Building Towards an Inclusive Organizational Culture
Insights and Lessons Learned from YES Nature to Neighborhoods
This brief is the third in a series resulting from a collaborative project, Working Towards Equitable Organizations, that is funded by the Pisces Foundation and the Clarence E. Heller Charitable Foundation, and would not be possible without the contributions of all the partners: Charity Maybury, Christy Rocca, and Francis Taroc of Crissy Field Center at the Golden Gate National Parks Conservancy; José González, founder of Latino Outdoors; Eric Aaholm of YES Nature to Neighborhoods; and Kim Moore Bailey, Laura Rodriguez, and Rena Payan of Youth Outside.
The first brief, Examining Equitable and Inclusive Organizations in Environmental Education: Perspectives from the Field (Romero, Foreman, Strang, Rodriguez, Payan, and Moore Bailey, 2019), drew our attention to an important consideration: that “many equity, inclusion, and diversity initiatives are primarily focused on external-facing programs; that is, organizations are more likely to be thinking about equity, inclusion, and diversity in regard to learning experiences for learners, as opposed to the organizational work environment” (p. 3). The lack of focus on the organizational work environment marginalizes people of color in the field.
The second brief in this series, Intentional Hiring and Recruitment through the Lens of Equity and Inclusion: Insights and Lessons Learned from Crissy Field Center, Golden Gate National Parks Conservancy (Romero, Foreman, Strang, Maybury, Pepito, & Rocca, 2019), highlighted the organizational journey toward mitigating unconscious bias in their recruitment and hiring practices, as a means towards cultivating a workforce that reflects the youth they serve and their organization-wide core values of equity and inclusion.
The third brief, Building Towards an Inclusive Organizational Culture: Insights and Lessons Learned from YES Nature to Neighborhoods illustrates our intentional journey to build an inclusive organizational culture. YES offers gratitude to The Lawrence Hall of Science for providing this platform so that we could share our story. Special thanks to Valeria Romero for lending her talents throughout this project, and for Jedda Foreman’s guidance.
