Diversity in the Curriculum

This is a post originally written in September 2021…

Recently, we started our professional learning as a High School faculty for the 2021 school year by dividing ourselves into three groups to act as PLTs (Professional Learning Teams). Each PLT will focus on a different, pre-determined area of learning, either “differentiation,” “diversity,” or “impact.” The differentiation group will look into best practices for meeting the needs of individual learners, the diversity group at the curricular areas of focus and resources we use in the High School, and the impact group will examine the opportunities we’re providing students to “impact their local and global communities” as called for by our Strategic Plan. Due to the potential discomfort in tackling issues related to diversity, equity, and inclusion, I am acting as the facilitator for the diversity group.

So, where to start? We began with the decision that we would focus our efforts as a PLT this year on evaluating and, if needed, supplementing the Lincoln curriculum to ensure the inclusion of diverse perspectives, content, and conversations in our written curriculum and instructional practice. There is plenty of work to be done under the umbrella of social justice, and certainly more is being done in other areas by different groups. Other groups are looking at school-wide policies, for example, to increase diversity among our student and faculty populations and senior leadership is working to craft a school-wide diversity policy. Examining diversity within our curriculum, though, is important work for this particular group that will have a direct impact on students’ social-emotional wellbeing and opportunities for academic achievement. To get the conversation rolling, we planned an introductory session with a few activities aimed at preparing us for the work to come.

We started by establishing norms for the group. Because this is a conversation that can, at times, challenge one’s views and beliefs about education, our community values, and even oneself, we settled on:

• This is a place of learning.
• We are here to ensure our students have the opportunity to learn from and about diverse perspectives in order to better understand the world and themselves.
• Everyone chose to be here; assume good intent.
• Everyone deserves the space and support to learn.
• This isn’t Vegas, but it is a place where mistakes can be made without fear of ridicule or gossip.

There were many other possibilities, but we felt these norms set the right tone for the work of our group. We wanted to be able to have challenging conversations in a respectful and open manner, without fear of making mistakes that might otherwise prevent us from participating. We also wanted to make sure we stayed focused on what’s most important: our students.

From there, we played a game. Michelle Lampinen, the High School Assistant Principal, led a protocol she learned during her induction to the Kent State Graduate Program in Translation. The protocol was simple, but powerful:

• We started by listing 7-10 people whom we trusted that were not a part of our family.
• Then we evaluated our list, placing a tally mark next to each name that fit particular criteria related to diversity (one mark per criteria per person). For example, we placed a mark next to each person who is the same gender as us.
• We talked about our lists. For this conversation, we focused less on individual specifics and more on why we choose the people we do and how diversity (or a lack thereof) might inform our identify, our views, etc.
• Of course, this began to evolve into a conversation about our students and our role as facilitators of their learning, but we put a pin in that conversation for a little later in the session.

Our next activity focused on the term “diversity” itself and our common understanding (or our lack thereof) of that term. We talked in small groups about what the word means to us in a general context and in the context of our school and our work. We also talked about how the word makes us feel, what we think of when considering the term, and what we hope to learn over the course of the year in talking about diversity in our team and with others.

And that was all we had time for in our introductory session. The conversation was rich and exciting. We had more planned, but these are the kinds of conversations that deserve the time to explore each person’s individual perspective. We’ll now tackle what was meant to be the second part of our conversation in our next meeting as a PLT in a few weeks.

That meeting will start with an activity meant to mirror the one in our first session. This time, we will ask teachers to list their 5 favorite topics to teach, and to consider the names of any persons, real or imaginary, included. This might include authors or characters in their work, inventors, scientists, mathematicians, musicians, artists, etc. Once they’ve written their lists, we again will ask them to evaluate their lists through the lens of diversity, noting similarities and dissimilarities between the names/topics on the lists and even with themselves and/or their students. Finally, we will ask them to turn and talk with a partner about their observations, both of their lists and about how the exercise made them feel. Additionally, we will ask them to begin to consider what more or less diverse viewpoints, topics, etc. might mean for their students. We will let them know that this “turn and talk” is still just the beginning of the ongoing conversations we will be having about our curriculum and resources at Lincoln.

Next, we plan to engage in a short reading about the impact of diverse curriculums on student achievement and social-emotional development. The goal is to start the process of our group research and learning on the topic. We want to go beyond our general sense that diversity is important or even “good” for students and see if we can find and use data to prove that a diverse, inclusive curriculum can have a measurable impact on students’ social-emotional wellbeing and even on their academic gains. We’ll wrap with a homework assignment for each member of the group to find an article or other source on the topic that we can read together. We have a shared digital repository for these materials, and we will let everyone know they have access and the ability to add resources for the good of the group. Finally, we will convene with the understanding that we will come back together in a few weeks to continue the conversation and begin organizing our learning with the hopes of ultimately sharing with the rest of the faculty.

There are many entry points into conversations around diversity, equity, and inclusion in our schools. At Lincoln, we’ll be looking at issues of DEI school-wide and in our individual divisions to make sure we’re creating a safe, supportive environment for all of our stakeholders. In terms of academics, this PLT is just one of the ways we’re working to make sure our students have access to a diverse/inclusive curriculum and that they are working toward a more equitable and just world.