Dallas Afterschool

Equity Statement

Dallas Afterschool integrates racial equity into the core of our agency's culture and works alongside our partners to provide training and resources to help them meet their own racial equity goals. Pursuing racial equity is a major part of our two-year strategic plan that was approved by our board of directors in 2021. The strategic plan is available to download on our website under the "Our Priorities" tab.

Seven years ago, Dallas Afterschool took steps to make racial equity a central part of our decision-making process. In 2015, the Board adopted a policy to run all salaries, promotions, and merit increases through an equity review with the HR Committee to prevent discrepancies in compensation. Similarly, we adopted an HR policy to ensure at least one person of color is considered in the hiring process for any open position, while also widening the spheres where jobs were advertised and new staff recruited. Recognizing that the Board itself did not adequately reflect the people served, we launched a Board diversification effort that has resulted in Board diversity rising from 7% people of color in 2016 to 47% today, while our leadership team is now 80% POC. In 2018, we held a strategic planning retreat with the Board that resulted in the addition of "race" as explicit language into the agency's mission statement. In the most recent strategic planning process over the past year, we made racial equity one of the four pillars of Dallas Afterschool's strategic plan.

Over the last three years, our leadership has implemented a series of trainings for all staff. During the trainings, the lived experiences of so many African American and Hispanic/Latinx staff members also emerged as key learning points that helped shape internal policies and protocols. In 2018, all staff participated in two Border Crossers training programs: Talking about Race and Racial Justice in Education. Over the course of the next year, all staff attended four day-long sessions on Brave/r Conversations facilitated by outside consultants. The leadership team also received individual coaching sessions during this period. Last year, staff participated in voluntary Racial Affinity Groups with monthly meetings using the Racial Healing Handbook to guide discussion. In the fall of 2020, staff and Board members completed a Groundwater Training with the Racial Equity Institute on the causes and impact of systemic racism. In 2022, our team participated in a series of training from Hidden History DFW to learn more about Black history in our community.

This last year, Dallas Afterschool launched a Racial Reconciliation Cohort for Out-of-School Time (OST), with our staff facilitating monthly discussions and reading groups with staff from partner agencies. Dallas Afterschool worked with Dallas Truth, Racial Healing, and Transformation to review its Afterschool Quality Advancement (AQuA) assessment tool through a racial equity lens. We were are also inaugural participants in the Dallas Foundation's Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion cohort for nonprofits. Finally, our development team hosts monthly meetings to allow staff from other departments to review all marketing and communication materials from a racial equity standpoint.