I.D.E.A. Toolkit

As a service organization, NATS is dedicated to both the education and support of its members in the areas of: Inclusion, Diversity, Equity, Anti-Racism.

This toolkit is designed to deliver the foundational building blocks of I.D.E.A. through the lens of the arts. It endeavors to provide our vast and varied membership with a baseline of understanding, language, and tools to not only begin to engage in authentic and interrogative conversations about systemic racism — in the arts — but to provide you with language, tools, and suggestions that will allow us, as a community, to better serve our students and organizations in a more culturally competent way.

Diversity strategist Theresa Ruth Howard and consultant Alejandra Valarino Boyer worked closely with NATS leadership and a curated focus group of NATS members to design a toolkit that spoke to the specific needs of our community and what we do.

Module 1*

Module 2*

*Check email for password or visit Member Home

Module 3

**COMING SOON**

Module 3 is designed and produced by NATS members to help us reflect on the information presented in Modules 1 and 2 and apply this information to NATS-centric situations and scenarios. 

Thank you to the following NATS members for their assistance in preparing this module:

Jill Terhaar Lewis
Holly Bewlay
Greg Brookes
Phyllis A. Hale
Sandra Oberoi
Paula Patterson
Marcía Porter
Caroline Schiller

Included in our I.D.E.A. Toolkit are two interactive exercises that you may want to use with your leadership teams or with members in your chapter or region. 

Active Listening Exercise

Allyship

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Best Practices Guide

NATS also has created the I.D.E.A. Best Practices Guide. It provides guidelines for:

• Creating and maintaining a welcoming and supportive community and culture of diversity and inclusion;
• Strategies for communicating across cultures;
• Strategies for demonstrating that we value and validate each other as well as educating ourselves and identifying ways to build an inclusive NATS leadership team.

It is our desire that this guide will help you and all NATS members gain a greater understanding of diversity in order to encourage enhanced awareness of inclusive practices for all identities.

I.D.E.A. Best Practices Guide

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We thank NATS D&I Focus Group members for their time, feedback, and commitment to ensuring that all voices within NATS are valued and heard in an inclusive environment with equitable treatment for all.