By a vote of 149-8, with 2 abstentions, APA’s Council of Representatives adopted a Racial Equity Action Plan (PDF, 1.3MB)opens in new window. The action plan builds on APA’s apology to communities of color for the association and psychology’s roles in contributing to systemic racism. It outlines the next steps that APA and the field should take to prioritize and operationalize the commitments made in the apology.
The action plan was produced after extensive consultation with thought leaders and experts, APA members and leadership. The plan is divided into five sections that list priority actions in the areas of:
- Knowledge production
- Health
- APA/workforce
- Training of psychologists
- Education
Each section concludes with a summary of social impact and innovation.
Among the actions the plan recommends:
- Redesign traditional methodologies used to conduct, review, communicate, disseminate, and report psychological research to ensure equity, diversity and inclusion, including expanding ways that the psychology community documents scientific, scholarly and social impact.
- Improve the psychology workforce talent pool by advocating for inclusive recruitment, hiring, pay equity and promotion practices that attract, retain and advance racially and ethnically diverse people.
- Implement efforts that mitigate barriers to the entry and completion of graduate training programs; improve psychology graduate education and training to include diverse, non-Western cultural perspectives; and enhance the visibility of psychologists of diverse backgrounds.
Read the press release for more information.
Next steps
The association has created a Leadership Development Institute (LDI) and Racial Equity Fund as initial steps to help implement the action plan.
- The LDI will serve as a science-based, central hub for all APA leadership development, training and mentoring programs, including the Leadership Institute for Women in Psychology and APA’s Minority Fellowship Programopens in new window.
- The Racial Equity Fund will be seeded by a $1.1 million grant from APA, which will support research and other work related to the priorities and principles articulated in the plan.
