Safe Harbour: Introduction to Diversity and Inclusion 

The BCLTA is pleased to have joined the BC Library Federations in offering access to the Safe Harbour: Introduction to Diversity and Inclusion course from the Affiliation of Multicultural Societies and Service Agencies of BC (AMSSA).  All staff and trustees of the province’s public libraries are eligible to register for this training.

There is no registration fee.

The goal of the Safe Harbour Training is to support individuals in in building their awareness of diversity and the implications of diversity and to gain knowledge to foster inclusion in workplace settings with their co-workers and the clients they may serve. The workshop is 2 hours.

Objectives:

  • To understand the key concepts of diversity, bias, prejudice, stereotype, and discrimination and consider the impact of each in workplaces.
  • To identify dimensions of diversity that exist in society and to understand the value of diversity in workplaces.
  • To consider the different ways in which respect is communicated by different cultural groups and apply this learning to the concept of inclusion.
  • To apply learning through a series of scenarios and discussion questions that build awareness of how exclusion can occur in workplaces.
  • To develop ideas for fostering inclusion in workplace settings with co-workers and customer/clients.

Feedback from participating libraries and staff:

“Our large municipal library used the Safe Harbour anti-racism training as an introduction to EDI as it covered basic concepts and terminology. The training gave our staff a common language and shared understanding of EDI principles. We found this training to be a strong foundation for building our own internal EDI journey and training with a consultant. We liked the fact that it was self-paced and explored some scenarios”.

“We had all of our staff and board trustees participate. We assigned a couple of modules per month to our trustees and started our monthly board meeting with a conversation around that section of the course for the first few months of 2021. It was a useful introductory course and generated some good discussion”.

“It’s really good training! …. it surpassed my expectations”.

To register for the Safe Harbour course, library staff can register directly with AMSSA at https://www.surveymonkey.com/r/CGC77K8

One or two days after registering, two emails will be sent from AMSAA.

  • One email is in regards to setting up a password to access the course
  • The other email confirms course access

We gratefully acknowledge the financial support of the Province of British Columbia through the Ministry of Municipal Affairs.