VITALIA Active Adult Community® – North Olmsted Shows Their Colors During Pride Month

In celebration of Pride Month this June, Arrow Senior Living is looking at The Pride Flag, a symbol that is a representation of the forward movements to support and celebrate those in the LGBTQIA+ community. This important piece of the community has a meaning that is described by the colors included.

Red represents life and passion among many cultures. Orange represents healing, fun, and celebration. Yellow is a symbol for sunlight and is said to stimulate new ideas and thoughts. Green is synonymous with nature, a healing place, also associated with prosperity and growth. Blue represents serenity and calmness. Purple is the color of spirit, thought to connect us to the spiritual realm.

At VITALIA Active Adult Community® – North Olmsted North Olmsted, OH, we feel most connected to the color red. In our community, we appreciate a life filled with passion. We strive to make sure that our residents discover and enjoy their passions each day. Red represents life and passion among many cultures. We find ourselves saying yes to trying new trips and events and to learning new things daily.

As a Resident Services Director, I love feedback from my residents. It is extremely important to me to collaborate with them when planning events and outings. To create a safe space to live for residents through programming, we have monthly event planning where they work with me to plan the next month’s events and trips. We also have monthly town hall meetings where residents can feel safe in sharing any thoughts they have with the whole team. In addition to our monthly town halls and event planning, I am always available to residents to share any comments or ideas they may have in a one-on-one setting. I am also a big advocate of getting staff involved. I try to make it fun for everyone with different themed days throughout each month, where staff and residents can get involved together.

In our community, we know that each of our residents have come from different lifestyles and backgrounds. As such, we work to maintain that diverse culture across both residents and staff with targeted programming and staff education efforts. Arrow Senior Living has launched a resident-led Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (DEI) speaker series for employee and resident education. Residents interview speakers who represent some of the relevant topics of the day related to diversity, equity, and inclusion ranging from non-binary people and use of pronouns to Juneteenth history. Through our tradition’s council, which coordinates core resident and employee cultural celebrations and education, we work actively to celebrate diversity within our community. This has created a means for residents and employees to join in recognition of each other. The road ahead is to ensure that diversity and inclusion is not just an initiative. Moving forward requires necessary conversations to address discomfort and to open dialogue on important perspectives. This helps to ensure that we are providing not only an enjoyable place to retire, but one where seniors can feel enriched, safe, and excited about life!