30 Ways to Challenge the Barriers to Equity

In recent weeks, through the beginning of Pride Month and the rise of anti-racism marches and black lives matter protests, there has been a lot of talk in the news and social media about equity and equality.

Equality, of course, is the state of everyone being equal from status to rights and opportunities.

But was is Equity?

Equity by some has been described as the next step past equality, because not everyone needs to be treated the same way to become equal. Equity is about fairness and making sure everyone has what they need to succeed, even if what they need is different than what others may need.

Learning about equity can help us to lead with compassion, fairness and critical thinking in many areas of our lives and our community. It helps us learn how to push through any discomfort we may have in learning these new ways of thinking to better understand and interact with any marginalized group from those of a different race to us, a different sexuality, or even a different age group.

Putting it Into Practice

Committing to practicing equity in your daily life may seem daunting when you don’t know where to begin. With anything else, a new way of thinking and learning takes small changes and daily practices.

Wellbeing Waterloo Region has released a new 30 Day Challenge to Practice Challenging Barriers to Equity that is a fantastic resource to help take that first step and start building new habits.
This challenge asks you to set aside ten minutes a day to help you boost your knowledge on issues like unconscious bias, social inclusion and privilege.

Every day you will have a new topic of discussion like Inclusion, Trans Phobia, Microagressions or Empathy. You’ll watch a short educational video, answer several reflection questions to guide your thinking on the topic and be given a small actionable item to help bring your new learning into practice.

Lutherwood and Wellbeing Waterloo Region hope that if you sign up and complete the daily practice and encourage others to do the same, you will “develop strategies to improve relationships, cultivate new thought processes, and rewire your brain in ways that will help make Waterloo Region a place where everyone thrives and no one is left behind.”