MANAUS’ Equity Action Project was recently awarded a notable grant from the Colorado Health Foundation. With the support, the EAP is now looking to reach new heights in its efforts to build a more equitable and inclusive future.
Launched by MANAUS in early 2021, the EAP began as a seven-week organizational training program around diversity, equity, inclusion and anti-racism initiatives. The project has served through its training programs over 150 individuals representing 32 different organizations from Aspen to Parachute, said EAP Manager Bryan Alvarez-Terrazas.
“What’s been really cool to see is that we’ve had alumni from schools, from municipalities, from different nonprofits that range from, you know, health care to environmental work,” Alvarez-Terrazas said. “There’s been a big, broad range of folks that come with different expertise and focus areas, and I hope that the movement will continue to push forward, to make sure that these organizations continue to invest in the personal work and the organizational work to really build a more inclusive and equitable region.”
In order to ensure a continuation of the DEI work manifested through these trainings, the EAP is starting to focus on supporting the existing alumni network, Alvarez-Terrazas explained, adding that after this current and final cohort of trainees, EAP’s training component will wrap up for now.
“We’re kind of at this pivotal point where, instead of wanting to keep going broader with more organizations and more individuals, we’re hoping to start to hone in on what support for the existing alumni network will look like moving forward,” Alvarez-Terrazas said.
The funding received from the Colorado Health Foundation — which amounts to $240,000 — will, in part, go toward supporting EAP’s alumni network. Funding will also be allocated to EAP’s Equity Speaker Series, Alvarez-Terrazas said. The manager went on to explain how the Foundation’s grant will be broken down to benefit four main initiatives of the EAP in 2023.
The first is to support alumni network events so that community members who went through EAP’s training have opportunities to connect with one another and continue to develop and implement both their personal and organizational equity work, Alvarez-Terrazas said.
In the next year, the EAP is also working to offer language justice grants to all of its alumni organizations in order for these organizations of all kinds to foster translation and interpretation services, and-or for them to work with a consultant in developing a language justice plan.
Another one of the EAP’s initiatives that received grant funding involves the planning of an equity symposium, to be held next spring.
The fourth initiative that Alvarez-Terrazas mentioned has to do with the continuation and growth of the Equity Speaker Series — which launched last spring and runs in partnership with The Arts Campus At Willits.
Alvarez-Terrazas explained that with EAP’s seven-week training courses being more organizationally focused, the speaker series was started with the intention to reach the entire community and provide everyone with free opportunities to engage in conversations around equity.
“We’ve had variety in terms of different DEI experts and performers and in terms of presentation style and topic,” Alvarez-Terrazas said. “We’ve had a slam poet in the past and more of an academic presentation — and then we also had a film screening of ‘The Holly.’ … We want to make sure that we’re bringing different lived experiences into the series and into the space.”
Joining the diverse speaker series lineup for a discussion being held at TACAW this evening is Colorado-based artist and facilitator Assétou Xango. Known as the “Dark Goddess Poet,” Xango identifies as a Black pansexual polyamorous, genderqueer woman.
They’ve been featured on HBO’s “Brave New Voices” in 2010 and were a 2021 Fellow of the Academy of American Poet Laureates, among other accolades. Xango’s work dismantles binaries and divisions through storytelling.
For tonight’s event at TACAW — which starts at 6:30 p.m. and is free — Xango will be doing a poetry reading as well as give a presentation around how to be an ally when it comes to DEI work — and specifically, how to navigate difficult conversations in a way that helps build a more inclusive and equitable world, Alvarez-Terrazas explained.
“This speaker event is covering a topic that we haven’t gotten a chance to dive into yet,” they said. “And so I wanted to make sure that we’re bringing in different perspectives and different lived experiences into the series and into the space and just to provide these different topics and mediums to the public.”
Following Xango’s presentation this evening, the Equity Speaker Series is to pick back up around the start of 2023, Alvarez-Terrazas added, as will the EAP’s other continued efforts in developing a more equitable community.
For more information about the EAP or speaker series, visit manaus.org.
