Diversity & Inclusion Commitment
City on a Hill Charter Public School believes that all students can and must achieve at high levels. We empower students to do so by cultivating a connected, supportive community of scholars, families and staff who are committed to growing and making decisions that reflect anti-racist values.
As a school, we use “DICEE,” Diversity, Inclusion, Civic Engagement & Equity, as the core principles of our work.
Diversity
Our students come from a variety of backgrounds and experiences across the City of Boston and the Commonwealth of Massachusetts. Our scholars bring unique and valuable perspectives to every class, Town Hall Meeting, and extracurricular activity, and are invaluable to making City on a Hill the school we strive to be. We commit to honoring these differences, and working to ensure that our staff and Board of Trustees reflect this same diversity in their composition. We live out our value of diversity by:
- Providing identity, bias and anti-racism professional development to our staff at least four times per year and providing opportunities for individual learning;
- Participating in programs like Lynch Leadership Academy and the UNCF-Walton Family K-12 Education Fellowship to build pipelines of strong, diverse leaders;
- Holding hiring processes for our open roles which include interviewers of various backgrounds and experiences, and discuss how bias appears in hiring.
Inclusion
We seek to create an environment where all of our community members, regardless of identity, feel welcomed and safe - physically and psychologically - to participate in our school. We live our our value of inclusion by:
- Creating multiple opportunities per quarter for students and families to hear directly from School Leaders and provide feedback either through letters to families, surveys, or virtual open houses;
- Crafting explicit policies and guidelines, like our Gender Identity Policy, for our staff to clearly outline how City on a Hill can support students of various experiences;
- Maintaining Student Government, Family & Community Council, PBIS Committee and Academic Committee to advise School Leadership and the Board of Trustees on changes to our programs.
Civic Engagement
City on a Hill was founded in 1995 with the values of Public Accountability, Academic Achievement, Citizenship, and Teacher Accountability. As we continue on our journey over 25 years later, we invoke these values and lift up our history of civic engagement in the City of Boston as a core feature of our anti-racist agenda. We live out our value of civic engagement by:
- Holding weekly Town Meetings to debate current events;
- Sending our Junior class to Washington, D.C. to observe the Democratic process and visit colleges and universities;
- Inviting local representatives to visit our school and speak with students about public policy and public service;
- Requiring all Seniors to take City Project as their capstone course, where students identify an issue affecting Boston, attend a 100-hour internship with a related nonprofit or governmental organization, and present solutions to a panel of their peers, staff, and community members.
Equity
As a school, we acknowledge that systematic oppression is deeply ingrained in our greater society and that institutions, including schools, can and have caused disproportionate harm to marginalized communities. We confront the hard truths surrounding public education, own the role that we have played, and pledge to continuously evolve our practices and policies with equity in mind. We live out our value of equity by:
- Running the City on a Hill Equity Task Force (ETF) comprised of City on a Hill teachers, students, and support staff to act as an advisory board on the topic of equity;
- Ensuring student and family voices are heard through consistent opportunities for feedback and participation in our community;
- Creating clear decision making frameworks as a means of ensuring all staff have the opportunity to submit recommended changes to improve our school.
