Our journey has been characterised by a word. Alliances.

Our initial goal was to build up relationships between community groups that could and should come together to uplift us all. Beginning as an organisation filling a gap of representation for ethnic minority and migrant folks in the county, the original vision was of a strong network to fight against discrimination and build up our defences against racist attacks which were frequent. SEMA began as the Shropshire Ethnic Minority Alliance in 2017. Much of those original goals we achieved. We are a strong network that combines our talents for collective achievements.

Today we continue with a wider and deeper vision. We are Shropshire Equality Means Action and we still insist that equality means action, means taking action, means doing something!

From a group determined to raise the profile of Black, people of colour, and migrant realities in Shropshire, we gained greater and greater networks with other folks fighting on other frontlines for equality, diversity, inclusion and justice, for LGBTQIA+, Refugee and Asylum Seeker, Neurodivergent, Disability, Poverty, Homelessness, Interfaith, Domestic Violence, Police Reform, Debt Relief, Anti-War and all kinds of issues that determine the life outcomes and hopes of our people, all the world’s people, right here in Shropshire and Telford & Wrekin counties.

SEMA specialises among all this in targeted interventions and advocacy with our team trained in conflict resolution, peacebuilding, trauma, bereavement, child protection and chaplaincy. We are regularly contacted for our mediation and presence alongside individuals and organisations dealing with conflict and/or discrimination. We have worked in schools, universities, emergency services, statutory organisation and councils for support of individuals and groups seeking to transform their environment into one of equality, diversity, inclusion and justice.

All of this work is still built on that one word. Alliances.