Fuller Project

The Fuller Project was founded in 2015 on the belief that news coverage must represent the views of all individuals. When it does, journalism can fulfill its promise of helping to create a fully informed citizenry.

Journalism has the power to inform, to expose abuses of power and human rights, and to inspire urgent action. Yet when the voices, stories and perspectives of women are disproportionately left out, the result is reporting that reinforces bias.

Today, women are still underrepresented in news, especially those facing race and identity bias. This has been true for centuries and progress has been slow. As a result, the barriers and harms that women face are often considered tangential – instead of central to the security, economic, legal, environmental and other issues societies face each day.

The Fuller Project brings journalism about women to millions of readers in the U.S. and around the world through legacy and local media partnerships. In 2020 alone, they published 80+ articles with 25+ partners reaching more than 8 million readers in outlets such as The New York Times, The Guardian, Kenya’s Nation, and Foreign Policy. 

We first funded The Fuller Project as part of our Women, Peace, and Security Initiative (WPSI, 2016–2018), which aimed to embed a gender lens in U.S. national security and foreign policy. We launched the Initiative with policy and advocacy groups, but quickly understood that this “insider” work in Washington, D.C. needed to be paired with a broader media strategy to help reshape how policymakers, and the public, understand the interrelation of gender and security. The Fuller Project became a cornerstone of the Initiative, and their independent reporting has helped end life-threatening practices, led to large scale releases of public data, and influenced the introduction of new legislation.

The Compton Foundation was one of The Fuller Project’s first foundation funders, when it was still in a start-up phase. The story of our partnership is a great example of how unrestricted funding at an early stage can seed new initiatives and support independent news.

Recent grant history