Pollyanna advances systemic change by developing stronger communities.

Pollyanna works with academic and other institutions to achieve their diversity, equity and inclusion goals. Through its unique conference models, discussion platforms, and racial literacy curricula, Pollyanna increases cultural competence.

The Independent School Conference, launched in 2011 at The Dalton School in New York City, is a daylong interactive program to train school leaders to broaden inclusion in and outside of the classroom. Schools in close geographic proximity come together for the day, wrestle with common problems and share the collective wisdom. Pollyanna has created a template for independent schools that will enable a school to replicate and customize the Conference in cities around the United States and around the world. The full-day Conference is hosted by one school in a geographic region, and aims to promote action and strengthen leadership by deepening the conversation, addressing challenges, sharing effective practices and generating positive steps. The goal is to improve inclusion within schools and the understanding that racial, socioeconomic, religious and sexual diversity enhances all elements of our schools. Each school attending the Conference sends a group of community members called a POD, which includes two members from each constituency: administrators, alumni, diversity coordinators, faculty, parents, students and trustees.

Pollyanna designed the Intra-Conference as an institutional capacity-building and excavating tool for schools wanting to deepen their knowledge, enhance practices and improve skills in the areas of Diversity, Equity and Inclusion. The very nature of the Intra-Conference, its emphasis on Pollyanna’s motto Every Voice Matters brings a school together and establishes and strengthens community connections. The conference informs the community and provides a platform for sharing personal experiences, expressing opinions and perspectives, and generating ideas and solutions for growth. This results in an enthusiasm and a strong desire for informed Aspirational Action by the school community.

As schools evolve beyond the Intra-Conference model, or if a school wants to investigate cultural and environmental perspectives on DEI topics, a Cross-Constituent Assessment is designed and implemented and consists of online surveys, focus groups and a comprehensive summary of both qualitative and quantitative data to provide infrastructure for on-going initiatives.

Aspirational Action is successful when it is owned and led by school community members. Pollyanna’s goal is to ensure that positive and sustainable capacity-building approaches to the work of inclusive practice becomes institutionalized within a school so that year-to-year as demographics evolve and the community widens, approaches continue to be relevant, inviting and engaging. Aspirational Action ideally picks up shortly after the Intra-Conference. Pollyanna helps structure retreats for small and large groups, co-designs DEI projects with metrics and starts down the path of creating goals for the school year where they can be held accountable, and in-process data and results will be collected and shared with the community to highlight how the needle is moving on respective initiatives. Regardless of how a school decides to approach Aspirational Action, Pollyanna serves as facilitators the entire way.