EHS brings an equity-rooted focus to its work contextualizing science, improving our health, and making our environment safer and more sustainable for all.

These following guiding principles are simply the foundation of our work to address social and environmental injustice and inequity.

By focusing on equity, we aim to transform the root causes of structural environmental inequity, so we no longer have to remedy its symptoms.

Our values

EHS believes that equity work happens at the intersection of power and opportunity. We work with and within science and journalism to elevate power within communities and create opportunities so that race, gender, and/or ZIP code do not predict your health or environment.

We also believe that equity does not happen by chance, and EHS will act on and invest in efforts that measure, track and close outcome gaps. That requires looking in as well as out, and EHS will spend time and resources to expand more diverse leadership within its board, staff, partners and advisory bodies.

Equity is an intentional, urgent attempt to right historical wrongs through systems-building. Outcome gaps plague our country and region because of practices that harm underrepresented communities. This improved collective wellbeing is a shared right and shared responsibility. We believe that, jointly with science, those whose health is affected by policy should have the driving voices in the creation of those policies.

Our work & commitment

We recognize that structural environmental inequities must be relentlessly exposed, measured and disrupted. We do so using data, history and stories to explain the systems and structures supporting long-standing inequities.

We use science whenever possible, but we also recognize that our goal is to change people’s lives and environments for the better. As we unwind the systems that created historic and ongoing inequities, we use stories and journalism to breathe life into tangible impacts of those inequities – and to highlight paths toward a more equitable future.

We further recognize that we have much work to do within our organization. While we operate from a perspective of urgency, we recognize that these inequities are endemic both within and without our spheres of influence.