Jupiter Theatre would like to publicly acknowledge our receipt of the 35//50 Initiative and thank its contributors for their work on the project and for inviting us into the dialogue. Jupiter Theatre is a volunteer-run non-profit organization with a board of directors that is 33% BIPOC and 66% female or non-binary.
The Anti-Racism/Anti-Oppression Declaration we released back in the spring was intended to “clearly express our support for the BIPOC community and our commitment to explore ways of becoming a better anti-racism/anti-oppression company moving forward.” We uphold the values and the spirit of The 35//50 Initiative and we are happy to update to the public on our current and future plans for action
ACTION ITEMS
We are making a commitment to diversifying our programming. We will actively pursue avenues that remove barriers for BIPOC artists and will continue to research how this can be done within our organization to create an action plan by summer 2021.
During the 2020/2021 season, we will be putting into place a code of conduct that prohibits any racist or oppressive behaviour within the company. As part of creating this policy, we will also create a working plan on how it affects our artists and anyone who comes in contact with our company and its personnel.
We will raise funds specifically for EDIA and ARAO training, workshops, and tools for our company, its board of directors, and its volunteers by the end of 2021.
We will further investigate our practise of land acknowledgements, what our relationship as a company is to this land and its Indigenous people, and what that means to our company and to us as artists and individuals.
We will continue to publicly post statistics of the race and gender of our company’s volunteers, artists, and board of directors with the next posting scheduled for summer 2021.
At Jupiter Theatre, we are actively dedicating resources to discussing these issues, identifying bias and racism in our company, and building short-term and long-term plans. We are excited to be moving forward with this work and will continue to make public updates on our progress as an organization and share our plans as they develop. If you have any questions about these items or Jupiter Theatre’s Anti-Racism/Anti-Oppression Declaration, please feel free to reach out to our Artistic Producer, Andrew G. Cooper, at andrew@theatrejupiter.com.