Sis’s Place: Student Founds Housing Nonprofit

As conversations about the local housing crisis circulate on campus, one student is taking matters into her own hands.

A full-time student double-majoring in sociology and Spanish, Aletheia Woodford ’26E is also the founder and executive director of a new nonprofit organization, Sis’s Place Inc., which seeks to provide immediate housing to domestic violence survivors.

Sis’s Place is in its early stages, and Woodford highlighted the courage and ambition required even before the organization is in full operation. It will be exciting to see how Sis’s Place positively impacts the local community through increasing access to resources and safe housing.

Over this past fall break, Woodford officially closed on a building in Springfield, the physical home for Sis’s Place. She is optimistic that the building will be furnished and ready for residents as early as December, striving to ensure people have a warm place to live during the cold New England winter.

The oldest sister of seven, Woodford is affectionately called “Big Sis.” Her experience empowering and guiding her younger siblings inspired her to found this organization, which supports women escaping abusive situations.

“I want it to feel like they’re just coming over to their sister’s place, like this is a place where you can stay for a while when things get tough,” Woodford said.

While researching the Amherst housing crisis for a class in Fall 2023, Woodford began questioning why no one seemed to consider addressing this crisis from the angle of the real estate market. To understand firsthand what solutions lay within the market itself, Woodford earned her real estate license last January term and found a job working at a local real estate agency.

It was through this job that she met a philanthropist (who wishes to be left anonymous) who funded the building purchase for Sis’s Place. As the cost of operations and the demand for more shelters increase, Massachusetts’ state shelter system’s ability to remain functional is uncertain. Budget cuts have a direct implication on individuals’ day-to-day ability to find shelter. Sis’s Place seeks to mitigate this expanding gap through accommodating immediate housing needs and circumventing the exorbitant waitlist lengths.

As a financially independent student, Woodford had to navigate the arduous housing market herself when searching for an off-campus apartment after arriving at Amherst. Since the college only ensures a dorm room while students are enrolled in classes, if an independent student needs to take a leave of absence, they may be left with nowhere to go. Woodford decided to find housing off-campus because it was “important for [her] to have a stable place to live.” Given the housing markets and costs of living in this area, the closest viable option was 40 minutes away in Springfield.

Woodford explained that the Springfield community was crucial to her success during her first year at the college. “There were a lot of organizations in Springfield that helped me out,” Woodford said.

“They gave me a hand when I was in this really tough spot, so I always told myself, ‘When I’m in a position to help, I’m going to come back and give back,’” she added.

While Sis’s Place is still in its early stages, Woodford plans to expand the services it offers in the future. This will be supported by an existing partnership with a local organization supporting a similar demographic (to ensure survivor confidentiality, Woodford requested to keep the name of the organization anonymous). This partnership enables Sis’s Place to fall within the larger organization’s 501(c)(3) status while Sis’s Place works through the paperwork to officially qualify as an independent organization.

Woodford is energized and hopeful, describing the future as bright. While there is yet to be a publicly shared process for people moving in, obtaining the property is the most important step to catalyze her community-building action. The next step is completing lots of permitting paperwork and furnishing the building so that it’s up and running before winter sets in.

“The purpose of life is doing meaningful stuff. And I really feel that I’m doing something meaningful here. This is something that really, really means a lot to me. And I’m lucky that I’m in a position to do something about it. I have to do something.”