Deepen your understanding of DEI issues and further your cultural competency with the following resources.

Courses, Podcasts, and Videos

• APTA Learning Center: DEI Courses
  More than a dozen courses cover foundational concepts, guidance for clinicians, understanding culture, allyship, and more. A highlight is APTA’s six-part DEI Certificate Series, which introduces learners to bias, microaggressions, population health, the Americans with Disabilities Act, treating a gender-diverse population, and improving diversity in the physical therapy profession. Participants will engage in self-reflection throughout the series to apply concepts to their clinical and personal lives with the goal of creating more inclusive and diverse environments.
• Five Short Videos: Implicit Bias and Cultural Competence in Health Care
  Learn about implicit bias and cultural competence in health care, and get recommendations for mindfulness, empathy, and self-reflection.
• APTA Video: DEI Discussions: Race and Racism
  APTA's first in a series of discussions about diversity, equity, and inclusion. This discussion focuses on race and racism in physical therapy. 
• CNN/"Sesame Street" Video: Racism Town Hall
  CNN’s Van Jones and Erica Hill partner with “Sesame Street” for Coming Together: Standing Up to Racism, a town hall for kids and families.

APTA Podcasts

• Fostering Allyship in DEI - Part 1
• Fostering Allyship in DEI: Part 2

Videos: Lynda D. Woodruff Lectures

• 2020: Who Do We Want to Be? Responsible Stewardship of Our Profession
• 2021: The Road to Success: Are We Ready to Change Directions?
• 2022: The Profession's DEI 'Disability' Must Be Addressed
• 2023: Without Us, We Are Not Complete: Proffering Pragmatic Solutions to Combating the Costs to Society of the Lack of Diversity and Representation in the Profession of Physical Therapy

Videos on Microaggression

If you're not used to experiencing microaggressions, it can be hard to understand what they are and why they're so harmful. In this session, the participants discuss their own experiences with microaggressions to help demystify them once and for all.

• Real Talk About Race: This Is How Microaggressions Show Up in the Workplace
  If you're not used to experiencing microaggressions, it can be hard to understand what they are and why they're so harmful.
• Real Talk About Race: Workplace Microaggressions: What Do They Look Like and How Do You Respond?
  This topic is so big that we had to come back for Part II.
• TED Talks to help you understand racism in America
  From passionate pleas for reform to poetic turns of phrase, these talks take an honest look at everyday realities of Black Americans and illuminate the way forward.
• Climate Scan Tools
  Use these climate scanning tools to help assess the DEI culture of your individual spaces and identify areas of improvement.
• Take a Test to Understand Your Implicit Bias
  Project Implicit is a 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization and international collaborative of researchers who are interested in implicit social cognition. Leverage their tests to find out your social and health-related implicit biases.

Apply your knowledge and passion. Here are ways to get involved and make a difference in your communities.

Opportunities Within APTA

• Set up an APTA Engage profile to get notified of volunteer opportunities.
• Join a chapter or section/academy DEI committee.
• Join APTA's Advocacy Network to stay up to date on advocacy opportunities.
• Seek volunteer community engagement opportunities at the APTA Combined Sections Meeting and other APTA events.
• Donate to make a difference:
  • PT Fund.
  • Foundation for Physical Therapy Research.
  • Physical Therapy Political Action Committee of APTA.
• APTA Academy of Leadership and Innovation PT Proud CommitteePT Proud’s mission is to improve health care access for LGBTQIA+ patients as well as empower LGBTQIA+ students, faculty, and clinicians within the physical therapy profession to influence health and well-being that is specific to sexual and gender minority populations. 

Opportunities Beyond APTA

Explore engagement with these groups that were identified by the APTA Student DEI Project Committee:

• Academy of Filipino American Physical Therapists
  The academy's mission is to promote unity, professionalism, and the advancement of Filipino American physical therapists through an academy of supportive fellowship, via the pursuit of clinical evidence, education, and career opportunities.
• The American Academy of Physical Therapy
  A not-for-profit organization whose mission is to provide relief to poor and disadvantaged African Americans and other minorities by promoting new and innovative programs in health promotion, health delivery systems and disease prevention, encouraging minority students to pursue careers in allied health professions, and performing clinical research directly related to health conditions found within minority communities.
• Cynergy PT (One Step Ahead Foundation)
  The Foundation provides Black and Indigenous people of color student-athletes and students pursuing careers in physical therapy a mentorship program that focuses on health and wellness, athletic development, academic and career mentorship, acquisition of college grants and scholarships, and community building.
• Live & Grow Mentorship
  Mentorship for pre-physical therapy students applying to DPT programs, pre-physical therapy students starting directly after undergraduate graduation, students in a gap year, and career changers.
• National Association of Black Physical Therapists, Inc. ("Each One, Teach One" Mentorship Program)
  NABPT is a nonprofit organization with the primary focus of increasing opportunities for the African diaspora in physical therapy. The mentorship program involves fostering communication and a professional relationship between current physical therapists and physical therapist assistants with current PT and PTA students.
• Ujima Institute
  The Ujima Institute was founded by Lisa VanHoose, PT, PhD, MPH. As a physical therapist and researcher, she believes that individual and societal wellness ​requires village-like efforts. The Institute offers training to help people live an inclusive life or create an inclusive workplace.