Rising’s 2025 Equity Commitment
The front cover of Rising’s Equity Commitment - Illustrated by Rising Community Member, Parys Gardener.
We’re excited to share our Equity Commitment that details the ways that Rising commits to champion equitable practices through our work, partnerships and community. This is something that is very important to us and our community have been at the forefront of developing this.
If you share Rising’s vision for a more equitable creative sector, and want to support our genuinely youth-led movement, please consider making a donation https://www.rising.org.uk/our-why#donate
As a Community Interest Company (CIC) that is committed to creating social change, challenging the status quo and centring the voices of communities who have been historically and systematically underrepresented in the cultural and creative sectors, we strongly believe in the transformative power of intentional equity. This is our commitment to uphold, create and embed equity across all our work.
We understand equity as :
”recognising that we do not all start from the same place and therefore we must make changes that factor in the imbalances caused by systemic structures”
AN ACTIVE AGENT OF EQUITY
Three members of our community sat at a table filled with art materials. They are looking off-camera and smiling.
We see Rising, the community and the agency, as an active agent of equity. We see this document as a collective and tangible resource to create equity in ways that are not currently the standard within the sector. A space to dream, trial and practice creating space for each other. An instrument to prise open the seemingly immovable harmful practices that our sector is built on.
This written commitment is a labour of love from our community, team and board to everyone we engage with, work alongside and exist to serve. It has been created as a living document to go beyond protected characteristics in the Equalities Act 2010, to address the ways that power, lived experience and structural factors intersect to shape people’s experiences of Rising Arts Agency and the cultural and creative sector at large.
If you share Rising’s vision for a more equitable creative sector, and want to support our genuinely youth-led movement, please consider making a donation https://www.rising.org.uk/our-why#donate
DOWNLOAD A COPY OF OUR EQUITY COMMITMENT / pull-out poster
We have created a cute pull-out poster for you to print and put up in your windows and workspaces.
If you print it back-to-back, you’ll be able to put one side facing out of your office window, while the other side is facing inward so you can be reminded of some actions to being more equitable.
Pull out poster illustrated by Parys Gardener
HOW IS IT FOR YOU?
If you have any questions about this commitment, or require this information in another / more accessible format, or want to share your feedback, please contact our Co-Directors jess@rising.org.uk and euella@rising.org.uk
WANT TO EMBED EQUITY IN YOUR WORK?
Thinking about how you can embed equity in your organisation and / or your work?
During this 4-week training we'll explore how to embed care in every phase of the your work - from access and recruitment to generative conflict and policies made for people.
We'll share the successes (and failures) Rising have had implementing these practical tools, the positive impact it's had on our business and how we've supported companies of all different sizes to embed care.
