My Five Top Tips for Making Your School LGBT-friendly
Written by Jared Cawley
LGBT (lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender) Pride month seems like a very appropriate time to give extra attention to making sure your school is an inclusive, diverse and safe place for your families, students and workforce who identify as LGBT+. The month of June honours the anniversary of the 1969 Stonewall riots, where LGBT people and allies fought against police brutality and harassment that many were and continue to be subjected to today.
Schools are well-known for their openness and celebration of diversity when it comes to students, but some LGBT teachers still feel isolated and uncomfortable to talk openly about their sexuality. Schools are heteronormative workplaces and being a person who is not ‘straight’ requires some careful navigation. Headteachers and school leaders have a responsibility to sustain a school environment that welcomes diversity, supports equality, and defend all staff, including those who identify as LGBT. If you are a school leader who identifies as heterosexual, or is not part of a minority group, you are less likely to notice the exclusion or the discrimination that may be happening in your school.
As a LGBT teacher and a gay man, I have been subjected to abuse and discrimination throughout my life for loving someone of the same sex. Even though Government legislation has strengthened over the last few years, there is still a long way to go. As a LGBT teacher, I am hypervigilant and cautious about who I ‘come out’ to. This feeling of uncertainty is because being straight is the preferred and presumed sexuality. Choosing to ‘come out’ to students, families and colleagues is fearful, as you do not know their opinions and beliefs when it comes to the LGBT community. Making your school LGBT+ friendly must begin with small, deliberate steps. We must acknowledge that this will not happen overnight, but with thoughtful planning and strong leadership, a school can improve its culture of inclusivity for everyone.
When making cultural change in your school, it is important to avoid tokenism. It is superficial to teach diversity for a week or a month as a bolt on to your curriculum, when that is the only time you discuss LGBT rights or teach how to be anti-racist. All members of your school community is needed to make real change, deliberately walking the walk, instead of just talking the talk.
Below are my five top tips for making your school LGBT+ friendly:
1 Use Inclusive Language
Making small changes around inclusive language can have a huge impact on either making people feel accepted and/or feeling excluded.
Here are my suggestions:
- Instead of greeting your staff team or students with, ‘Good morning ladies and gentlemen, boys and girls’, say, ‘Good morning everyone’. With this, you have included all genders and identities without assuming everyone identifies with the gender they were assigned at birth.
- Challenge students and colleagues who continue to use phrases that diminish showing emotion or acting like a particular gender. For example: ‘man-up’, ‘you throw like a girl’, and ‘boys don’t cry’.
- Stop organising students into boys’ teams and girls’ teams, find different ways.
- Avoid reinforcing gender stereotypes.
2 A LGBT+ friendly school is everyone’s responsibility.
- It is a mistake to think that creating a LGBT+ friendly school should solely be the responsibility of the ‘gay teacher’. It should be a collective responsibility. Headteachers, senior leadership teams, teachers and the rest of the school community should be actively working together to promote an inclusive and diverse environment, ensuring all members of staff and students feel safe and can be their authentic selves.
- CPD and INSET days could involve external speakers, offering your staff a refreshing voice and a different perspective.
- LGBT+ people experience the world differently to their heterosexual counterparts, and school leaders should give them a safe space to talk about their experiences, with the support of their LGBT allies.
3 Be Proud of LGBT Visibility
If you are showing a prospective same sex family around your school, or a LGBT teacher comes for an interview, or a new student who may identify as LGBT or does not know their sexuality, how do they know that this school or future workplace is a safe and inclusive environment where they can be their authentic self?
Here are some suggestions:
- Give teachers a choice to wear LGBT badges/pins or have LGBT lanyards
- Display the Pride flag inside and outside your school. There are many flags here that represent the LGBT+ community.
- Displays. Show your visitors that you celebrate inclusion and diversity. Have displays celebrating LGBT stories and issues.
- Encourage LGBT+ teachers to make a network or support group where they can talk about LGBT issues and use this to show that LGBT+ voices matter.
- Have your senior leadership team and staff go on a learning walk, where the focus is LGBT inclusion. Can you see it represented in your school?
4 Have an inclusive and diverse curriculum
Your curriculum should be well planned and deliberately tailored to minority groups and should not be left to chance. To avoid tokenism, these practices should be carefully planned and seen across all subject areas.
