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Welcome to the Leading Equity Podcast

The Leading Equity Podcast focuses on supporting educators with the tools and resources necessary to ensure equity at their school. On this podcast, listeners can expect to hear interviews and stories from voices of equity in education today. Be sure to subscribe to the podcast on iTunes, Google Play, Stitcher, and Spotify!

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The Leading Equity Podcast focuses on supporting educators with the tools and resources necessary to ensure equity at their school. On this podcast, listeners can expect to hear interviews and stories from voices of equity in education today. Be sure to subscribe to the podcast on iTunes, Google Play, Stitcher, and Spotify!

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The WEEAC Virtual College Courses are now available through Google Classroom.

1) Go to Google Classroom at the following link and sign into a google account: https://classroom.google.com

2) Use the codes below to join course and access materials.

Equity in K-12 Education Code: 3eskuig

Who has Bias? We all do! Code: 2mz6sau

Successful Practices for Working With Native American Students Code: bizrjsh

Supporting Students Gender Identity and Expression Code: sx3jyen

Trauma Responsive PRactices in the Classroom Code: sjfa7vu

Culturally Responsive Parent and Family Engagement Code: zbypmvq

Getting To Know Title IX Code: lvyydgu

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The WEEAC Virtual College is an online learning format designed for educators to participate in workshops that increase awareness in equity related topics. These courses will be self-paced and free of charge to anyone that participates. The content aligns with the mission of the Equity Assistance Center grant funded by the United States Department of Education.

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It is a nice recognition that racism exists and sets the right tone, but doesn't have identifiable action items.

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Prepare teachers in advance in regards to how to approach sensitive holidays, what is modern appropriate terminology in regards to various races or other designations (sexual orientation, gender identity, disability). This changes just as ALL language changes over time, and there's nothing wrong with that. It should be expected, and appropriate to learn the current lingo. Maybe an annual, beginning of the school year training or handout at least to be given to the teachers. Brief.

Make sure we have representative toys, books, handouts, and other images in the classroom.

Not sure how possible it is, but make sure we're looking at diversity in hiring of teachers and staff.

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Recognize everyone has implicit bias, and that's ok. It's how we choose to act in spite of those biases. Don't make people feel bad for who they are and how they were raised to think. But encourage everyone to have a growth mindset and the desire to continue being better in regards to overcoming bias.

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I am extremely concerned about the legislature's recent discussions concerning "critical race theory." To me this is a manufactured issue meant to enflame and anger voters, and that has no basis in reality and in what is really happening in schools. My concerns is that vocal and forceful attempts to combat CRT will negatively affect our efforts that we've been discussing now for over a year. We all agree racism exists, and I fear these efforts will work to prevent us from even acknowledging racism. I plan to keep my eye on this, but I'm not sure there's much we can do about this as it is becoming a new politically charged issue. It's like trying to stop a freight train.

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https://www.kuer.org/education/2021-05-13/a-new-workshop-aims-to-help-teachers-educate-students-on-tribal-nations-and-indigenous-people

I saw this article, but can't find any more info on the program and whether it would be something available to our teachers!

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I was happy to see the USBE clearly call out racism, especially unintentional racism, but I was dismayed that there was no way forward. I fear many of us will read the nice words, agree with them, and then move on with our lives without making change.

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We can provide anti-racism training for staff and the community.

We can educate ourselves on how to create a more diverse staff, and then follow steps to create a school that will be inviting to a more diverse candidate pool.

We can continue to use the Second Step program, with emphasis on teaching children to recognize harmful language and behaviors while being equipped to handle them.

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My first thought as I read it was that the resolution did not have much substance to it. Instead, it read like a summary of the statements without a direction. While I realize that identifying an issue is the first step, this resolution did not give me hope for substantial changes in the future.

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I think especially of how our biases affect the young children at Alta View. This is when they will form biases and have them reinforced by the behavior and speech of the adults in their lives. We have such a great opportunity to challenge biases and provide more inclusive viewpoints so that the children don't grow up harming each other, and so that they can take our work further.

The more that parents and teachers get comfortable talking about their biases, facing them, and dismantling them, the better our children will be.

It would be nice if we could create a culture in which parents and teachers can kindly point out harm without worrying the other party will shut down or get defensive. I think we're still in a place where many adults feel uncomfortable approaching biases, but we're getting better and better. Having these discussions as a group will empower us with language that can make appropriate change.

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I don't think we should wait to make changes. I think we need to implement a plan, with or without the district. Many things could be done, like more inclusive literature (yay kindergarten teachers for already taking that initiative!); resources shared with teachers to help with their own anti-racist learning; specifically recruiting diverse candidates when positions open up; sharing info and tips in each faculty meeting; getting ahead of problematic holidays; specifically teaching a history that includes women, people of color, indigenous people, and more; examining classroom and school policies with a critical anti-racist/anti-sexist eye; etc.

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https://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/667251/the-conversation-by-robert-livingston/

EXCELLENT book that breaks down issues in understandable ways, provides language for discussing anti-racism with those who don't believe it's a problem, helping to uncover our own biases, and more.

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Even the most open and fair minded individual will have biases. It is inevitable as we are products of the environments in which we were raised. I believe that acknowledging the labels created both by the biases that we use to measure others as well as those biases that others use to measure measure us is a step towards removing them. The idea of walking in a mile another's shoes, comes to mind. An exercise that encourages students to identify how others see them and how they see themselves might be a good place to start.

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We can continue to educate ourselves, faculty and staff on diversity, equity, and inclusion. Continued education and sensitivity training as needed for holidays or events that might be more sensitive or difficult for varying groups of people.

Working on fundraising or grants to provide opportunities for teachers to continue to diversify their classrooms and make them more inclusive through diverse books, toys, posters, etc.

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https://firstnamebasis.libsyn.com/

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It's all about removing labels and owning when you mess up :)

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We can give students a fresh chance. We can give them a clean slate.

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I appreciated the recognition that racism DOES exist in our schools and that there is no place for it. I do wish there was a sort of curriculum provided to support teachers in helping foster an anti-racist classroom community.

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I am thrilled that this resolution was made and I wonder if this is what started the backlash from parents about CRT

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Take others opinions of students with a grain of salt. Try to really get to know them for yourself, and not because someone else told you something about them.

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I like that this is the first step towards being anti-discriminatory instead of just passively saying, 'its wrong'

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Recognizing the labels that have been given to students-self labels and those given by others and the limits those place on them.

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Give kids a break. Don't let a misstep or a preconceived notion define who they are. Meet them where they are. The entire point of being an educator is helping kids GROW into wonderful people.

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promoting discussions among faculty about race and the consequences of lack of representation in curriculum and classrooms

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promoting discussions among faculty about race and the consequences of lack of representation in curriculum and classrooms

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Teachers, in my experience, hide behind being experts. So often, we do not model vulnerability in front of our kids because we think it will make us less in their eyes. However, it is the best way to view and be viewed as an important human.

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I am a HUGE advocate for learning names and their proper pronunciation. I loved the point made about learning the history of names to help build deeper relationships.

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Everyone has bias and everyone treats people differently whether they know it or not. Ignoring this fact just means you perpetuate those bias and may be setting up kids for failure.