Workshop Equity Budgeting Payment Policy

We have shifted the way we pay instructors for this series and how we charge participants. This shift was influenced by Sarah Dziedzic and Jess Lamar Reece Holler's work on equity budgeting for oral historians, and building on the broader legacy of oral history economic justice organizing & praxis developed by the Marion Voices Folklife + Oral History Program, the Oral History Undercommons working group, Danielle Dulken, the OHA’s Independent Practitioner Task Force, and informal and candid conversations initiated by students and graduates of the OHMA program -- all inspired by decades of BIPOC-led movement work advocating for fair pay for labor.

 In the past we paid $500/workshop, as an honorarium. We are now asking instructors to self identify as either a full-time salaried employee who should receive an honorarium or a freelancer who should be paid a fee for service, and we are offering each freelance instructor $1200. This reflects the fact that freelancers have additional expenses (health insurance, equipment, office space, self-employment taxes) to do the same work as salaried employees. 

We are also committed to making these workshops as broadly accessible as possible, so we are offering an option of free registration for those who could not otherwise attend, with a sliding scale suggested donation of $20-$100 per workshop. We encourage you to pay what you can to support fair pay for our instructors as well as free registration for those who need it. 

In the past we have used these workshops to raise money for financial aid for OHMA students. In order to pay instructors fairly, we have committed to finding other ways to raise these funds. Any money we make from this series beyond that required to pay instructors will be used to continue to build and deepen this work through, for example, paying for interpretation for workshops.