Overview

On the eve of Juneteenth 2020, leaders of Tufts Clinical and Translational Science Institute (CTSI) and the Institute for Clinical Research and Health Policy Studies at Tufts Medical Center (ICRHPS) issued a statement to express outrage at the deaths of Black Americans who were murdered due to systemic racism in our society, to make a commitment to continue to work to be anti-racist, and to fight social injustice and inequity. Leaders, faculty, and staff from both institutes formed the Anti-Racism Action Committee (ARAC).

Anti-Racism Mission Statement

We recognize our society’s continued struggle with the lasting effects of racism on health disparities. Our mission is to promote racial equity and make a collective impact on our research and education environment by building awareness, distributing knowledge, and taking action on anti-racism across our institutions’ education, personnel, program, policy, and research initiatives. ​

Anti-Racism Action Plan

Members of ARAC worked together to develop a formal Anti-Racism Action Plan. Prior to the plan’s development, Tufts CTSI and ICRHPS had been working toward becoming more diverse, inclusive, and anti-racist organizations. The plan includes new initiatives as well as those that were already underway or previously planned. It focuses on five categories:

Education

Objective: Strive for equitable access and support for underrepresented racial and ethnic groups with the long-term goal of increasing diversity in the health policy and clinical and translational research workforce.

Research

Objective: Increase knowledge and practice of broadly-engaged team science and the concrete steps researchers can take to confront racism and exclusion, and include voices of people from diverse racial and ethnic backgrounds in different aspects of research.

People

Objective: Support ongoing awareness and introspection about racism (explicit and implicit) at the individual level.

Programs

Objective: Increase programming on racism and anti-racism in the workplace, academia, research, health care, and society.

Policies

Objective: Institutionalize continuous, intentional review of ways to confront racism through the work of ICRHPS and Tufts CTSI. Racism in the workplace can occur in persistent or pervasive ways, affect productivity, and make valuable workers feel uncomfortable, degraded, undervalued, or unwelcome. As an anti-racist organization, we will establish policies and a clear code of conduct which will make clear that racist words and actions are unacceptable within and beyond the organization.

Resources at Tufts

Tufts University

Tufts Medical Center/Wellforce

Contact

Racism is a public health crisis. Together, ICRHPS and Tufts CTSI are committed to confronting this crisis head-on through collaborative initiatives, resources, and programs for faculty, staff, students, and the community. Our plan to become anti-racist individuals and organizations is already well underway; however, we recognize this is a lifelong process and our plan will evolve. We welcome new ideas as we continue this critically important work.

To share your ideas, or for more information about our commitment to anti-racism and our commitment to diversity, equity, and inclusion, please email info@tuftsctsi.org.