2022 PROGRESS

The DEAI mission is shared with new staff and volunteers by the President & CEO during New Staff Orientation and updates are provided monthly at the all-staff meeting, as well as discussed regularly at leadership team meetings.

The DEAI Task Force was assembled in August of 2021 comprised of staff and volunteer representation from across the organization. Within the first year the Task Force members spent over 500 hours dedicated to this work.

The Task Force conducted a DEAI culture survey for staff in April 2022. The survey focused on collecting demographic data, gaining insight on the effectiveness of internal communication, assessing if staff feel they belong and are included, respected, understood and valued at the museum, learning if staff feel there are career and growth opportunities, seeking staff thoughts on compensation and benefits and understanding staff thoughts about the museum’s DEAI work more broadly.

A subset of the DEAI Task Force focused on improving the internal learning culture creates and posts a monthly calendar and supplemental educational resources about differing cultural celebrations of historical significance.

The museum implemented the use of an Equitable Hiring Tool in our recruiting and hiring process in early 2022. The tool provides a framework and guide for hiring managers to help them source, recruit and hire more diverse talent. A part of this new process includes the use of diverse hiring panels, leveraging diverse sourcing sites, adding DEAI questions to the application, and measuring the diverse pipeline funnel activity.

The following statement was added to all job descriptions: The Children’s Museum is fiercely devoted to our Diversity, Equity, Accessibility, and Inclusion (DEAI) efforts. Together we are building and sustaining an inclusive culture that encourages, supports, and celebrates differences.

The base hiring hourly rate was increased to $15/hour up from $12/hour in 2021.

Starting wages are now included on all job postings for more transparency.

The intern program transitioned from unpaid internships to paid internships.

A suite of DEAI trainings will continue to be offered (and improved upon in 2023) which staff and volunteers will be required to complete.

Annual DEAI goals will be included in staff annual work plans. The goals will align with the museum’s DEAI goals to ensure that individual staff member’s efforts are contributing to organizational progress toward improvement.

2021 PROGRESS

The Museum promoted Jennifer Pace Robinson to the position of President & CEO in May of 2021. Jennifer's long-standing commitment to elevating unheard voices, including differing and representative voices in decision-making, and her commitment to ensure that the Museum is for and about all children and families made her the ideal person for this leadership role. She has repeatedly emphasized the importance of DEAI as one of her main priorities.

The Museum conducted a diversity, equity, accessibility, and inclusion (DEAI) staff survey in August of 2020. It then retained DEI consultant, Demetria Miles McDonald, to assist with staff DEAI listening sessions and small group debrief sessions in late 2020 and early 2021. The aggregate results from the survey and the listening sessions were shared with staff and trustees in May of 2021. In June of 2021, we vetted individual applications from staff and volunteers to create an inclusive and representative group to participate on the DEAI Task Force (comprised of 26 diverse individuals from across the organization).

At the advice of Ms. McDonald, the Task Force--with the support of the board of trustees and in concert with the Executive Team--analyzed the feedback from the staff and volunteer survey, the listening sessions, and small group meetings. From those results we identified 5 areas of focus for our initial DEAI work:

• Sourcing, recruiting, and retaining diverse staff, volunteers, and interns

• Internal inclusion and communication

• Establishing a DEAI learning culture

• Equity and accessibility enhancements

• Purposeful inclusion of those that live and work in the neighborhoods surrounding the museum

Each member of the DEAI task force completed the Intercultural Development Inventory (IDI) and is working with our consultant, Demetria Miles-McDonald, to develop their own individual inter- cultural development plan to systematically increase their skills in understanding and navigating cultural differences. Each task force member will be assigned an accountability partner to work in pairs to ensure goal completion.

The museum created a dedicated staff position, the DEAI Talent Acquisition Manager, to refocus and invest in additional diversity sourcing and recruiting measures to attract and retain top talent (staff, volunteers, and interns).