Here are some suggestions:
- Children’s story books should include and promote different family dynamics, including same sex couples, single parents, foster parents, disabled children and parents, families of colour, families of different religions. Here are some ideas.
- In mathematics, have word problems that are inclusive of same sex families. Instead of Mrs. Smith or John, have names that come from a range of countries and heritages.
- In your presentations, ensure that the pictures you use show a range of minority groups.
- In your humanities curriculum, teach about colonisation, the impact of imperialism, and celebrate indigenous communities and customs. See here for more about decolonising your school curriculum.
- Diversify your set texts, offer a range of authors, not just white, heterosexual men.
5 Educate Yourself
I believe the best way to learn more about the LGBT community is to educate yourself, have an open mind and be comfortable with being challenged. I feel there can sometimes be a fear about people who do not belong to a certain minority group, making a mistake or unconsciously offending someone, or using a term or acronym that is outdated.
Here are my suggestions:
Read books and use organisations that specifically discuss LGBT voices in education and whole school approaches:
- Catherine Lee’s ‘Courage in The Classroom. LGBT Teachers share their stories’.
- Shaun Dellenty’s ‘Celebrating Difference. A Whole School Approach to LGBT+ inclusion’.
- Andrew Moffat’s book series for the No Outsiders programme.
- These organisations offer a plethora of teaching resources: Schools Out, Stonewall Education, Mermaids UK, LGBT Ed, and The LGBT Primary Hub.
- The LGBT Primary Hub offers a snappy timeline of our history and glossary of LGBT vocabulary.
Did you think being a female leader was tough? Try being a diverse one.
Written by Susie Fernandez-Gomez
Med in Educational Leadership, Head of MFL and SLE
There are studies concluding that race and gender may interact to shape different dimensions of women’s employment experiences. Therefore, understanding the interlocking system of intersections is key to addressing diversity challenges in education. The theory of intersectionality articulates a framework which can help address the challenges that minority women face with regard to their identities and their experiences. When race and gender act as a barrier, minority women in leadership positions may face specific challenges which are often unmet by others.
I am one of those women. What some would class as the ‘too different type’ of leader.
According to research, women have developed values and beliefs that translate into specific behaviours. Women are considered to socialise to show feelings, compassion, patience and intuition. This has led to a judgement that all women need to showcase these attributes in order to become effective leaders. One could argue that this list of values and skills would be ideal if it wasn’t for the fact they have actually become barriers which women have to overcome to become leaders.
I am one of those women. What some would class as the ‘soft type’ of leader.
On the other hand when women display attributes such as strength in character, being passionate about their own views, the ability to ask difficult questions or relentlessly having high aspirations from their followers as well as their own leaders, frustratingly, there is still a tendency to class these women as difficult and scary.
I am one of those women. What some would class as the ‘hard type’ of leader.
At this point you are probably wondering:
How can she claim to have all these attributes at once?
I will answer your question by posing another:
How could anyone become a leader and not be a mixture of all those attributes?
Surely if you offer different views, can support and empathise with your followers at the same time as showing the strength needed to lead them and challenge the establishment, would that not make you a true leader that can connect pretty much with any type of follower?
It would seem not…
I have faced great challenges when attempting to reach senior leadership positions. In particular, I believe that cultural variations exist in terms of expectations of leaders. Kuckhohn (1951) defines culture as a pattern or way of thinking, feeling and reacting in specific situations. Culture signifies values, ideas and symbols. Leadership expression may therefore vary based on the values, practices and symbols followed by individuals within a society. Societies may support either masculine or feminine values. Societies like the UK which support feminine values are found to balance masculine traits like aggression along with feminine traits like cooperation and collaboration. When leaders from different cultures co-exist, it can lead to potential challenges regarding how a leader should behave.
I am one of those leaders who happens to be culturally different. That combined with being a woman that shows ‘soft’ attributes as well as ‘hard’ characteristics, which only male leaders are praised for, makes me a bit too weird, I suppose…
The truth is that many women, just like me, who attempt to reach senior leadership positions will need to balance potential biases from various levels. One such bias is expectations of specific qualifications and extensive experience, especially among those of different racial origin. The average white British male aspiring leader already has the most valued qualification desired for senior leadership that there is: the nationality and the gender. In regards to experience, as long as he can show potential, the box would have been ticked. Why not apply for the job, hey?
