Dear 826 Boston Community,
Over the summer, we shared with you that we are re-examining how to better serve and support our team and community. We would like to follow up with updates about how we are deepening our anti-racism and anti-oppression work at 826 Boston.
At 826 Boston, we honor and actively work toward diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) across our organization. We are committed to centering the voices of the students who we serve, to creating inclusive spaces, and to incorporating feedback from our community into our decision-making processes. Our DEI lens is always evolving through the courageous conversations in which we participate and the relationships that we build through our work and service. We strengthen our cultural competency through experience, training, and feedback, which informs the development of all new organizational practices and goals and the evaluation of all existing procedures.
826 Boston is dedicated to providing a platform for student advocacy through writing and publishing opportunities. In our work and mission, we are committed to dismantling white supremacy culture by recognizing that we are complicit in systems of racism and oppression. We will work to hold ourselves accountable in addressing these harmful structures and behaviors.
We would also like to acknowledge that the land where the 826 Boston center, offices, and partner schools are located is on the original homelands of the Massachusett Tribe. We honor and pay our respects to the ancestral bloodline of the Massachusett Tribe and their descendants who are still inhabiting this land on which we work and serve today.
Please read on below to learn how our organization has applied a DEI lens to our work at 826 Boston in the development of team action plans.
All 826 Boston teams—including programs, operations, fundraising, communications, and our Board of Directors—have outlined concrete, specific action plans that connect back to our revised DEI statement. This work began in 2017 and has evolved through thoughtful collaboration on the 826 Boston DEI Committee, in our all-team workshops, and in annual planning. You can view our organization’s DEI action plans here.
These documents have been developed over time and reflect the expertise and contributions of current and former 826 Boston staff and service members, for which we are grateful. We would also like to recognize and express gratitude for our partners and consultants who have led our DEI trainings, and have pushed us to reflect, to do our work, and to grow.
Our learning never stops. We are building our DEI plans into our organizational and individual priorities and goals to ensure that our words are backed by action. We hope that you will help hold us accountable, too. You can send any suggestions, questions, or concerns here.
Sincerely,
The 826 Boston Team
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