A Barn For Life

As equestrian programs seek to broaden their appeal and public access to horses, how can they meet new participants and develop positive cultures that welcome newcomers from all backgrounds? We asked several experts including some from USEF Community Outreach Organizations, about their experiences and advice for creating diverse and inclusive barn communities.

By Glenye Cain Oakford

Entering a barn to sign up for a riding lesson can be daunting for anyone who is just beginning to explore equestrian sport and the community around horses. That sense of vulnerability is often greater for newcomers who don’t see anyone like them or from their own community in local equestrian facilities, competitions, or sport coverage. The feeling of not belonging can be enough to discourage some people from pursuing their interest in horses.

That could have happened to Mtima Richardson. Richardson, who is Black, is the senior nutrition programs support coordinator at FOOD for Lane County in Eugene, Ore., and chair of the City of Eugene Sustainability Commission. She first took up riding at a facility where she was the only Black rider, which left her feeling isolated and vulnerable.

“Oregon is a predominantly white state,” she said. According to the U.S. Census Bureau and the data resource BlackDemographics.com, Oregon’s Black and Black interracial population combined is about 3%. “So when you’re Black and living in Oregon, most of the spaces that you walk into, you’re a minority or the only person of color. That can feel a little bit intimidating, and you can feel kind of alienated. At least in my own experience, that hindered me from exploring different outdoor hobbies I might be interested in, because they felt like they weren’t a place for me or just felt scary.

“At this other barn, nothing bad ever happened there, but I was just feeling alienated and not understood,” she said of her initial lesson experience. “I just felt like everyone was looking at me, and I felt super-insecure and super-vulnerable there.”

That sense of “otherness” and vulnerability can prevent curious horse-lovers, and even active equestrians, from staying in horse sports. That’s a scenario that Ebony Horsewomen founder, president, and chief executive officer Patricia Kelly has seen play out many times in equestrian programs and at competitions.

“How many times have African Americans, Latino people, darker-skinned people, gone to facilities and they are assumed to be workers?” she said. “They’re immediately downgraded before people understand why they’re there, what their skill level is, and so on.”

In other cases, Kelly added, equestrians who are perceived as different, unfamiliar, or “unlikely to fit in” for whatever reason can be more aggressively discouraged or prevented from participating. “I know of a very tall, dark-skinned young man, an English rider who is just poetic in the saddle,” Kelly said. “When he tried out for the team at his university, it was like, ‘Oh, he can’t ride. He certainly can’t. He’s too big. He’s too whatever.’

“We have a lot of talented young people out there who are getting stopped at these invisible walls when they don’t fit the image.”

Every time this barrier to entry diverts a potential equestrian away from the sport, that person loses the chance to experience a positive, possibly life-changing relationship with horses and to grow a lifelong hobby or career — and the equestrian world loses one more supporter, community member, and potential horse owner or competitor.

That’s a lose-lose scenario that doesn’t have to happen, say equestrian program managers and representatives from several USEF Community Outreach Organizations. These groups specialize in developing positive barn cultures that encourage people from a broad range of experiences and backgrounds to thrive alongside each other and with horses. The work they do and the lessons they’ve learned along the way can apply to growing a positive culture in any barn, and they say the work of promoting inclusion and a supportive community can be transformative for everyone involved.

In Richardson’s case, switching to a different program with strong outreach and engagement in the Eugene area’s Black and other communities made the difference. Today, she not only takes riding lessons, but also helps the program — Solid Strides, a USEF Community Outreach Organization — with their community outreach efforts.

“When I’m doing community outreach, I’m trying to let people know that, yes, this is a place and a hobby that you can pursue, and people like you are going to be there,” Richardson said.

What is Cultural Competence?

Equine programs that are planning to expand their outreach programs or who are looking for ways to foster positivity and inclusion can start by learning about cultural competence, which is the ability to interact effectively and appropriately with people from different cultures and worldviews, starting with an awareness of and appreciation for cultural differences.

A team of mental-health researchers coined the term “cultural competence” in 1989 as part of a paper that discussed how medical professionals’ lack of cultural understanding could contribute to inequitable care services for children. Many therapists regard cultural competence as a critical part of serving clients. Ebony Horsewomen’s EHI Equestrian and Therapeutic Center, which provides culturally competent equine-assisted psychotherapy, also offers a training and certification program in that approach for mental health professionals and equine specialists.