I am one of those leaders who is not British nor male so my lists of qualifications and proven experience do have to be quite extensive, indeed. Why would I dare applying for the job, really?
I have often felt that my non-Britishness has been a factor which has led to such lack of opportunities.
Diversity is key to education leadership, as the intersection of different characteristics may highlight some systemic challenges faced by leaders. Awareness and alertness exhibited during communications, along with insight into the rules, practices and conventions to be followed in various settings, are often more evident when there is diversity in leadership.
Moreover, diverse leaders may respect the cultural differences of their teachers and remain well-informed about the various cultures. Therefore, a diverse leader may define the roles and responsibilities of the members while acknowledging differences in expectations. Communication management and trust are important factors which support success in institutions that have diversity in their leadership positions.
Time has come for schools to understand the benefits of diversity leadership. Diversity in leadership is key as it can enhance a wide range of views and opinions. It has also been argued that such different perspectives can help in problem solving. By supporting diversity in leadership, it is possible to improve self-efficacy, resilience and self-management. Research has also identified that by enhancing trust-based accountability rather than test-based accountability, it is possible to enhance the quality of outcomes.
Women leaders are considered to establish better morale and therefore are able to achieve better results. A preference for diverse women leaders can help achieve such trust-based accountability. Diverse women leaders are considered to provide better support for employees. This can in turn mean that teachers are provided with independence, agency, and an ethical and righteous purpose, along with a trust-based accountability system.
I am one of those leaders whose team respect and love in equal measures, I can proudly say.
The key component to development of leadership is by establishing an identity as a leader. However, for the female leaders, it has been argued that the failure to include the discussion of the identity and the gender identity especially related to the leadership identity development can lead to additional challenges. The failure to discuss the issues with gender identity and its effect on the identity and the leadership can be essential to understanding credibility in a culture that is deeply impacted by the external environment.
Through the entire process of leadership identity development, the female leaders may be asked to prove their credibility as a leader. As a diverse female leader, at various junctures of my career I have been asked to mellow down my ‘Mediterranean’ ways.
I am one of those leaders who has said NO. This is who I am and I will stand united with many other diverse female leaders out there who, I am sure, have some stories to tell about their own tough journey.
Thoughts and Musings on... Diversity
Written by Audrey Pantelis
Audrey Pantelis is an associate coach, consultant and trainer. She is a former Headteacher of a Special Educational Needs and Disabilities school and a current Diversity, Equity and Inclusion consultant and leadership coach.
What does diversity mean to you? What about cultural diversity? Often mentioned, usually at interviews where the interview panel will want you to know that you “know” about diversity. I would put diversity in the same bag as equality and equal opportunities. When I was a teacher, these words scared me. Not because I didn’t know what they meant, but because I couldn’t be sure that I was applying them to my delivery of the subjects that I was teaching. As I reflect on those early years, I know that I loved promoting difference – probably because as a black woman in a predominantly white world, I embraced difference. I have always loved any aspect of character that shows individuality in any shape or form and it may also answer why I love special educational needs pupils. I was a mainstream teacher before changing phase to SEND in 2008. I guess I thrive on the fact that despite difficulties, we can express our true selves; our true characters. Overcoming our difficulties is a strength and shows true resilience which is a value that I so admire. And we can bring this to any table we choose to come to.
I spoke at the last DiverseEd conference in Slough in January 2020 with @HeadsUp4HT and had really enjoyed the set up and the drive that came from meeting likeminded colleagues. There were a lot of groups and grass roots movements that I had not heard of before but there was something compelling about their missions and values that resonated with me. I came away from the conference pumped up and wondering how I could get more involved.
When lockdown took hold of our lives and all face-to-face meetings were on hold – I was informed me that DiverseEd would be a virtual event and asked if I would look at ‘Smashing Ceilings’. You may have heard of the ‘glass ceiling’ concept – defined as : “an unacknowledged barrier to advancement in a profession, especially affecting women and members of minorities” . From my lens, I would go so far as to say that as black women in the work place we often have ‘concrete ceilings’ to contend with. The main difference being that at least you can SEE through glass and aspire for more – with concrete – that’s it!! This has been my experience. I have been let down, as we all are as we aspire to leadership positions, but for me it’s been very difficult to work out whether I was the wrong fit, or just plain wrong. When you add ethnicity into the mix – we could be here for a while, trying to work it out.
