Reproductive justice and community engagement shaped the annual Ms. on Martha’s annual discussion at the Grange Hall Tuesday evening.

Health care activist and educator Byllye Avery spoke in conversation with Ms. Foundation president and CEO Teresa C. Younger about reproductive justice and its intersectionality with class, race and gender.

For Ms. Avery, the event was a full-circle moment.

“It’s good to be among activists,” she said in an interview with the Gazette before the conversation. “It’s good to be here for Ms. Foundation. They gave me the very first money over 40 years ago. They took a chance on me, someone who had an idea and saw there was a need.”

The Ms. Foundation advocates for policy that addresses challenges faced by women of color and those with low income. They also support over a hundred grassroot’s organizations around the world and connect them with essential resources.

Ms. Younger is celebrating her 10-year anniversary as CEO of the organization, which achieved its goal of raising over $100 million to “substantiate the future of Ms.”

The foundation also recently released a report entitled The Color of Infertility.

“It looks at the infertility rates for women of color across the U.S.,” Ms. Younger said.

During Tuesday’s conversation, the women spoke about Ms. Avery’s work as the founder of the National Black Woman’s Health Project, the effects of overturning of Roe v. Wade and how the immediate future looks in the reproductive activism field across the nation.

Vice President Kamala Harris’s recent run for President and what happens after election season was a topic throughout the evening.

“I would say we are building community and being part of deepening relationships so that when we get past November we can stay in relationship and community, because it’s going to take all of us to make sure that we see the policy change we want,” Ms. Younger said.

Ms. Avery’s advice for those on the ground running grassroot’s campaigns is to take care of themselves.

“This work is so hard and it’s wonderful,” she said. “You get passionate like me and you go at it like a crazy person and you get such a high from it, but you can get really burned out and tired from good news, just like you can from bad news. Self care is really important.”

While the event celebrated work done in the past and present, the future is just as important, according to Ms. Younger.

“We need to be dreaming bigger than we’ve ever dreamed,” she said. “We need young people to not just accept the status quo. We need them to be part of it, and we need to fund them to be part of it. We also need to recognize that the legacy of those who have come before actually need to be seen and heard and part of it. We can’t just push people out of the way.”