In December, Clearinghouse board members and staff gathered for our second-annual DEI Retreat, led by DEI Coordinator Lex Brown.
These retreats offer us a meaningful opportunity to collectively reflect on our unique identities and experiences, recognize our biases, review our organizational practices, and evaluate how these practices impact the people and communities we serve.
Lex first provided an overview of the Lawyers Clearinghouse Language Access Plan and Language Access Resource Guide as part of a larger conversation about the importance of language access in legal services.
Board members and staff then broke into smaller groups to discuss our identities—such as race, gender, age, and socioeconomic status—how they intersect, and how they inform our perspectives.
We highly recommend all organizations reserve time for this type of reflection and discussion on a periodic basis. The experience is always enlightening; it enables us to connect in new ways and think creatively about how we can strengthen our organization and programs. Many thanks to Lex for another fantastic retreat. We’re already looking forward to the next one!