The National Center for Cultural Competence at Georgetown University’s Center for Child and Human Development refers to the following five essential components of cultural competence that can provide a framework for any individual or organization to start with:

• Valuing diversity
• Having the capacity for cultural self-assessment
• Being conscious of the dynamics inherent when cultures interact
• Having institutionalized culture knowledge
• Adapting service delivery to reflect an understanding of cultural diversity

“To be open and inclusive, I think we have to literally feel in our bodies what it means to be open and inclusive,” said

Lynne Phipps, founder of Beachwood Center for Wellbeing in Charlestown, R.I. “When I’m meeting somebody new, is my first thought going to be to let them in? Or is my first thought, ‘Do I want to let them in?’ One is from an inclusive place, and the other is from a defensive place. If we’re inviting people in, we have to be clear that we are inviting people in.

“Most of us are not aware of our blind spots, culturally or personally. Our own personal experiences create us, and that means we are just not always aware of others’ experiences. Out of that lack of awareness, we can hurt each other, completely unintentionally. The more consciously we choose what we say or do, the more self-compassion we have and the more compassion we can feel for another, the more aware we get of how somebody might hear something.”

According to Kelly, cultural competency isn’t just "White people need to understand Black people."

“It’s Black people understanding other Blacks in other cultures, as well as Hispanic culture, and vice versa," she said. "We have intergenerational biases, too. There’s a lot of understanding that needs to happen.”

For therapeutic programs like Beachwood and Ebony Horsewomen, horses are integral to the processes of self-awareness and building trust — not just between horse and human, but human-to-human, as well.

“I think working with horses is one of the best ways to see, understand, and appreciate how important it is to be intentional, careful, and conscious of everything,” Phipps said.

The traits that horses encourage people to develop — being intentional, careful, self-aware, and conscious in their actions — are a good place to start if you are considering widening your program’s outreach into new and culturally different communities. There are other things to consider, however, from learning about one’s own cultural biases and how they might affect relationships with others from different backgrounds, to the nuts-and-bolts practicalities of meeting members of different communities, increasing accessibility to lessons, and stopping cliquishness or gossip in the barn before it starts.

Set Clear Priorities

Whether you’re establishing a new equestrian program or tweaking the focus of an existing one, start by nailing down your priorities, advises Kate Sharkey, trainer and head coach at Sharkey Farm near Snoqualmie, Wash.

“Determine what is important to you, and stay true to that,” Sharkey said. “If what’s important to me is to have the team that wins at Nationals, then I need to do everything in my power to make that happen. If what’s important to me is creating the next generation of horse people who have a passion for this animal, this culture, and this environment, then I do everything in my power to create that.

“It doesn’t have to be an ‘either/or.’ It can be an ‘and,' but you have to have a priority list. If the number-one priority is culture, then you might have to accept letting go of a kid who would help you win Nationals. If the number-one priority is winning, then you might have to accept a kid who doesn’t fit the barn culture you’d like to create.”

Setting clear priorities has helped Sharkey be open and transparent about what her program is and is not when she speaks to potential team members and clients.

“When a new client is thinking about coming to our barn, I interview them, just as they would interview me before joining

our community,” she said. “I talk to parents about the culture we have, that it’s a group of kids who love horses and want to support each other, and that our primary goal is not showing—it’s learning about and loving horses. Those who are looking for competitive sports rather than a community first find a place that fits their priority better.”

That clear communication early in the process helps prevent misunderstandings and problems that might otherwise fester in a barn, Sharkey said. That communication also can include other cues, as Sharkey learned when a parent spotted a Pride flag in her barn. “It’s just a small one above our lesson-horse assignment board,” Sharkey explained, “I didn’t realize it made a big difference until the parent of a transgender child came up and said that that made a huge difference to their child.”

Phipps said, “We can set up the dynamic of ‘We’re here. We’d love to have you. This is who we are.' I like to say clarity is kindness. The clearer we are about who we are and what we offer, the more likely we’re going to have people that it resonates with show up and join us. People it doesn’t resonate with or who don’t like the way we do things won’t stay.”

Let Go of Assumptions

“Inclusion starts with perception,” Kelly said. “As a facility of color, it’s not in our makeup to assume anything about anyone. They’re welcomed, and there’s no assumption that you are anything other than what you say you are, that you are here for a service that you thought would be good for you and so you sought it. When people of color go to other facilities, they’re often assumed to be lost or looking for work.”

Kelly notes that when a facility makes assumptions based on the color or relative darkness of a person’s skin, how they speak and dress, the kind of hair they have — all completely unrelated to an interest in or skill level with horses — they’re creating a negative experience from the start. “If these facilities can get rid of that, then inclusion and equity can happen. And then diversity will follow,” she said.

Kelly notes that damaging assumptions can include labeling others as “at risk,” “underprivileged,” or “underserved.”

