Creating a Healthier Multicultural Comm.

Creating a Healthier Multicultural Community Project

The Creating a Healthier Multicultural Community Project was a response to the desire of many residents of the predominantly white La Crosse region to widen their awareness, understanding, respect and empathy for the lived realities of people with a wide range of racial, cultural, and ethnic backgrounds. This project was accomplished in partnernship with Dr. Fran Kaplan and Reggie Jackson, anti-racist educators with Nurturing Diversity Partners.

2019 Completed Components:
Facilitator Training: Two-day facilitator training workshop. Twenty-eight local ethnically and racially diverse participants successfully completed this training held in La Crosse.

Deep Dive Small Group Facilitated Dialogues: Forty-eight La Crosse area community leaders participated in four 3-hour small group discussions exploring topics of bias, history and its impacts on racial disparities, unconscious bias, and present-day status of racism. The attendees included community leaders from public school administration, judicial, police, hospital administration, government, business, Health and Human Services, the colleges, churches and community organizations. These discussions were facilitated by our locally trained small group facilitators, under the supervision of Reggie Jackson and Dr. Fran Kaplan. The facilitators and the attendees from the Deep Dives are a community resource creating a secondary wave of change by taking this work further into our community.

Public Presentations: Two public presentations, How Did We Get Here? The Hidden Impacts of Racial Disparities and Unconscious Bias: Can We See Our Own Blind Spots?-were given in the Fall of 2019. Each was attended by approximately 300 people.

Dr. Fran Kaplan and Reggie Jackson are the Co-Founders and Lead Trainers/Consultants of Nurturing Diversity Partners, a consulting firm that fosters diversity, equity, and inclusion within institutions and communities. They educate groups about the history, sociocultural dynamics, personal skills, and institutional practices that build a more equitable society. Reggie Jackson has been a much sought-after speaker and published writer for over a decade. Reggie specializes in sharing seldom-told stories and facts about the experiences of African-Americans and other peoples of color past and present. Dr. Fran Kaplan has spent fifty-five years working against poverty and for social justice and peace locally, nationally, and internationally. She has experience as an adult educator, social worker, community organizer, executive director, training director, published author, award-winning filmmaker, and more. Together, they have over 65 years of experience and 24 awards for their public service promoting racial equity and reconciliation, including the 2018 Friebert Social Justice Award from the Jewish Community Relations Council and the 2021 Unity Award from Milwaukee Magazine.

Thinking differently about difference

Ongoing Components:
2021 Regional Read of Waking Up White: “Book Chat Meet-ups” were orchestrated by the La Crosse Public Library and other community partners. These are small group theme-based discussions and are free and open to the public. They will be facilitated by local people who received their training from Nurturing Diversity Partners’ anti-racist educators Reggie Jackson and Dr. Fran Kaplan.

Gatherings of the Deep Dive Attendees: Monthly the facilitators and community leaders who participated in the 2020 Deep Dive Dialogues are offered the opportunity to gather and continue the discussion around the issues of race and anti-racism work using Waking Up White and other material as springboards.