The Society for Intercultural Education, Training and Research (SIETAR) BC chapter seeks to advance cultural competency and racial literacy. The former refers to the skills that promote positive and inclusive cross-cultural relationships, and the latter refers to the capacity to see, understand, and respond to racism and build racial equity.

 

To achieve its mission, SIETAR offers programs, workshops, and events to provide individuals and organizations an opportunity to: 

• Build effective intercultural relations.

• Develop awareness of racism and ways to respond to it.

• Understand how culture affects education, policy-making and business

• Connect with SIETAR members and global Intercultural Professionals.
 

Given our goal to increase mutually supportive interaction, we are guided by
four core values: 

1. Empathy – seeking to build an environment where our capacity to understand or feel what another person is experiencing, from within this person’s frame of reference, can occur freely. 

2. Openness – operating in an honest way of communicating and behaving with respect and compassion, in which we do not hide anything; a way of being that allows us to be fully present.

3. Courage – within ourselves and a commitment to empower each other in dealing with difficult situations with empathy and openness.

4. Acceptance – working to build a process of receiving another person as they are and a gateway to appreciation of what the other person brings.