Infusing
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Faculty & Teachers, Start Your Inclusive Year With a High Five!
During the first days of class – even the first moments – what you do can make all the difference to students – and to the success of everyone’s experience in your class. You feel their energy, they perceive their first impressions of their new teacher, and those responses – favorable or not – can set the tone for the new academic year. So, start your academic year off enthusiastically inclusive! “Through my education, I didn’t just develop skills, I didn’t just develop the ability to learn, but I developed confidence.” -Michelle Obama Put Out The Welcome Mat For Every Student For an effective learning environment, people have…
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As a White Person, How Do You Reconcile Teaching About Racial Justice?
What We Think We Are, We Oftentimes Are Not… Yeah, I get it. Years ago, I believed that the worst thing that could happen to me was to be labeled a racist by a person of color. But guess what? It happened. Me! The person who I thought was committed to making a difference in my life and others by teaching about diversity. My illusion was shattered by an early experience where I had been asked to try out my capacity as a leader for a new position. Two people of color confronted me regarding some of my behaviors they felt were racist. Me? No way! I disagreed – but…
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When TMI Happens at a Training on Diversity, Equity & Inclusion
It happens sometimes. Your organization is committed to inclusion. Training sessions offer participants the opportunity to reflect, discuss and comment on exclusion and discrimination within the organization. And the dialogue is meaningful. Equity & Inclusion Trainings Can Be Intense But shortly after an intense sharing discussion, a participant expresses concern that they’ve shared a little too much. As a result, they may feel awkward, uncomfortable, nervous or even scared. Thinking that’s a problem? It doesn’t have to be. That negative feeling can serve as the basis for positive sharing. Openly admitting to feeling vulnerable oftentimes encourages others to admit to the same feeling – and authentic dialogue emerges. Establishing Authentic…
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Train the Trainer: Continuing Education is Key
As a facilitator, your role is very different from that of a teacher or educator. How so? Instead of providing information or giving your opinion, you’ll focus on asking lots of questions that help members of the group learn and deepen understanding from sharing their reflections, feelings and experiences. You may: Relate to what someone has shared Offer a bit about yourself to make a connection Encourage interaction and productive dialogue in the group Most importantly, the emphasis is on group members interacting with their peers. Specifically, you’ll: Bring as many different voices into the dialogue as possible Help share the air time equitably Encourage others to join in the…
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Teach More Effectively by Infusing Equity and Inclusion
In my last post, I briefly discussed strategies that facilitators can use to make their courses and training more effective by infusing equity and inclusion. Here, I’ll cover how you can design activities so participants can interact with and learn from the widest variety of people. Broaden Perspectives to Infuse Diversity and Inclusion Encouraging/requiring participants to interact with people different from themselves provides the opportunity to broaden their perspectives as well as increase their comfort working across differences. Here’s what I commonly observe: when facilitators let participants form their own discussion groups without any direction, most people seem to choose to work with those they already know and with whom…
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Could you be the missing link in infusing equity and inclusion into ALL activities?
Lately, I’ve been talking a lot about equity and tools that facilitators can use to make their courses and trainings more effective by paying more attention to the diversity and group memberships of participants and facilitating greater interaction among them. In my last post, I explained how you can successfully invite verbal participation from a full range of participants across group memberships. Here, my goal is to expand on that a bit by helping you to acknowledge and engage the input and contributions across the range of group memberships. Why? I’ve been in too many sessions where the facilitator seemed far more enthusiastic about some people’s comments than others. Upon…
