YMTC’s commitment to anti-racist solidarity, action, and radical inclusivity

We at YMTC believe that deep training and learning of any kind cannot happen in a vacuum outside of the world we inhabit. The community that we create at YMTC and the stories that our young artists tell have to be a connector to– and a reflection of– the world around us. YMTC has, over the years, aspired to make those connections; we have aspired to make our programs accessible to everyone, and have been committed to our outreach and strategies of inclusion so that the students we serve and the audiences we attract represent the diversity of the community in which we live. 

In the midst of the growing anger in our country over centuries of oppression and violence against Black and indigenous people of color, and the demand for white-lead organizations to take a long, critical look at their own practices that may be upholding and reinforcing systemic racism, we are taking steps to do more.  

We have not sent out public statements about our solidarity with Black Lives Matter or our commitment to equity and inclusion (though these things are true)  because we do not wish to pay lip service to the movement, or to get special attention for our commitment to act on what we feel is simply our responsibility. With that understanding, we are slowly, with thought, care and due diligence, taking action on the following items:

• Hiring an EDI consultant to assist in advising our board, staff and artistic teams about best practices moving forward.
• Forming an EDI Task force to invite BIPOC members of our community to share their stories, voices, concerns, and ideas for moving forward.
• Making an aggressive board development plan to ensure that our Board of Directors has at least 30% BIPOC members by the end of 2021, and an accurate reflection of the Bay Area community by 2022.
• Committing to recruiting and hiring BIPOC candidates to fill open staff positions (administrators, directors, and teaching artists), making the racial demographics of our staff commensurate with the racial demographics of the Bay Area.
• Beginning a strategic process of re-thinking our season’s repertoire, our choice of directors, and other teaching artists to include more BIPOC’s voices.
• Review and formalize pedagogical standards to ensure that white voices aren’t always the loudest in the room, making  space for BIPOC students and artists to study, to teach, and to lead.

As an organization, we want to be held accountable by our community, and we invite anyone who wants to talk to us about this subject to reach out. We, the staff and board, are available and looking forward to engaging in dialogue. You can find our contact info here. We are still at the beginning of this process and are far from having all the answers; in some cases we don’t even know the questions, but we are excited to be taking these crucial steps to rise up and meet this challenging moment with fresh ideas, along with willingness and openness to see possibilities for healing and new opportunities .