ACCOUNTABILITY

Formal: Accountability Board

The White People Confronting Racism workshop is guided by an Accountability Board of BIPOC colleagues and educators.  A complete list of the current Accountability Board is under construction.

Informal Accountability

Though the workshops are facilitated by white people, a foundational part of the work is building multiple forms of accountability to people of color.  This was a premise of the cofounders as well.

In addition to the formal systems of accountability with the Board, all facilitators are educators or activists who work with BIPOC and have personal relationships and networks that support ongoing accountability

Acknowledgments from the Cofounders

Many BIPOC contributed to the content and direction of the workshops. It was their voices asking us to design a space for white people to take greater responsibility for their own work to addressing racism. Those voices continue to echo in all the evolutions of the material.

We especially thank the late Dr. Frederick Bryant, who was by our side at all times.  Special thanks also to the late Norma Cobbs’ to Percy Bradshaw, Barry Cross, and Jim Crumel for their early input, editing, and guidance.

Many other BIPOC partnered with us and supported us in developing our consciousness about racial justice work as well as these workshops. We have them with us in spirit at all times: Barbara Smith, Pamela Freeman, Niyonu Spann, Marcine Pickron-Davis, Ruth Littlejohn, Jackie Cody-Downing, Marilyn Dyson, Judith Jones, Carolyn Jones, Patreece Thompson, Juan Thomas, Nelson Hewitt, Dolores Davis, and Fr. Paul Washington.

Thank you to the late Elsie Y. Cross, African American educator and pathfinder in organizational racial justice work.  We honor her memory and as well as the content she provided to the early work.

We thank our white colleagues & white support groups for the willingness to experiment with us as a learning lab as we developed designs, approaches, and materials.

George Lakey and the folks at Training for Change have given ongoing support to this work, with special thanks to Erika Thorne, who is also one of the facilitators.

Special thanks to manual designers Lula Jones of LULAdesigns (3rd edition); Hadassah Hill/Heels on Wheels Design (2nd edition); and Skylar Fein (1st edition). And a warm shout-out to Marria Nakhoda for her web design skill and creativity.  Thanks to Karen Moore for researching permissions to use materials.

And a big thank you to Sarah Halley and MJ McClure for having first taken over the public workshops, thereby enabling the work to continue, develop, and thrive thanks to their energy. Sarah Halley now carries on the workshop and its spirit, and leads an outstanding group of facilitators.

Header Image – From photograph of The Selma to Montgomery March, Mar 7, 1965 – Mar 21, 1965.