As we work toward embodying a deeper commitment to equity, justice, anti-racism, and anti-oppression, we have found that defining where we stand – in big and small ways, both externally and internally – is an important practice.
There is a precision, a rigor, and an intentionality to defining where we stand with respect to a particular concept, idea, and/or practice. At the same time, articulating a definition does not mean we are immovable, it doesn’t warrant permanence, and it doesn’t mean we have figured it out for good. It just means that these are the boundaries we are working with right now, based on what we know right now, and paraphrasing the words of Dr. Maya Angelou, when we know better, we do better.
We believe it is important to define where we stand because:
- The same term / concept / idea / practice can mean different things to different people. In this sense, defining where we stand is an act of clarity and transparency.
- We want to ensure that we are attracting collaborators whose definitions and commitments are aligned with and/or strengthen ours.
- There is a tendency for concepts that have radical roots (e.g. equity, justice, etc.) to become watered down and co-opted by the dominant systems when they enter the mainstream. In this sense, sharing where we stand is an act of rigor.
What follows are three different ways in which we have worked toward defining where we stand:
Differentiating between Equality, Equity, and Justice
In our YPI Virtual Launch workshops we use the images below to help us articulate the difference between equality, equity, and justice as we see it. We first invite students to take a guess as to what the differences between the images are and symbolize before sharing our interpretation of them.
The following definitions are informed and supported by the work of the 519.
We also contextualize what the baseball game, fence, and crates symbolize for us with respect to YPI’s work and our intended impact in the world. For us:
- The baseball game represents any sort of human right that we need in order to live well. This includes housing, education, healthcare, food security, access to clean water, etc.
- The fence represents barriers to accessing those rights. Barriers in our society include racism, ableism, sexism, poverty, etc.
- The boxes that the kids are standing on represent the supports that exist in our community to help people overcome some of those barriers. In the context of YPI, these supports might include the charities or social services that students might be researching as a part of their projects.
- The uneven grass represents the different positions that we each start from in our society, sometimes referred to as “privilege.” This is influenced by the intersection of the identities we hold. It often has nothing to do with how good or bad a person we are, rather it is often linked to the circumstances of our birth. This includes our race, our gender, our sexual orientation, the wealth or amount of money that we or our families might have, etc. The more privilege that one has, the more power and unearned advantages one tends to have in navigating these barriers. It’s important to distinguish that our identities, or the degree of privilege is not the problem, it in itself is not the barrier. Rather, the barriers, or the fences, are the systemic issues that we’ve allowed to persist for so long. A justice-oriented approach problematizes the systems that perpetuate these inequities, rather than pathologizing people based on their identities and/or level of privilege (I.e. the problem is not that racialized people exist, it’s that racism exists). That said, we also point out that there does appear to be an inverse relationship between level of privilege (height of the ground) the kids have and the height of the barrier (fence) that they have to overcome, where those with privilege tend to face lower barriers to accessing their human rights.
Given that we are encouraging students to identify the work of organizations in their own communities, we find that sharing these definitions up front can be a clear way to help them distinguish between the three. It also creates an opportunity for them to weigh in on the definitions, and for us to listen to and learn from their understanding of these terms.
"Our youth-led participatory grant-making model is intended to fill existing gaps in charitable sector funding, and our original curriculum incorporates interviews and site visits with local charities as a way for youth to familiarize themselves with the organization they are pitching for funding."
We have chosen to leave the final decision up to teachers, as there are charities that have expressed that they still would be open to phone calls and video interviews with YPI students, and many teachers and students have close relationships with local charities. In this sense, we understand that teachers are best positioned to know whether a particular charity would welcome email/phone interviews from their students and want them to retain agency in that decision while considering our recommendation.
As an alternative to charity site visits, we have also offered our support with connecting current YPI students and classes with their school’s alumni who are active in their community, or other guest speakers from their community’s local charitable and philanthropic sectors. This was a suggestion that came directly from students in our 2020/21 post-program survey, and we have been happy to support its implementation, particularly if it means easing the burden on an already stretched and understaffed charitable sector.