“I began to hear terms like this when we’d take our kids to horse shows, and these terms really bothered the children and their parents,” Kelly said. “So I began to gently teach relabeling. All children are at risk, because they have no control over their personage. They can be sexually abused or emotionally abused. When some people look at a Black child, they’ll automatically assume it’s just the mother in the family. Well, a lot of these kids have fathers, so we had to gently retrain the thought processes that come from that.

“If kids are left alone to develop their own thought process, a lot of this labeling goes away,” she added. “It’s when society and parents get involved and start labeling that it gets murky. Leave kids alone and they’ll find out they all hate school, their parents are driving them crazy, they have the same angst.”

Prioritize Personal Goals

The staff at Beachwood often work with children and adults with anxiety or trauma, therefore reducing performance pressure is key to lowering participants’ fear, which helps both the humans and the horses, Phipps said. “We try to teach people that we’re not about pushing through the hard things,” she said. “We don’t do loud voices or yelling. There’s no ‘Try harder!’ or ‘Do it anyway!’ Horses pick up on that anxiety as much as people do, and when you get everybody anxious, worried and scared, that’s when you get bad behavior. That’s when you get backbiting and gossiping or people trying to figure out how to one-up someone or who is the weak link. That kind of behavior comes from that fight-or-flight instinct.”

Instead, Phipps said, “It’s about setting clear goals but also letting the person themselves set the goals. It’s the trainer and the student choosing the goal together, which is a place of safety rather than a place of, ‘She’s not going to like me if I don’t want to do that or can’t achieve that.’”

For Sharkey, a former schoolteacher, it’s also important to give students a safe place to fail. “That’s something I did in public school teaching, too: allow risk-taking,” she said. “For kids to try hard things, struggle at hard things, and either succeed or have the knowledge that they tried is often more powerful than how they did. They understand when things go

wrong that it’s OK to make mistakes — it’s just part of the process. If another kid is having a hard day for whatever reason, maybe their horse who is normally soft in the bridle is a little bit stiff, none of the others are going to make fun of that struggling child. They’re going to have empathy.

“Katie Schaaf, the Iinterscholastic Equestrian Association president, was here doing a clinic, and she said to one of the kids that the goal is not perfection; your goal is excellence," Sharkey continued. "That was super-powerful, especially for my perfectionist kids to hear, because they’re always striving for perfection. Instead, they just need to be excellent. You could just see the light come on in some of those kids, that they’re pursuing excellence, not perfection, and it can be excellence in horsemanship, in being a good friend, in being a sportsman and rider.”

Lead by Example

All of our experts agreed that it’s important to live by the positive, inclusive code they establish for the barn. That means no gossip, no negativity, no classism, and no favoritism. “If you see that, you’ve got to jump in immediately and squash it,” Kelly said.

“My policy has always been that we’re a team,” said Katie Ebbage, executive director of Solid Strides. “We’re all in this together, and we’re all on a learning journey. Nobody is superior to anyone else. I have had instances where folks have tried to create a status hierarchy in the program, and when I see that, I immediately address it and remind them why we’re here.

“We’re here because we love horses. We’re here because we want to be in nature and with these animals and in a community of like-minded folks. If you set that tone, if you manage yourself in an organization like that, people match that energy.”

“Modeling is the very best way to set up healthy communities,” Phipps agreed. “If the leader of the community is clear about what expectations are and that the goals are driven by the individuals, not by competition between individuals, then we can keep the focus on our primary purpose, which is the wellbeing of all, including the horses.”

Focus on the Horses

Making clear that the focus is on the horses and their needs can help shift a barn community’s perspective away from interpersonal competition and toward a shared goal of caring, Phipps said. “If we’re focused on everybody around us and whether we’re competing successfully with them, we’re not really listening to ourselves or our horse,” she continued. “When we learn to really listen to our horse, it’s a very different kind of listening than competing or trying to fit in, but it’s very similar to learning how to listen to ourselves. It also helps build genuine connections between people. People start to pay attention on a deeper level to each other, and through caring for the horses we have a common focus instead of a competitive focus.”

Develop Partnerships — and Listen

Finding new participants, especially in communities that are not already connected to a program, is about more than posting flyers or buying ads. Building relationships with trusted community organizations can lead to fruitful collaborations, including potential advisory board or staff members, and also can provide valuable insights, Ebbage said.

“Our program is in a majority-white community, and so while we’re not only focused on reaching out to BIPOC [Black, Indigenous, and people of color] folks, that’s the demographic we don’t see in our horse community here,” she said.