Each division vice president, associate vice president, and director has accepted the charge to establish annual individual DEAI goals and measurable work plans in each staff member's work plan. The museum has set the expectation that every staff member and volunteer will engage in on-going education about the value of diversity, equity, accessibility, and inclusion and the role we each must play to advance these values at the museum. Directors and AVPs has begun to include topics focusing on diversity, equity, inclusion, and cultural awareness into their monthly meetings. For example, the group read an article about the characteristics of a white supremacy culture and identified how it is perceived that the museum holds up white supremacy and how it operates.

The museum rolled-out the use of personal pronouns within our email system, name badges, meetings, and our regular practices.

In the coming months, the Task Force will conduct a DEAI audit of the organization as well as short-term and long-term DEAI planning in concert with strategic planning.

2022 PROGRESS

As an international leader in the field of intergenerational learning and education, the museum works hard to acknowledge and respect challenges in under-served and under-represented communities and to help every family and every voice be heard. Here are a few examples of how we have helped tell stories to shed light on systemic racism in recent years:

• In 2021, we expanded the “Making WAVEs” (Words, Actions, Voices, and Education) program focusing on the Stories from Our Community: The Art of Protest exhibit about the August 2020 creation- and subsequent vandalism- of a piece of public art by 18 local Black artists in support of the Black Lives Matter movement. “Making WAVEs” engages families to help them identify ways they can express their feelings and have their voices heard through peaceful protest.

• The Boundary Breaker baseball exhibit featured stories of athletes who faced adversity and discrimination from the first women and Black baseball players to play professionally, to those who overcame physical challenges.

• Emmett Till and Mamie-Till Mobley: Let The World See traveling exhibit shares the story of Emmett Till’s life, murder and the subsequent brave actions of his mother to let the world see what had been done to her son, will debut at the museum in 2022. The exhibit, created over three years in partnership with the Till family, Emmett Till and Mamie-Till Mobley Institute, the Emmett Till Interpretive Center and other expert advisors, will travel to several states and venues from September 2022 – November 2023 to share the story of Emmett Till.

• Each exhibit and their associated programs addresses historical and intergenerational issues of systemic racism and provides spaces for families to have important conversations about race, as well as issues of diversity, equity, accessibility and inclusion more generally.

• Staff, volunteers and interns attend trainings so they are knowledgeable about the underlying stories, challenges and struggles faced by those represented within the exhibits.

2021 PROGRESS

As an international leader in the field of intergenerational learning and education, TCM works hard to acknowledge and respect challenges in under-served communities and to help every family and every voice be heard. The museum created an interpretation program that shares ways families can express their feelings and have their voices heard through the act of peaceful protest. This program is an extension of our Power of Children exhibit, which features youth who suffered horrendous prejudice, bigotry, and life threatening challenges. Anne Frank used the power of WORDS, Ruby Bridges used the power of ACTION, Ryan White used the power of VOICE and Malala Yousafzai is using the power of EDUCATION to inspire change (note that the four create the acronym WAVE, which is part of the museum's waves of change initiative). TCM also features blogs that address the making WAVEs offerings.

The museum recently opened the Baseball Boundary Breakers exhibit. This exhibit highlights stories of athletes who faced adversity and discrimination, yet were able to succeed at the highest levels of America's favorite past time. From the first women and Black athletes to play professionally, to those who overcame physical challenges, visitors learn about incredible people who became trailblazers on and off the field in this new TCM exhibit.

Another important exhibit addresses the ongoing needs and interests of our community. Stories from Our Community currently features The Art of Protest. It focuses on the August 2020 creation--and subsequent vandalism--of a piece of public art in Indianapolis by 18 local Black artists in support of the Black Lives Matter movement. Through this exhibit, families discover how artists' creations can evoke empathy and understanding of others' experiences by communicating stories, messages, and emotions that words alone cannot always express. Each of these exhibits and associated programs addresses historical and intergenerational issues of systemic racism and provides safe spaces in which families can have important conversations about what they can do to share the importance of diversity, equity, accessibility.