Cultural diversity is a form of appreciating the differences in individuals. The differences can be based on gender, age, sex, ethnicity, sexual orientation, and social status. Schools have realized the value in acquiring a diverse workforce but what is not so well promoted or encouraged is the opportunity to rise and in turn, steer the culture to embrace ALL. The stereotyping and prejudices, if unchallenged, contribute to a culture that can promote sameness and prevent the celebration of skills, abilities, and experiences.
My fellow speakers: Naomi Ward @naomi7444, Patrick Ottley-O’Connor @ottleyoconnor spoke of their approaches in how we can establish culture (see clip below). Hannah Jepson @Hannahjep also spoke in the same session (Session 3)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-Q7RWmbKONo
with me during Saturday’s virtual conference – #DiverseEd on Culture and Diversity – about Unconscious Bias: Recruitment and it really chimed with my own thoughts about how and why we recruit who we recruit. As a former Head of School, I was extensively involved in recruitment and always ensured that I fully considered candidates that weren’t anything like me – as Hannah stated “fit is important” – but it need not mean that I discounted potential employees that weren’t as I wanted. Like a jigsaw puzzle, we may have different shapes, but when we are placed together to make the bigger picture, no one worries about individual shapes, ONLY the bigger picture.
I believe that there is a lack of:
- comfortable, trusted strategic relationships
- positive strategic feedback
- opportunities to showcase breadth of skills and experience
If we don’t increase the amount of black and minority ethnic voices seen and heard at leadership and strategic levels, then how do we expect things to change? How do we smash those ceilings, glass or otherwise? Change means being uncomfortable – and the challenge doesn’t need to be aggressive but there needs to be clarity in the outcome with a plan and milestones to ensure that we are on the way to achieving that plan.
I am a big believer in action and we all have agency to make things happen. We are privileged in that respect – all of us. I’ve currently got the same excitement and passion bubbling up that I felt after the DiverseEd conference in January 2020. What I am aware of, in these post #BlackLivesMatters post #Covid-19 days, is that this is a REAL opportunity for change. A chance to do things differently. For too long we have said that same things and nothing has changed. We need allies, we need authenticity, we need curriculum reviews, we need visible leadership, we need programmes that enable our up-and-coming talent to remain in education and be the leaders of tomorrow, not become disillusioned as they are under-represented or oppressed again and again! We need the systems that already exist to be challenged to enable that change to take place. Yes – the conversations will be uncomfortable – but no one needs to get hurt! Let us LEARN from one another.
And….. my biggest take away from my session and indeed the conference itself, is that I would welcome a genuine level playing field. Merit is the only currency that we should be utilising to enable us to progress. Remember – “its difficult to be what you cannot see”.
I have focused on diversity from my own lens but the beauty of #DiversityEd conferences is the inclusion of LGBT, disability, gender, allyship viewpoints, as well as ethnic minorities. It’s such an important conversation – and in the current climate we MUST keep talking; and turning our words into actions. #MyDiversityEdPledge is: to use my voice to lead from where I am and to support others so that they can challenge their understanding of diversity and Black perspectives. What’s yours?
“It is not our differences that divide us. It is our inability to recognise, accept and celebrate those differences”.
Audre Lorde
Why Diversity Matters in Education: “The rise of an internationally-minded child.”
Written by Fatma Khalid
A lot has been written recently about diversity, especially in education. Whilst diversity has been “entertained” by a lot of administrators and specifically policy makers into bringing the novelty idea to practice, there is still a lot to be done in terms of making our society and specifically our educational sector more diverse.
Majority of times I have seen students, even my own children, being confused about their culture and identity specifically for children who are born and raised in countries that are not their countries of origin. The implications of this reaches out to sometimes loss of identity or even worse the breed of inferiority that we find most common even here in the UAE where certain cultures and nationalities are often viewed as being better because of how they are portrayed or advocated. This is further challenged by the market niche in the UAE which gravitates towards recruiting teachers of certain nationalities further compromising the practice or need for diversity and inclusivity. Children grow up feeling that the most knowledgeable and people holding high offices are isolated to only ‘a certain kind’ which itself is a huge impediment to ambition and self-esteem.
Although schools have tried to review their curriculums to include enriched activities that promote culturally diversified programs, little has been done to support world-wide inclusiveness or build a truly “international minded” child. Curriculums majority of times are still country bound; where they cover history or cultures to that particular country as compared to covering world history and include studying cultures of the world so children can truly build acceptance and respect and be aware of other cultures that are unique and significantly different to theirs; this is what after all is defined as an “international minded child”. How else can a child build compassion or become a global citizen if he/she spends all their lives thinking there was only one culture or history that was worth studying and understanding.
