教师 Lead Classroom Equity Initiatives Across Campus

布里斯托尔,R.I. ­– 在过去的400年里，高等教育机构一直存在于北美, 他们主要为白人服务.  Even after they started to accept women and people of color – for most that occurred just within the last century – 许多机构的课程、教学实践和师资仍然反映了这段历史.

As university classrooms continue to diversify, students of historically underrepresented racial, 经济, 性别, 性别身份常常被挑出来, 低估了, 受到歧视. 这 造成损害, 不仅仅是学业上的成功, 而且对学生的身心健康也有影响，在一个不是为他们设计的系统中. 

在RWU, 两位教员, 劳拉爱, associate professor of American studies and Kamille Gentles-Peart, associate professor of communication and media studies, are leading an initiative to support faculty in challenging inequitable traditions. 

“在学生就读的四年里，我们是与他们接触最多的人,皮尔先生说. “They sit in our classrooms for four months at a time, 所以，如果我们还没有准备好挑战现有的等级制度，创造安全和勇敢的空间, 在这四年里，学生们要么受到伤害，要么没有被要求挑战自己的世界和信仰.”

D 'Amore和Gentles-Peart与其他决心与课堂上的不平等现象作斗争的教师合作. 他们试图引入教育资源、战略规划和同行讨论. 

In order to achieve this, they secured funding from the 安德鲁·W. 梅隆基金会 去年夏天.  有了这些支持, they spent four days at a conference on Diversity, 礼貌, 以及亚特兰大的文科, 乔治亚州, 以及当时的RWU教务长安德鲁·沃克曼和RWU首席多元化官艾米·兰伯特.

“We discussed everything from use of language, 到个人特权, 教育工作者在课堂上的角色, to the institutional treatment of minoritized populations,皮尔先生说.

Though each day was full of important work and deep reflection, this was just the beginning of what is a multi-level, RWU正在进行的倡议. The next step was to roll out a plan for bringing what they learned to campus.

“我们的团队意识到，一个对公平做出深刻承诺的机构需要做的工作, 包容, 多样性, and social justice happens through its people – primarily the faculty and the staff,”达莫尔说.  "If we were going to be able to do the work meaningfully, 我们将不得不投入大量的时间和资源在教师和专业发展上, 为RWU的人们提供了思考和讨论这些材料的时间和空间."

The first step of this investment was a year-long faculty fellowship, 这是两家公司去年秋天推出的.  

Gentles-Peart, 爱与, 以及另外14名教职员工在2018年秋季多次会面，开始了深入的学习和反思过程, inspired by the work initiated at the institute in Atlanta.

“我们有来自大学里几乎每个学院的教员代表，”Gentles-Peart说. “我们有视觉艺术家、工程师、作家. We have professors in communication and media studies, psychology, anthropology, American studies, education, and historic preservation.”

整个秋季学期都在努力解决如何确保各种背景的学生都能在课堂上茁壮成长的难题. 

“多样性和我的工作研究员们正在做的是找出如何在历史上不公平的空间里创造公平的教室和教学实践,”达莫尔说. While it's built on similar principles the work can look different in every course.

其中一个研究员, 迈克尔富, 艺术教授, is making several deliberate changes to his figure drawing class.

The first is honoring each student’s individual style. 他腾出时间进行一对一的作品集审查，在那里他和学生讨论学生的独特影响和技术.

“他们必须学习如何画画，不管他们是谁，他们的背景是什么，”里奇说. “But they are becoming better drawers in their own language. 其中一部分是重新定义他们必须在绘画中满足一些古典理想的想法. 他们会带来不同的经历、背景和文化.”

Along with embracing diverse drawing styles and student experiences, 里奇正在改变他的课程内容. With drawing's historical focus mainly on white European men looking at women, 里奇利用他的学生绘制人体的机会来讨论代表性和权力动力学. 

“I want to use the body as a vehicle to talk about issues of race, 性别, 性, 和个性, rather than studying the body on just a formal level,里奇说。. 

里奇还试图通过让他的学生接触来自未被充分代表的身份的艺术家，来加深关于代表性的对话. 这不仅对他的学生很重要, but it is also expanding his own education as an artist, 与此同时, he is noticing the gaps in his knowledge where he needs to do more research.

Though the fellows are becoming more deliberate about 包容 in the classroom, 里奇指出，自我教育和自我反思是这项工作最具影响力的方面.

这不仅适用于里奇. 其他研究员肯定，这项工作的大部分是关于教师提高自己的意识，所以 他们可以成为更好的教育者.

“The way I look at it is that inclusive teaching is better teaching. 它更投入，更了解学生，他们的背景和挑战，”里奇说. “It’s making me a whole lot more aware of institutional and structural challenges, and particularly how they affect minoritized students.”

玛格丽特的情况, chair of the Department of English Literature and Creative Writing, agrees that much of her work as a fellow involves self-reflection. 在和其他人开会的时候, 她面对自己的挑战，并通过阅读和对话获得洞察力.

“它改变了我对课堂动态的看法，让我在教学过程中始终把多样性问题放在首位,凯斯说.

Case has always made a deliberate effort to teach a diverse range of literature, 然而，参与该团契已经巩固了对这一努力有意识的需要.

“I think the power of literature is absolutely huge, 不仅仅是为了弄清楚网赌的十大网站, but in figuring out how the world should be structured,”她说。.

Though the fellows are working hard to create change in their classrooms, 这个项目不会就此结束. 今年夏天, 这些研究员将为该校另外25名教员教授这门课程. 明年, a second cohort of eight fellows will teach 25 more faculty, 这是两年多的时间, this intensive development will be offered to as many as 75 faculty members. 

“以这种方式对教师的投资表明了我们对大学成功的重要性,”达莫尔说. 这75名教员将能够与同行分享信息和策略, 并成为这项工作的领导者. 我对未来感到乐观和兴奋.”