To expand its reach, Solid Strides started by partnering with local organizations to host low-cost summer camps for a limited number of kids. They’ve also promoted their programs directly to a variety of communities. “We’re introducing ourselves to a broader demographic that doesn’t know us, and I hear stories all the time about people from different demographics going into barns and having negative experiences,” Ebbage said. “So having partnerships with another local, culturally specific organization has allowed us to borrow some trust from those organizations and helped get us established more quickly than if we’d just been knocking on doors. We also attend some culturally specific events, like the local Pride and Hispanic Heritage events and the Black Cultural Festival in town, just trying to make people more aware of our existence. Through partnering with other organizations, we’ve gotten referrals and invitations from other places. We’ve worked to develop those relationships.”

Part of that work is listening and learning about other cultures’ history, mores, challenges, and concerns, then taking that context and knowledge into account.

Seek (and Hire) Diversity

“It’s important to have people on the board and on the programming side who represent the population you’re working to serve,” said Ebbage, who also suggested hiring service-providers and vendors from diverse communities, too. These practices introduce more people to equestrian sport and create career pathways in the industry. They also

foster deeper connections with the broader community and provide crucial perspectives that can help a barn improve operations or spot new opportunities.

Ebbage noted that one Solid Strides board member, an equestrian whose family struggled to financially support her riding, now is the Executive Director of a nonprofit that works with low-income people on housing issues. She was instrumental, Ebbage said, in creating Solid Strides’ low-cost summer camp program.

“If there are people on staff that are diverse, then there is an opportunity for a different set of perceptions and assumptions,” Kelly said.

“As a white person running a diversity-based organization, I’m very aware of not presenting a ‘white savior’ mentality,” Ebbage noted. “It’s important that we’re living our values. I try to be conscious that it’s not the responsibility of people of color to educate us. I’ve been blessed to be around some folks who do use their energy and time to point out if I, or we as an organization, have done something that’s out of step with who we’re trying to be. We have people on our board and in our behind-the-scenes programming so that when we’re building a website or putting messages out, they’re putting eyeballs on it.”

Increase Access

Cost has long been a barrier to entry for horse sports, but Community Outreach Organizations have found ways to reduce the expense for participants; one of the Community Outreach Organization program’s requirements for applicants is that they must offer services for free or on a sliding scale based on need.

Solid Strides’ first summer camps were sponsored with state-legislated summer programming funds for kids. Others were funded by a program participant’s generous donation. Through donations and grants, equestrian programs can offer scholarships, free or low-cost lessons or camps, and equipment or apparel. Students and parents often are also happy to contribute to equestrian programs in other ways, through working off lessons or volunteering regularly. “Every bit of that helps,” said Ebbage.

Sharkey Farms has found another model to increase access: operating as a co-op. “Our board is about half of what full-care board runs in the area,” Sharkey said. “So financially it’s more accessible to more kids. There’s no option for paying more and having to do less. That attracts families who want kids to work and who want kids to be a bigger participant in the horsemanship side of things. It attracts kids who are happy spending two or three hours out of the tack caring for horses, and it builds community. When we go to shows, I don’t pack the trailer or set up stalls; it’s a group of 10- to 18-year-olds using my packing list, going through it together, and deciding what to take, how to get everyone’s trunks in the trailer, what order horses should load. I teach them, and then they teach each other.”

Encourage Camaraderie

There are other opportunities to naturally foster camaraderie at home, too. Solid Strides has brought in outside educators to teach students about things like equine biomechanics, where students can be “co-learners” in an educational, non-competitive setting. Allowing lesson students to watch other lessons, and not segregating barn time by riding level, also can encourage learning and mixing. Trying new things on horseback as a group can also build community, as can barn clean-up or fundraising days or more social celebrations, like a barn-wide lesson-horse appreciation day.

Rewards Are Mutual

Developing a positive, inclusive community isn’t always easy, these experts acknowledged. However, they agreed that the effort is worth it, both for their programs and for individual participants.

“In the end, I think we’re developing thoughtful, kind, hardworking kids who know how to follow a passion through and turn that into something positive,” said Sharkey. “It’s not a bad business model. It can be emotionally hard to stick to your morals and vision. As a business owner, it’s hard to give up a paycheck and lose a client or ask a client to leave. It’s really challenging, if you’re not wealthy, to figure out how to become inclusive while trying to put food on your plate. What I found is that by staying true to this culture, I have been rewarded with more and better-fitting clients.”

“Horses give kids a fuller life experience,” Kelly continued. “I want my kids to have the same resources, experiences, and opportunities that other children have.”

For Richardson, the rider who found her equestrian home at Solid Strides, the opportunity has been life-changing and empowering. “That’s what I think has changed the most about me,” she explained. “I can be kind of timid and shy, but now even at work I feel like I speak up more. I’m giving my opinion and thoughts. You’re not trying to shy away from your own brilliance, in a way. Because once you’ve been on such a powerful animal, it’s hard to not have confidence.”

Photos: Courtesy of Sharkey Farm and Shelley Paulson Photography