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DRE in Our Neighborhood Toolkits

The Toolkits for Conversations on Race & Equity are self-guided programs that can be used to spark conversations between community members.

Three unique chapters are available and designed to be used in the following order: Privilege, Bias, Equity.

Toolkit on Privilege

Privilege can be defined as a set of unearned benefits given to people who fit into a specific social group. This toolkit helps users examine the advantages they accrue from privilege – even if they are unaware that they have it – and looks at how racism is built into society in some surprising ways.

Toolkit on Bias

Bias is a preference in favor of, or against, a person, group of people, or thing. This toolkit helps participants examine patterns of bias, and to challenge negative or harmful biases within us and around us.

Toolkit on Equity

While “equality” means everyone has the same rights, opportunities and resources, “equity” recognizes that equality doesn’t truly address everyone’s needs. This toolkit helps users understand the difference between the terms and facilitates discussions around racial equity. Help us advance racial equity in Arlington County using the Equity conversation guide to start and host conversations with family, colleagues, and members of your community.

Designed with our partner, Challenging Racism, each conversational unit will take about an hour and can be hosted in informal settings such as with family around the dinner table, with a book club, or in other social gatherings. As people have these conversations among family and friends, they build their capacity to have these conversations with anyone, anywhere.

How did the toolkits work for you? Let us know what you think!