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Cultural Competency, Diversity and Inclusion Plan.
POLICY:
Sunshine Farm is continually seeking to improve the quality of life for all individuals attending, staff, and stakeholders. We strive to achieve this goal by educating and training our staff and individuals attending to the dynamics of participating in a culturally diverse community. Through education, we enhance our awareness, compassion, and ability to interact with others, holding the space for dignity, respect, patience, and understanding. Embracing diversity in our community increases creativity, acceptance, tolerance, and innovation. It also broadens the range of knowledge, skills, and abilities of our staff and the people attending Sunshine Farm. Our focus on cultural competency, inclusion, and diversity will enable us to provide a culturally sensitive approach to the people we support, the staff we employ and the stakeholders we engage with.
Sunshine Farm acknowledges and respects the value of a diverse community. This recognition includes gender identities, race/ethnicity, family status, age, mental/physical abilities, sexual orientation, religious beliefs, socio-economic status and occupational focus. Our mandate is to maintain an environment that is supportive of these elements by promoting inclusion within Sunshine Farm and the communities we are a part of.
We commit to:
- Offering supports that respect individual and cultural differences and preferences.
- Promoting cultural awareness and understanding through education and immersive experiences.
- Reflecting the diversity of Sunshine Farm at the client, staff and management levels, as well as with services provided.
- No tolerance of discrimination of any kind.
PROCESS
In order to promote cultural diversity and inclusion, Sunshine Farmis engaged in the following activities:
1. Equal Opportunity Employment initiativesfor the hiringprocess.
2. All new staff must review the Cultural Diversity and Inclusion Policy as part of orientation and at least annually as scheduled in the operational calendar
3. In tandem with reviewing the Cultural Diversity Inclusion and Competency Plan, Sunshine Farm conducts an annual assessment of demographic information on the individuals attending Sunshine Farm.
4. Staffwill be provided with regular training on cultural diversity, inclusion, and competency on Staff training Day scheduled in February.
5. Staff and management will be provided the opportunity to attend educational experiences pertaining to culturally diversity and inclusion topics as they become available.
6. Literature that relates to cultural competency and diversity is available for clients, staff, and stakeholders.
7. Sunshine Farm leadership facilitates ongoing and open discussions regarding cultural competency, inclusion, and diversity between individuals attending, staff, and stakeholders which are documented in schedules, and meeting agenda.
PROCEDURE:
As Sunshine Farm continues to develop and improve our Cultural Diversity and Inclusion Plan, we will make sure that the following are always incorporated:
- Engagement of individuals who have cultural expertise,
- Participation in cultural competency inclusion and diversity activities by all clients and staff,
- The Administration observes the current cultural climate and solicits feedback on areas of interest regarding diversity, culture, and inclusion. From there, Sunshine Farm engages with an implementation process and activities that incorporate feedback and input from participants. This includes incorporation of culturally diverse art and food in the art and cooking classes.
The goal of the Cultural Diversity Inclusion and Competency Plan is to raise the consciousness of Sunshine Farm regarding culture and diversity by recognizing the need for ongoing training, dialogue, feedback, and input from all individuals attending and staff. It is important that individuals attending, and staff are involved in the process of making Sunshine Farm a culturally aware, safe, and welcoming environment for all.
Cultural competency includes self-examination and in-depth exploration of one’s own cultural background. This involves the recognition of personal biases, prejudices, and assumptions about people who have a different cultural background. Without being aware of the influence of personal cultural or professional values, there is risk that the individuals attending and staff may engage in cultural imposition and hold unconscious bias’. Sunshine Farm is committed to creating a culturally aware, safe, and welcoming environment for all.