tips & tools

Instructor Bias Self Assessment

This checklist is great for outdoor, experiential, and environmental educators (as well as traditional educators) to assess how bias might be manifesting in their teaching and to mitigate bias in any classroom, indoor and outside.

Toolkit on Implementing the President’s Memo on Diversity & Inclusion in Public Lands & Waters

We built this toolkit to help you implement the Presidential Memorandum issued on January 12th, 2017. The memo is available online here. The toolkit is attached.

Think before you appropriate: Things to know and questions to ask in order to avoid appropriating indigenous cultures.

For those looking for a toolkit or checklist on indigenous appropriation, this guide published by Creative Commons will be useful. This is particularly useful for camps and outdoor education organizations who have historically or contemporarily utilized indigenous culture, iconography, rituals, costumes, and other cultural resources.

Opportunities for white people in the fight for racial justice-moving from actor–>ally–>accomplice

This is one of many comprehensive toolkits that lays out concrete actions white folks can take in the fight for racial justice. We like it because it makes a great distinction between actor, ally, and accomplice, which is increasingly important in an era where the word “ally” seems to be overused and diluted. It also has 12 categories that folks can focus on in their journey from actor to ally to accomplice. Easy to navigate and very useful. Read more here.

Diversity Derailed: Limited Demand, Effort and Results in Environmental C-Suite Searches

In its most recent report (October 2016), Green 2.0 researches executive search firms and their approach to supporting the green sector with hiring. The upshot is that search firms—upon whom big green organizations are increasingly relying to fill leadership positions—have neither valued nor integrated diversity into their hiring priorities. Though this study is on search firms, the full report and the checklist contain some useful recruiting and hiring tips for all organizations in the conservation and environmental sector. Read more here.

Green Leadership Trust Board-Led Best Practices on Diversity, Inclusion, & Equity

The Green Leadership Trust is a network of people of color and indigenous people who serve on environmental boards. We work to build the environmental movement’s power by diversifying its leadership through promotion of best practices and other resources and by driving the leadership pipeline. In December of 2014, the Green Leadership Trust launched the “Board-Led Best Practices on Diversity, Inclusion and Equity.” Find their resources here.

100 race-conscious things you can say to your child to advance racial justice

The folks over at Raising Race Conscious Children put together a list of 100 examples of how to engage children in conversation around racial justice (and some ideas around sex and gender). A great resource for parents as well as educators. Read more here.

Implicit Bias and Its Role in Philanthropy and Grantmaking

john a. powell discusses the role of implicit bias in philanthropy and grant-making, and how implicit bias can negatively impact the equity efforts behind philanthropy. Read more here.

Diversity and the Conservation Movement

Chandra Smith, Marcelo Bonta, and Tony DeFalco compiled a comprehensive report on the conservation movement in respect to diversity and inclusion. They provide an overview of the challenges, suggest best practices, and provide case studies for successful efforts. Read here.

Madness & Oppression

The people at the Icarus Project put together this mapping tool for anyone to map out how oppression impacts their health.

In the words of the authors, “Mad Maps are documents that we create for ourselves as reminders of our goals, what is important to us, our personal signs of struggle, and our strategies for self-determined well-being.”

You an access the book for free here or, please consider, paying $8 for this resource here.

Diversity, Equity, Inclusion, & Justice Vocabulary

We have compiled this vocabulary sheet to provide you with some basic definitions of key words and phrases. This vocabulary sheet represents how we at the Avarna Group commonly talk about DEIJ concepts and are a reflection of our learning over the years. However, this is not meant to be a definitive list and we have provided other resources in this vocabulary sheet that provide more definitions, particularly from impacted communities themselves. Moreover, language and ideas move faster than we have capacity to update this sheet. Please use this information as a starting point for understanding rather than a definitive resource.

CivilSchools anti-bullying resources

CivilSchools is another organization we are really excited about; they offer comprehensive bullying prevention curriculum through the lens of anti-oppression work. You can get a free toolkit from them here and purchase the rest of the curriculum, if you’re so inclined. Access here.