The Kapor Foundation in Oakland, California, has announced the launch of an initiative focused on increasing participation of and protection for communities of color in the technology sector.

Part of the Kapor Center for Social Impact, which includes the Kapor Foundation, SMASH, and Kapor Capital, the Equitable Technology Policy Initiative calls for expanded access to tech education and careers, increased accountability and worker protections, and greater investment in entrepreneurs, investors, and fund managers of color. To that end, the program will support a broad range of policy efforts to close racial equity gaps in K-12 computer science education, invest in inclusive workforce development, expand workforce data collection oversight, support gig workers and unions to ensure equitable labor practices, hold technology platforms accountable for the harmful consequences of their content, mitigate the effects of artificial intelligence, close the digital divide through universal high-speed broadband access, increase investment in support of diversity in tech innovation, and advocate for tax policies that reinvest tech wealth in communities of color historically excluded from the tech sector.

In the past year, the Kapor Center has awarded $5.3 million in equitable technology-related grants to the Algorithmic Justice League, Color of Change, the Consumer Reports Digital Lab, the Day 1 Project, the Disinfo Defense League, the Disinfo Federation, Equis, the Institute for Economic and Racial Equity (Brandeis University), the Center on Race and Digital Justice, New Media Ventures, NorCal Grantmakers, the Tech Equity Collaborative, the Tech Transparency Project, and the Distributed AI Research Institute. In September, Kapor Capital, a social impact venture capital firm founded by Mitch Kapor and Freada Kapor Klein, launched a $126 million investment fund focused on tech startups in low-income communities and communities of color.

“To build a more equitable tech economy, we must increase action on tech policy with a racial justice lens,” said Kapor Center chief technology community officer Lili Gangas. “Despite recent efforts, ongoing disparities exist for communities of color in entering and succeeding in the tech industry and in the negative impacts of automation, mis/disinformation, and algorithmic bias.”

(Photo credit: Getty Images/Jeff Bergen)