Designing in Class Activities to Promote Equity and Inclusion

According to Musu-Gillette (2017) college enrollment of traditional aged college students has increased in the past twenty years with significant increases in the number of African-American and Hispanic males and Hispanic females. These enrollment trends illustrate changing demographics typically found in higher education classrooms. In these changing demographics, every student’s experience should be equally validated in the higher educational setting. Unfortunately, higher educational institutions represent the broader societal inequities that are often instantiated in the processes of the institution. Faculty across disciplines want to provide equitable and inclusive classrooms to support all students, but they are overwhelmed by the content they must cover and have no time to address equity and inclusion in their teaching. Equity and inclusion need not be seen as extra work but as important objectives that guide curriculum development. This book provides strategies to create a more purposeful, intentional curriculum that addresses equity and inclusion across disciplines without compromising content. We bring together practical lesson plans and instructional options that faculty can use and adapt to deliver content in a way that is mindful of inclusion and equity. In this book, we hope to further extend the practical application of social justice principles by describing concrete strategies across disciplines that help instructors develop and deliver course content to effectively implement equity and inclusion.