Building Community and Brave Spaces as a Foundation for DEI Work

You can lay a foundation for equitable classrooms by focusing on community building, fostering a sense of belonging, and encouraging “brave spaces” – spaces where students feel comfortable enough to share thoughts candidly, but also work at the margins of their comfort zones, where learning occurs.

Examining Instructor Bias

As we implement tools to create community, activate diversity, and encourage brave intellectual discussion, a crucial companion practice is to gain awareness of our own biases and maintain efforts to reduce them.

Becoming an Anti-racist Instructor

Anti-racist teaching frameworks, like critical pedagogy and decolonization models, share a commitment to active, engaged practices to combat racism and other forms of oppression in education.

Supporting and Including International Students

International students report isolation and alienation at the university.

Creating Accessible Classrooms and Courses

Utilizing the range of technologies and spatial affordances to support all learners will result in a more inclusive environment, enhance the diversity of voices and perspectives, and thereby improve learning for all.

Recognizing Identity and Intersectionality in the Classroom

Rather than assuming that a student can be ascribed an identity, consider spending plenty of time getting to know your students, and having them get to know one another through icebreakers, autobiographical collages, and other creative activities.

Creating an LGBTQIA+ Inclusive Environment

LGBTQ students have a higher dropout rate than heterosexual or cisgendered peers. While universities can offer a safe haven for LGBTQ students, they can also be a hostile, indeed unsafe learning environment.

Creativity and Boundary-moving Work

IScholarship of Teaching and Learning (SoTL) continues to offer new frameworks and perspectives on teaching practices, both in specific disciplines and across the educational landscape. This section includes articles and blogs that invite deeper reflection on inclusivity models and schema.

Office for Diversity and Inclusion Resources

The Office for Diversity and Inclusion (ODI) curates a list of books, articles, films, and other media with a global scope, as well as a set of resources for teaching, specifically.