The company says it’s inclusive because it has a text-to-speech option. But whose version of inclusion is that?

Goals

• One design flaw you spot

• One redesign idea

• One reflection: Who benefits from your redesign?

Equity Lens

1. Participation & Co-Design

2. Accessibility & Agency

3. Cultural & Contextual Design

4. Empowerment over Achievement

The app assumes all students share the same cultural reference points and lived experiences. Garcia & Lee remind us that this is a deficit-based design, which forces learners to adapt to the tool rather than the tool adapting to them.

2. Our Redesign Idea:

"Community Story Bank + Local Content Flexibility"

Following the See Stories model Rafael shared, let teachers and communities upload reading passages that reflect students' actual contexts—whether that's fishing villages in Alaska, agricultural communities, or urban neighborhoods. The AI still adjusts difficulty levels, but now draws from a culturally situated library.

Add:

• Multilingual support (home language + English side-by-side)

• Student-authored stories as valid texts

• Teachers can tag content by region, culture, language to ensure relevance

Shift from "one-size-fits-all" to asset-based framing.

3. Reflection: Who Benefits?

Students whose identities have been erased or marginalized in mainstream EdTech like rural learners, Indigenous students, multilingual families, recent immigrants, and students from non-Western backgrounds.