Approach:
Utilizing leadership development and anti-oppression best practices, DiversityWorks’ programs are designed to
1) increase people’s understanding of themselves, others, and of social justice issues that impact their lives,
2) help people become leaders in their own communities, and
3) help create safe communities that are free of discrimination.

Core Pillars:
DiversityWorks achieves the above goals through innovative, interactive training programs that include the following four pillars:
1. Community Building: DiversityWorks creates a safe, open space for people to express themselves and connect with one another on an authentic level. We value trust and teambuilding and through this, develop a space for expression, reflection, healing, and growth. In such an environment, people are able to connect with one another on a heart-to-heart level, creating lifelong relationships with people who they would not otherwise meet.
2. Consciousness-Raising: We believe that in order to affect long term personal and group transformation, we need to explore the ways that we experience systemic oppression and internalized oppression. We look at ‘membership’ in power and non-power groups, how these shape our interaction with others around us, and at the institutions that support oppression.
3. Skill Building: We believe that we do a disservice to people if we identify problems without also offering possible solutions and the skills to make them a reality. We promote leadership development (effective communication, goalsetting, conflict mediation, teambuilding) and emphasize popular education (theatre, spoken word, facilitating activities). These competencies are invaluable tools for all of our programs and for life outside of DiversityWorks.
4. Taking Action: Our training programs make a huge impact on our participants but they serve only a fraction of the community directly. To widen our impact, we continuously stress the importance of positive action in the community. We work with participants to develop action plans through which they can promote inclusion in schools, homes, workplaces, and the greater community.


Current Programs:
Some of our current programs are...

The DiversityWorks Book Club meets once a month in the Oakland/Grand Lake area to discuss fiction and non-fiction books that are related to such diversity topics as race and ethnicity, sexual orientation, class, family structure, religion, age, and ability/disability. The group meets on the fourth Thursday of every month from 7:30-9:00PM, with the first meeting being on the 28th of August. Sign up by contacting Julie Chang at or 510-835-9227.

This year’s presidential election has raised no shortage of fascinating diversity issues, and the Diversity In Politics Dialogue Group will take a look at some of these. Meeting every third Wednesday from 7:00-9:00PM between August 20th and election day, we’ll look at such topics as “identity politics vs. political position”, “religious minorities in the US”, “the hierarchy of ‘isms’”, and “mixed race America”. This dialogue group is in no way about promoting any one candidacy, nor is it much about politics. Instead, we’ll use this year’s political races as a point of departure to look at more universal diversity issues. The dialogue group will meet in Berkeley, and you can get more information about the group by emailing .

We invite you to come out to this year's edition of the Appreciating Diversity Film Series, our bi-monthly presentation of documentary films and discussion about related diversity issues. Click here to learn more about it!