Cape Cod Voices is a 501(c)(3) non-profit created by women of color who grew up on Cape Cod. Our organization focuses on keeping black and brown voices at the center of the conversation on race, combating and educating about issues of systemic and institutional racism on Cape Cod, and advocating for students of color in our local schools.
In the wake of national protesting sparked by the murder of George Floyd, the Cape Cod Voices' Leadership Team started attending protests locally here on Cape. Many of these protests featured a majority of white speakers which we felt minimized the voices and experiences of people of color in our community. There seemed to be an emerging theme that there is no racism on Cape Cod. However, we know personally that Cape Cod is not exempt from racism.
After voicing our opinions, we realized we were not the only ones who felt this way. We then decided to have our first listening event titled POC Speak Up. The event consisted of 10 stories and experiences of POC from Cape Cod ranging in age from 16 to 56. Our greatest takeaway from our first event was that every single participant and person we spoke with either told a story or had a story where they had experienced racism in a Cape school. This sparked our desire for long-term change and started our journey towards creating an anti-racist Cape Cod!