Racial Equity Work Plan (All Updates)

Published June 2021, updated December 2021, updated July 2022, updated April 2023, November 2023, July 2024

Poetry is vital to language and living. Copper Canyon Press publishes extraordinary poetry from around the world to engage the imaginations and intellects of readers. It is imperative that we address inequities that keep Black and Indigenous community members and other people of color [BIPOC] from engaging fully at all levels of Copper Canyon Press, whether as authors, readers, donors, board, or staff members.

Copper Canyon Press staff and leadership have been majority white, a makeup that does not reflect the diversity of our authors or readership. We take seriously our responsibility—as publishers of poetry books by Black, Indigenous, Asian American, Arab American, Latinx, immigrant, undocumented, multilingual, and multinational writers and translators of the (non-white) global majority, as well as poetry books by white poets in the U.S. and abroad—to be informed about, and actively resist, systemic racism. With the actions in this plan, we seek to build a foundation from which we can do the proactive, intentional, and overdue work of dismantling structural racism in our own house and within our field. We are grateful for BIPOC poets, organizers, and publishing colleagues who have led this work for many decades, and who continue to lead the charge. 

Each of the efforts listed here is part of an urgent and ongoing process toward culture change, and greater equity, inclusion, and access for our brilliant poetry community. 

Our commitment to racial equity and justice includes:

• An organization-wide assessment of inclusion, diversity, equity, and accessibility at the Press. Next steps: CCP has hired poet and independent consultant Ama Codjoe to solicit feedback from authors, staff, and other stakeholders, resulting in a recommended action plan. This assessment will conclude by the end of 2021, and CCP will share a summary report on our website. 
  • Update: An organization-wide assessment facilitated by consultant Ama Codjoe was completed in June 2021. The process included a survey, several focus groups, and an internal report of findings and recommendations for strategic change. Since then a CCP Board-Staff Task Force has met bimonthly to take action on those recommendations. CCP will share a summary report on our website after the external audit (below) has concluded, no later than June 2022.
  • Update July 2022: Copper Canyon Press IDEA Report Summary & Recommendations
  • Update July 2024: For more information about our IDEA findings in 2022, please read our Copper Canyon Press IDEA Report Summary & Recommendations.

• An external audit of organizational practices and processes at CCP, provided by data2insight. With the information provided by the audit, we have sought to identify and remove inequitable barriers to employment, publication, participation, and advancement at the Press. The audit examines CCP’s:
  • HR policies including hiring practices, job descriptions, and employment manual
    • Update July 2022: In December 2021, Copper Canyon Press partnered with All Things HR – a human resources services firm in Lynnwood, WA – to assist in the review and implementation of our HR policies and procedures, forms and agreements, and hiring practices, to ensure reliable, professional compliance in areas such as employment, labor and immigration law and payroll, as well as to provide staff with a subjective resource to support and sustain healthy employee relations.
      With the support of All Things HR, the Copper Canyon Press Employee Handbook is currently being revised, with a projected completion date of Fall 2022. Review and updating of job descriptions and organizational chart, including reporting structure, is underway and ongoing through the end of this 2022.
  • Board governance and procedural documents
  • Book list and editorial policies

Next steps: An external auditor hired by CCP will complete this audit by the end of 2021 as part of our organization-wide assessment, and CCP will share a summary report on our website.

Update: The timeline on the audit has been expanded into 2022. In summer and fall 2021, we sent out multiple rounds of RFPs to find the right consultant(s) for this project. After vetting candidates we have agreed to work with data2insight starting in January 2022. CCP will share a summary report of findings from the audit and assessment by the end of our fiscal year in June 2022.

Update July 2022: Copper Canyon Press IDEA Report Summary & Recommendations

In addition, the Copper Canyon Press IDEA Task Force has reviewed the full results of the data2insight report and will continue to meet and bring recommendations to the Board of Directors for next steps.

