By Helena Theodoro - President of the ELAS Deliberative Council and

Madalena Guilhon - Vice President of the ELAS Deliberative Council

In our 20 years of existence, we have lived through a period of great change. In order to continue creating relevant impacts and maintaining our passion for women, we need to be attentive to changes in behavior in society and to advances in technology. And we always are, because only this guarantees an active and valuable future for ELAS. Once again we are updating ourselves to continue our trajectory. Diversity and multiplicity have always been part of our values and we maintain this commitment when we support the most diverse women's groups and organizations. That's why our Board also includes women of different types, ages, races, ethnicities, sexual orientations and identities, religions and professions: businesswomen, academics, communicators, artists. They are the ones who drive our institutional evolution.

Now together, Assembly, Council and coordinators, we feel the need to take a step forward. You will see a new sign in our brand, a plus sign: ELAS +. If you subscribe to our newsletter, CONVERSA COM ELAS, you'll know first-hand that the ELAS Council has welcomed three new members: Chirley Pankara, an indigenous woman, Jaqueline Gomes, a trans woman and Lam Matos, a trans man. We reaffirm our commitment to diversity and multiplicity and our absolute commitment to social change.

Madalena Guilhon, one of the founders of ELAS and now a member of the Council, puts it this way:

"ELAS has always been about women, but in the breadth that diversity has gained, ELAS has become small, hence ELAS +. The world is changing and we have to change with it. We already fund trans and indigenous women and men and it's time to see this diversity represented on the Council. It's a journey, the world is changing and ELAS is open to change. " 

The Council formed in this way strengthens the deepening of ELAS' methodologies: Selection, Donation and the Dialogues we carry out with organizations. A year ago, the entire Council and team received training with trans activist Lam Matos and teacher Jaqueline Gomes to understand the movement, its needs and challenges.