Our Commitments

People will always remain at the heart of Key Assets, and a ‘one-size-fits-all’ approach does not value or recognize the personal experiences of our staff, carers, children and communities. We are committed to striving to meet ‘best practice’ standards through achieving an inclusive, equitable and diverse organization.

Diversity and inclusion are different in that diversity is a fact while inclusion is a distinct choice. Equity relates to identifying and addressing the disparities within society and organizations relating to diversity and inclusion. We firmly believe that all three intersect and are required to create a safe environment which contributes to successful outcomes.

We define inclusion and diversity according to ‘The Global Diversity & Inclusion Benchmarks: Standards for Organizations around the World (GDIB) and Equity referenced by the Centre for Global Inclusion’:

‘Inclusion of various diversity dimensions may vary by geography or organization. Inclusion is a dynamic state of operating in which diversity is leveraged to create a fair, healthy, and high-performing organization or community. An inclusive environment ensures equitable access to resources and opportunities for all. It also enables individuals and groups to feel safe, respected, engaged, motivated, and valued for who they are and for their contributions toward organizational and societal goals.’

‘Diversity refers to the variety of similarities and differences among people, including but not limited to: gender, gender identity, ethnicity, race, native or indigenous origin, age, generation, sexual orientation, culture, religion, belief system, marital status, parental status, socio-economic difference, appearance, language and accent, disability, mental health, education, geography, nationality, work style, work experience, job role and function, thinking style, and personality type.’

‘Equity, sometimes referred to as social equity, in its simplest terms means fairness. In an equitable society, all people would have full and unbiased access to livelihood, education, participation in the political and cultural community, and other social benefits. It does not mean that everyone is the same or receives the same benefits.’

We are passionately committed to the safety, well being and success of our children, families and staff and we will continuously challenge ourselves to be exceptional leaders, teachers and role models who strive to make the world a better place.

At Key Assets in Canada we stand in solidarity with Black, Indigenous and people of colour (BIPOC) in the fight against systemic racism and injustice. We condemn all forms of racism and are committed to creating a more equitable and anti-racist environment which supports our purpose of achieving positive and lasting outcomes for children, families and communities.

We recognize that for decades there has been an over-representation of Black and Indigenous children in contact with the child welfare system as a direct result of the intergenerational traumas experienced through colonization, slavery and racism. As an organization we are committed to listening to the experiences of people who identify as BIPOC, recognizing power and privilege and acting to effect change.

We will strive to become an anti-racist organization through continued learning and creating safe spaces to have candid conversations about racism. We will hold ourselves accountable for being allies and making the world a better place for our staff, children and families who identify as Black, Indigenous and people of colour. To that end, we have made the following initial commitments.

We will:

1. Elevate and amplify the voices of Black, Indigenous and youth of colour in our network in a way that does not tokenize or place a burden on them, while also committing to greater representation of all racialized youth through our Children & Youth Participation Strategy.
2. Speak up about the impact of racism on our children and youth and address the systemic barriers they face within the child welfare system.
3. Review our Human Resource policies from an anti-racist, equity and inclusion lens and apply these learnings to all areas of our work.
4. Review our organization against the Global Diversity and Inclusion Benchmarks (GDIB) and develop and implement action plans to address gaps in our service and practices.

As an organization, we commit to re-evaluating our progress annually and ensure ongoing learning and efforts to improve the experience of the children, families and communities we serve.

The earth’s natural environment is under severe stress from pollution by human activity. Our vision is to achieve positive and lasting outcomes for children, families & communities and in line with this purpose, we believe that our present actions must have the future in mind to achieve these lasting outcomes. We acknowledge that our work has an impact on the global environment.

At Key Assets, we believe that:

• To achieve positive and lasting outcomes for children, families and communities, we must also protect the environment for the present and future generations, as a healthy environment is essential to the wellbeing of humanity;
• As an organization, we are committed to respecting cultural diversity in the communities we work with. We recognize the connection to, and sacred importance of, land, country, water, mountains, oceans and the wider environment to the traditional custodians and owners of the land upon which we work and live;
• We should be responsible for our actions and we should consider the effects of our individual and collective actions to the environment.