In October 2003, EVAW in the United States and Carleton University in Ottawa, Canada were awarded grants from the W. H. Donner and the Donner Canadian Foundations to work with Sexual Assault Training & Investigations, Inc. (SATI) and Ed Renner, Evaluation Research, and the Founder of the National Action Plan Against Sexual Assault (NAPASA) to sponsor two national conferences, one within each country, to promote an integrated community response to sexual violence.

Attendance at the conference was selective, with scholarships awarded to joint applicant teams of 8 representatives from within the same community, representing the fields of: policing, prosecution, victim advocacy, forensic medicine, and/or other sexual assault services. A competition was held to award conference scholarships to 8 participant-communities in each country. A total of 88 applications were submitted by U.S. community teams and 26 applications by Canadian community teams. The community teams that were selected through this competitive process were the following:

A team of 8 professionals from each of these communities participated in a 3-day conference that was hosted in each country in the fall of 2004. These professionals represented a range of disciplines involved in responding to crimes of sexual assault within the community, including:

Police
Prosecution
Forensic Medicine
Crime Laboratories
System-Based Victim Advocacy (e.g., Victim-Witness Assistance)
Community-Based Advocacy (e.g., Sexual Assault Centres)

While only 8 professionals were able to attend the original 3-day conference, others have since joined the project. Thus, within each of the 16 communities there are now many professionals involved in the international Making a Difference Project.