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Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion at Clayton

Early childhood offers one of the most powerful levers to create a brighter future based on justice, opportunity, and equity. To authentically realize that future, we are working from the inside out to become an anti-racist organization poised to transform the systems and beliefs that perpetuate inequity. To ensure our organization is racially diverse at every level and that our policies and practices are inclusive and equitable, we engage with our staff and our community to improve our practices and continue on a forward path toward creating the beloved community characterized by trust, dignity, and love.


Our DEI Definitions

Diversity: We strive to build a community enriched by different identities, perspectives, and experiences.  There are many elements of our intersectional identities that are valuable to our work at Clayton such as race, gender, ability, socioeconomic background, age, religion, country of origin, primary language, immigration status, LGBTQIA+ status, neurodiversity, and different life experiences. Our diversity will enrich our perspectives and decisions, increase our ability to solve complex problems through innovation and collaboration, and accelerate progress toward the beloved community.

At Clayton we center racial justice given the legacy of systemic racial oppression in our country, how that legacy continues to impact each of us including the children and families we serve, and the history of racial exclusion on our campus that must be reconciled to truly create the beloved community; We center race because it is the most pernicious of the inequities in our society, profoundly impacting education, health, and well-being outcomes.

Equity: We believe that equity means providing the information, opportunities, and supports needed for each of us to have a fair shot. Therefore, we are committed to transparency, fair treatment, access to information and resources, opportunities for advancement, and participation of all staff, partners, families, and children. In addition, given the context of institutionalized oppression within which we are all operating, we are committed to designing and providing differentiated supports as needed.

We do this by examining our structures, practices, norms, and policies to identify and address structural racism, systemic poverty, linguistic differences, and other forms of marginalization, to make sure we are not unintentionally creating or allowing for experience gaps or predictable outcomes based on identity to persist.

Inclusion: We define inclusion as putting diversity into action by creating an environment of belonging, respect, and connection -- where an abundance of ideas, backgrounds, and perspectives are brought together to advance our mission. We strive to create a place where people feel valued, heard and can bring their range of intersecting identities to work, where each person feels seen and supported as they reach for their goals. We do this by creating a work environment that builds deeper human connections and values the diversity of ideas, perspectives, and experiences.

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