Award-winning Diversity work with Year Up

The mission of Year Up is “to close the opportunity divide by providing urban young adults with the skills, experience and support that will empower them to reach their potential through professional careers and higher education.” IISC worked with Year Up staff to design and facilitate their Diversity and Cultural Competency Initiative, which has engaged the entire system in an effort to deepen understanding of diversity and the drivers of the opportunity divide, and to build cultural competency as a way to support achieving their mission. IISC has guided the design of the process and facilitated or co-facilitated many of the sessions involving building a shared vocabulary and understanding of core concepts and how they relate to Year Up’s mission, vision, values, and organizational operating principles. IISC also trained a core of leaders throughout the organization in facilitation and in content related to diversity, dynamics of oppression, and cultural competency so that they could continue to move the process forward on their own. IISC was recognized alongside Year Up’s staff and board for t his work with receipt of the Adrienne Foster Williams Diversity Award from Freedom House, a community-based nonprofit organization with a long history of service to Boston’s urban communities.