizations and family planning providers statewide and by strengthening providers' capacity to provide culturally and linguistically competent care.

Get the Facts NY seeks to support the right of every young person to access the information and develop the skills necessary to make safe and responsible choices about his or her sexual health. Get the Facts NY advocates for medically accurate, age-appropriate sex education for all youth in New York State.

The Emergency Contraception Access Project strives to increase women’s access to emergency contraception (EC) as a means of back-up birth control to prevent unintended pregnancies. The project concentrates on two major access issues: Provision of EC in hospital emergency rooms, particularly to rape victims; and availability of EC in pharmacies.

Concerned Clergy for Choice is a network of pro-choice clergy across New York State who are able to raise much-needed voices of moral authority on the side of reproductive freedom in contentious public debates over issues ranging from sex education to abortion to stem cell research.

Planned Parenthood Global Partners has approved a partnership between Family Planning Advocates and the Irish Family Planning Association (IFPA), headquartered in Dublin, to enhance the communications, advocacy and legal work of the two organizations. IFPA is a litigant in a fascinating case in the European Court of Human Rights involving access to abortion in Ireland, which has one of the most restrictive abortion bans in the world.

The Young Leaders Advisory Board (YLAB) is a group of men and women in their 20s and early 30s committed to leading the pro-choice movement into the future.  Formed in recognition of FPA’s 30th Anniversary, this talented group is devising and implementing ways to involve more young people in the pro-choice movement.

MergerWatch Goes National

In 1996, the Education Fund created the MergerWatch Project, an initiative dedicated to informing communities about how to preserve reproductive health care services threatened by the mergers of religious and secular community hospitals. The Project was created after a merger between religious and secular hospitals in Troy, NY caused the loss of contraceptive services at an outpatient clinic that had been operated by the secular hospital.

MergerWatch gained national recognition for its informative community guide, "Religious Hospital Mergers and HMOs: The Hidden Crisis for Reproductive Healthcare," and its hands-on technical assistance to communities facing mergers. The Project has worked with more than 50 communities facing a religious/secular hospital affiliation, helping community activists preserve reproductive health services.

In order to better carry out its nationwide focus, the MergerWatch Project became an affiliate of Community Catalyst, a national consumer advocacy organization, in July of 2005. MergerWatch is now based in New York City.

The Education Fund continues to advocate for access to a full range of reproductive health services in New York hospitals.