• Anti-bias and inclusion, diversity, equity, and accessibility training and education for all staff and board members. As publishing professionals and patrons of the literary arts, we hold powerful gatekeeping positions. Our organization can only be as antiracist and liberatory as those who run it. Next steps: 
  • In January 2021, the Copper Canyon Press Board of Directors and all permanent staff attended antiracism trainings facilitated by poet and independent consultant Ama Codjoe, through which we gained shared vocabulary, greater understanding of personal accountability and implicit bias, and guidance on applying antiracism frameworks to CCP’s mission and operations. 
  • CCP offers paid work time and financial support for staff and leadership to attend outside learning opportunities and events that build knowledge and community on issues of inclusion, equity, diversity, and access. To date, staff have attended workshops on a variety of intersectional topics including disability and racism; antiracist recruitment; and how to advocate for meaningful, action-supported anti-racist practices as a marketing professional, with the ultimate goal of centering antiracist values and practices in our work plans and organizational culture. 
  • Update October 2020: CCP staff and interns participate in monthly peer-led racial equity dialogues, in an internal self-education effort focused on topics of race and equity in poetry, publishing, and beyond.
  • Update February 2023: The focus of the racial equity dialogues has shifted to reading, analyzing and discussing a Copper Canyon Press book through the lens of racial equity themes.

• Active board recruitment and trustee onboarding. Recognizing the resources and opportunities that BIPOC leaders bring to CCP, we are committed to actively recruiting more BIPOC board members. A new board committee was formed in 2021 to accomplish this goal. We have revised our board position descriptions and member onboarding materials to reflect responsibilities related to inclusion and equity at CCP (i.e. participating in special meetings, training, recruitment efforts, and other board-level change work).
  • Update July 2022: We have welcomed three new BIPOC Board members to CCP this past year. We continue our efforts to expand the diversity on our board through the work of the board committee.

• Dedicated funding and program changes to make the Copper Canyon Press internship program more equitable. Many literary professionals begin their careers as interns. The CCP internship program is an immersive experiential learning experience, and offers interns a deepened relationship to poetry, and a professionally-competitive understanding of literary and nonprofit landscapes. We are taking steps to remove systemic barriers to BIPOC participation in the CCP internship program accordingly. Past and present intern cohorts have provided invaluable feedback and activism around intern compensation and other opportunities for greater equity and inclusion. 
  • Copper Canyon Press internships have historically been unpaid—an unfair advantage for prospective interns with access to wealth, and a barrier for those who cannot afford to work for free. As of January 2021, interns at the Press are offered compensation in the form of a volunteer stipend of $500/month, which does not provide a living wage, but is one step towards increasing equitable access to the program. 
  • Further commitments include a greater focus on actively recruiting BIPOC interns, and exploring new mentorship and networking opportunities for interns at CCP and in the field of publishing. 
  • Update June 2022: a Facebook forum for current and previous interns was created. This Facebook group grants access for interns to connect with one another and continue networking in the field of publishing after their internship.
  • Update April 2023: For our Spring 2023 intern cohort application process, we expanded our selection team to include one of our BIPOC full-time staff members. We will continue to incorporate feedback from our BIPOC staff members in the intern selection process.

• The launch of a new Publishing Fellowship program for BIPOC—and others historically excluded from publishing—who are exploring careers as editors. As we dismantle barriers, we also wish to build new inroads and connections. The Publishing Fellowship program will welcome BIPOC emerging editors to bring skills and expertise to the CCP editorial program while receiving professional development and mentorship from CCP staff. Next steps: Planning details for this program will be informed by our organization-wide assessment, with a goal to bring on the first Fellow(s) in 2022. 
  • Update: As of December 2021, CCP leadership are in the hiring process for our first Publishing Fellow.
  • Update July 2022: The inaugural Publishing Fellow has been hired and is currently working on a variety of projects with the staff.
  • Update April 2023: The Publishing Fellow has led several key projects for the Press, including co-editing an Anniversary anthology and co-producing a 50th Anniversary promotional video
  • Update November 2023: The Publishing Fellow has been hired as a full-time staff member of the Press, filling an existing and recently vacated position.
  • Update November 2023: The hiring of our next Publishing Fellow has been postponed. The Press is currently developing a plan to strengthen sustainable long term funding for the program to ensure the Fellowship’s health and longevity. 
  • Update July 2024: The first Fellowship was successfully conducted in 2022, ultimately resulting in a full-time staff hire. Subsequent Fellowships have been delayed pending sustainable funding, a primary operational goal.

