The Academy has doubled the number of non-white members well ahead of schedule, and its goal of doubling female members is now within reach
With its fourth consecutive year of sending invitations to several hundred prospective members, the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences is on track to meet or surpass the diversity goals it set for itself three years ago at the height of the #OscarsSoWhite movement.
It has already met its goal of doubling the number of non-white members by 2020, and it is now within striking distance of doubling the number of female members.
Both of those goals were announced in early 2016, when the second straight year of all-white acting nominations led to an outcry and caused the Academy to take steps to diversify its membership. It also announced specific goals to change the makeup of an organization that had long been predominantly white and male.
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At that point in early 2016, the Academy’s own figures showed that the organization, which at that point consisted of 6,436 active members, was 92 percent white and 75 percent male. To meet its goal of doubling minority and female members, then, it needed to add about 515 non-white members and a little more than 1,600 female…
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Steve Pond
Awards editor and columnist for TheWrap. Been writing about entertainment and popular culture for more than 30 years for such publications as the Los Angeles Times, Rolling Stone, the New York Times and the Washington Post. Rock 'n' roll writer back in the day.