As an anti-racist theater organization, we challenge ourselves to be increasingly thoughtful and intentional about the ways in which we can best champion diversity, equity, and inclusion. As a performing arts institution, we acknowledge the responsibility we carry to actively dismantle the systems that have historically benefited many of us while simultaneously silencing, oppressing, and causing harm to far too many others.

Our organization celebrates the different backgrounds and perspectives of our community members and patrons. Although we have misstepped along the way to achieving this vision, our commitment to learning and unlearning the ways in which we can better live up to these values continues to grow. As a result, we intend to operate within the functions of:

•   Educating ourselves: As leaders of an organization, we must ensure we have the tools required to analyze our privilege and how it impacts the decisions we make in creating and running an anti-racist organization. Through workshops, trainings, and seminars, we will work to offer learning opportunities to our staff, board, and participants on the history of systemic racist and exclusionary policies as well as the current landscape of discrimination that exists at the intersection of the theater and nonprofit sectors.

•   Lifting marginalized voices: We recognize the role that theater can play in amplifying underrepresented communities by telling their stories. We will focus on and revisit our programming model and select programs that are developed by, or center content on, voices in the community that are marginalized in our community. We maintain a commitment to selecting leaders for our programs who come from diverse backgrounds and are aligned with our goal of empowering those who have been underrepresented or overlooked.

•   Deconstructing our approach and policies: We acknowledge that theater as an institution was created by and for white people. As an ongoing practice, we will continue to review every aspect of AWT’s operations, deconstructing and rebuilding them with DEI at the center, rather than bolted on as an afterthought. This will cover everything from casting practices to how we interpret and make decisions based on participant data we collect.

•   Elevating transparency: We believe progress can only come when we are committed to proactively communicating and sharing key information with our community. We aim to ensure all of our stakeholders — participants, donors, volunteers, and others — understand how we are governed, make decisions, balance our books, and more.

Of course, there is more to come. Thank you so much for working with us to build a better AWT community.