North Idaho Alliance Women of Impact: Leadership Roundtable lands on 'D' for diversity
Marilee Wallace
The Women of Impact Leadership Roundtable met for the final series of its nine-month program in April landing on the “D” in our I.M.P.A.C.T.E.D year.
Diversity: The practice or quality of including or involving people from a range of different social and ethnic backgrounds and of different genders, sexual orientations, etc. "Equality and diversity should be supported for human sake.”
Corporations, higher education institutions, nonprofit organizations, worldwide scientific research studies, governmental entities and religious groups are dedicated to educating equity and inclusion of diversity. World wars and hate crimes have arisen from that lack of understanding and diversity exclusion; it is universally broad and historically complex.
North Idaho — we have some big diversity problems and we know it. Luckily, there are some local heroes who are leading the charge — visionary community leaders and citizen groups who publicly reject hate and injustice and speak instead to kindness and compassion by educating our citizens about biases, responses and acceptance. The Human Rights Education Institute (HREI) in Coeur d’Alene is a good place to start. Jeanette Laster, executive director of HREI spoke to our group using real life examples of conflict management and offered sensible, non-biased solutions we can use by choosing words when we communicate. Word coaching can be a good thing, so we recommend you spend some time on the Human Rights Education Institute’s website at www.hrie.org and take a look around.
We also heard from Dr. Sarah Lynch who is the executive director of the North Idaho Pride Alliance which envisions a safe and inclusive community where LGBTQIA+ individuals belong, can connect and are empowered to thrive in North Idaho. Kiki Miller, Coeur d'Alene city councilwoman, spoke to us how she is leading studies on the affordable housing and growth arena along with other dedicated community leaders to address the local working housing crisis through Housing Solutions Partnership. And Blair Williams of the Art Spirit Gallery and community activist who believes nothing is impossible and often shares her downtown space with groups to celebrate what they are doing to build and strengthen community.
Diversity inclusion progress is visibly happening here in North Idaho. Kindness and compassion is within our reach. Communication is the key and the tools are here and readily available for us to access. In a time where we are becoming more verbally aggressive, quick to judge and more singular minded in our environments, we are on the verge of squeezing out inclusion. Let’s all do a refresher course and start with the one thing we all have in common, each other. Humans. We all belong.
The Women of Impact Leadership Roundtable meets once a month for a nine-month series, and we base our monthly agenda on the word IMPACTED. We will begin our next series Sept. 25. To see the lineup of our monthly topics and to get details or view additional programs NIA is offering to Impact women in our region, please visit www.thenialliance.com.
• • •
Marilee Wallace, IOM, president/CEO of the North Idaho Alliance Women of Impact. The Women of Impact Leadership Roundtable meets once a month for a nine-month series, and we base our monthly agenda on the word IMPACTED.