All efforts need to be in place to ensure that all children’s cultures are represented in curriculum which is highly recommended for a highly inclusive society such as the one here in the UAE. Culture awareness cannot be left for isolated occasions such as the most commonly celebrated “international day” where children and parents are encouraged to bring their traditional food and dress in their traditional clothes, then tribute done and the rest of the year, children go back to studying the curriculum (country bound) history. When we have made technology a mandate, cultural diversity too holds importance and should be integral and be embedded in our core curriculums.
Moreover, ensuring that our teams are made up of qualified individuals from different nationalities increases the opportunity for children to learn and understand cultures from multiple countries that most importantly also represents them. Curriculums are consequently enriched with creativity and increased global perspective for a truly diverse society that aims to understand, acknowledge and accept that although we are different, we are fundamentally the same kind…
The human kind.
What does it mean for education to be diverse and inclusive?
Education is without a doubt the most transformative force in society. Education lifts people out of poverty, it opens up choices with regards to the livelihoods they can pursue, and it empowers them to challenge the status quo. But education has a diversity and inclusion problem. Like any social institution, it is rooted in its history and has evolved within a system predominantly designed by white men. This means that much of the curriculum is based on the thinking, insights and mindsets of white men who were taught by other white men who came before them. There has been some progress in addressing this and making education more inclusive.
Many educational institutions have developed policies to promote equality, diversity and widening access and success, yet statistics consistently show students from a minority ethnic background are underrepresented in many disciplines within Higher Education. There is also a significant gap in the success rates with students from ethnic minority backgrounds consistently lagging behind their white counterparts. When we look below the surface of the marketing materials provided by many educational institutions – which show diverse students smiling and having a good time – these images do not necessarily reflect the experience of learners from a diversity of backgrounds.
As the recent surge in Black Lives Matter protests illustrates, we do not yet live in a society where everyone feels safe and included. Quite the opposite, this global movement has illustrated that large sections of our society face oppression and exclusion as part of their daily lived experience, including experiences within education. The fact that this experience has remained largely under the radar of white privilege does not make it any less real and urgent.
Now what would it mean for education to be more diverse and inclusive, and what steps can we take to move in the right direction beyond articulating policies and providing diverse images in marketing materials?
First of all, it is essential that education explicitly addresses its own biases and blind-spots and actively works to incorporate a more diverse range of voices within the curriculum. This means including works from authors and theorists who represent under-represented groups within society because of their gender, race, sexual orientation or other relevant characteristics.
Secondly, it means making the contested nature of knowledge explicit and encouraging active debate among students about how many current perspectives and understandings are rooted in white privilege and promote insights which serve the interests of an establishment that promotes the interests of some over the interests of others.
Thirdly, it means transforming some of metaphors prevalent within educational institutions. Masculine metaphors around competition dominate within educational discourse and education is seen as a competitive battle among students for the best grades and a competitive battle for institutions to acquire the “best and brightest” students. We should instead be shifting these metaphors to something more grounded in collaboration and sustainable growth. Life doesn’t need to be seen as a competitive struggle for survival – and opportunity does not need to be presented as a cake with a limited number of slices.
Fourthly, it requires educational institutions change their recruitment, development and promotion practices so that these are effective at removing any barriers for minority applicants and staff to join and develop within an organisation. This includes using blind recruitment processes, balanced recruitment panels which include minority representation and whose members are trained in avoiding the adverse impact of unconscious bias, as well as a range of development programmes aimed at supporting minority staff to develop as part of their role.
These four steps form a starting point for addressing issues of diversity and inclusion in education, and responsibility for their implementing very much lies in the hands of the those in leadership positions in our educational institutions. However, the systemic issues cannot be addressed within our education institutions alone and require the active participation of the media, arts, literature, and other institutions in stopping the damaging stories and limiting expectations which give rise to access and success barriers in education and beyond.