• Review and revision of our house style guide toward current and liberatory uses of language. Next steps: As of fall 2020, CCP completed an initial revision of our house style guide. The revision includes a new section guiding the language CCP uses in printed materials to refer to marginalized and racialized identities and groups of people. We will revisit this portion of our style guide annually or as-needed. 
  • Update July 2022: In April 2022, our Digital Style Guide was updated with links to additional resource articles. We will revisit and revise the Digital Style Guide periodically.
  • Update December 2022: As part of our pressmark revision process, we are in the process of creating a new Digital Standards Guide that will include our new branding materials and assets. We will incorporate the language guidance tools we have developed prior to this update within the new standards guide. 
  • Update July 2024: As part of our pressmark revision process in 2022, we created a new Digital Standards Guide that included our new branding materials and assets. We incorporated the language guidance tools we have developed prior to this update within the new standards guide.

• Revision of our pressmark. In recent years Copper Canyon Press staff and board have engaged in complex and honest conversations about the ways that our pressmark and logo impact readers and poets. For decades, Copper Canyon Press books and materials have carried a Chinese character that means “poetry,” representing our long dedication to the art of translation, and the global scope of our list and authors. We are grateful to community members who have provided feedback on the negative impact of the CCP pressmark in context of the history of orientalism, racist exclusion of Asian and Asian American voices from contemporary literature, and appropriation of Asian cultures and symbols in western and white literary institutions. Next steps: We will revise the CCP pressmark and logo toward a more culturally-sensitive, inclusive, and accurate representation of the Press’s vision. We will complete this by 2023. 
  • Update July 2022: CCP hired a nationally recognized design firm to engage a process to revise Copper Canyon’s logo. We anticipate this process to be completed by Fall 2022.
  • Update April 2023: With the input of numerous stakeholders, CCP has selected a new pressmark and logo and begun implementing it across all spheres of the press. This includes appearances on Copper Canyon Press books, its website, social media, letterhead, and all administrative and promotional materials. Based on the new pressmark, the Press has also developed a completely new branding standards guide and made significant updates to numerous design elements of its website. It has communicated an official pressmark change statement, which can be found on the Press’s website here.  As of April 2023, the Press considers the adoption of this new pressmark complete. 

• Development of a new racial equity decision-making framework to guide all major efforts at CCP. Inspired by RaceForward’s “Equity Prime,” this will consist of a set of questions—adapted specifically for a nonprofit arts organization—that place equity and inclusion at the forefront of organizational decision-making. Next steps: Such a framework will be developed and incorporated into staff and board processes by the end of 2021. 
  • Update: In a collaborative effort involving all staff members and the Board of Directors, in 2021 we developed a set of questions to help all team members apply a racial equity lens to organizational decision-making at CCP. We will meet quarterly to assess and strengthen our use of this tool.
  • Update July 2024: Copper Canyon Press continues to adapt how this framework can be involved in our organizational decision-making.

The actions listed above are directly related to our day-to-day operations as a book publisher, employer, and nonprofit literary arts organization. As individual stakeholders, and as an institution, we also hold responsibility within the larger context of country and culture. We commit to:

• Direct and overt support of the movement for Black lives. As long as the state-sanctioned killing of Black people continues, the Black poets, readers, and colleagues among us do not have equal access to basic levels of safety and wellbeing. Next steps: CCP adapted our Read Generously donor program to raise funds for Black Lives Matter between June 15 and September 1, 2020, resulting in a contribution of nearly $6k to BLM. Staff and board members will work to determine how CCP can provide longer-term support to the movement.
  • Update April 2023: Copper Canyon Press has donated over 700 books to organizations that serve and support Black and other marginalized communities, including schools, churches, libraries and prisons.  
  • Update July 2024: Copper Canyon Press continues to seek projects that interact with and give visibility to these realities by way of the diverse perspectives of the poets who experience them.

• An ongoing intersectional approach to all equity and inclusion work, acknowledging that other forms of oppression—including sexism, transphobia, homophobia, ageism, ableism, xenophobia, and classism—must be addressed at all levels of the organization (in the books we publish, among staff and board, and in CCP’s organizational policies) to achieve a truly antiracist and liberatory vision for change. 

We will update this plan annually—or more frequently as needed—with reports on our progress. If you have comments or questions, please send your message to poetry@coppercanyonpress.org. 

Thank you.

Signed,

Copper Canyon Press Staff & Board