Bio
Jitse van Ameijde is a social entrepreneur and founder of Social Change Academy – a social enterprise focused on the development of tomorrow’s change makers passionate to make a positive difference to the lives of others. Originally from the Netherlands, Jitse came to the UK to finish his Masters in Social and Organisational Psychology, and ended up working for the Open University where he worked on the design of distance learning experiences and taught systems thinking in practice as an Associate Lecturer. He is passionate about issues of inclusion, social justice, and equal opportunities for all regardless of their past.
Jitse van Ameijde is the founder of the Social Change Academy: https://www.socialchangeacademy.org/founder/
The Role of Wellbeing & Resilience in Diversity
Written by Tasha Fletcher
Lead Primary Teacher in KS1
Resilience “an innate capacity to rebound from adversity and change through a process of positive adaptation. For young children and adolescence, resilience is a fluid, dynamic process that is influenced over time by life events, temperament, insight, skill sets, and the primary ability of caregivers and the social environment to nurture and provide them a sense of safety, competency, and secure attachments.” National Resilience Resource Center
International and local schools around the world are culturally, ethnically, and racially diverse. Now more than ever there needs to be a conscious shift in the role that wellbeing, mental health and resilience play in diverse classrooms.
But how can we as educators begin making this a priority in our classrooms?
What are some of the signs we should look out for?
What role can we play in ensuring our students feel valued and safe regardless of their ethnic backgrounds?
What is culture?
Culture shapes society’s attitudes, beliefs and behaviours. Every individual is a part of multiple cultural groups, based on several factors such as; race, ethnicity, faith, country, type of work, level of education, physical ability or disability status, sexual identity and so on.
If you work with young children or teenagers that have different cultural backgrounds from your own, there can be additional communication challenges, as teachers we face these challenges every day. Many communities have agencies that provide services for specific cultural and ethnic populations.
How is wellbeing and resilience linked to diversity?
Wellbeing and resilience play a huge role in diversity, especially in today’s classroom where the cultural differences that exist between teachers and their students/students and their peers are numerous.
Diversity may exist with regard to race, culture, religion, language, sexual orientation and socioeconomic status. Parents/guardians, teachers, caregivers, extended family members and other adults in children’s lives have an important role to play both in their responsibilities and opportunities to model ways for children and teenagers to feel safe, connected, valued, capable, respected and grow in resilience.
Unfortunately, within many school systems, a lot of students are faced with discrimination from other students as well as staff every day, due to a lack of understanding or empathy with regard to the variations in beliefs, practices, and values of different cultural groups. Since ethnic minority children have higher rates of suspension/expulsion, special education placement and school dropout, it is evident that numerous disparities exist within our education systems.
There are instances where students, for a variety of reasons, may face more challenges due to adversity, trauma or unsafe living conditions at home. On the other hand, children can grow up in completely nurturing environments and still, because of genetics, brain chemistry or a special educational need, have an emotional, mental health or behavioural disorder.
The role of culture
Culture has a significant impact on the beliefs and attitudes surrounding child development, identification of problems and judgment about the best way to intervene when problems do occur. Furthermore, each of us operates within an individual culture, which espouses specific beliefs that determine how we interact with others and interpret their actions.
Cultural variations in expressions of behaviour may contribute to misunderstandings and conflict, which can be decreased through enhancing multicultural awareness. And while risk is a contributing factor for poor outcomes, it is not a given because educators, parents/guardians and other adults entrusted with the care of young children and teenagers can help all children gain and maintain a sense of their own strengths and abilities (if they know how to and should receive support from the relevant authorities; DSO, counsellors, psychologists, child and wellbeing services etc).
So what can we do as educators and parents to promote diversity and inclusion in schools and communities?
Recognise the cultural diversity and uniqueness of students and learn as much as you can about your students’ cultural background by spending time with your students and getting to know them. (This is especially good to do at the start of the year) and a simple “All about Me” activity is a great way to start. Some teachers may argue that this activity is geared towards younger children, but as a teacher creativity is at the heart of what we do. You can turn this into a carousel activity of guess who clues for Middle School or KS2 children and staff around the school, in the gymnasium or sports field.
You can start a class mystery blog for Secondary students in which each student writes a blog about him/herself (I would suggest giving a minimum word limit but not a maximum).
The goal will be to feature a new student each week and the class has fun guessing who it may be while learning about each other.
Whatever activity you choose to do, don’t just collect the information, use that information to help your students and create successful relationships in which your students feel valued as a member of your class.
Recognise that socioeconomic and political factors have a significant impact on the psychosocial functioning of culturally and ethnically diverse groups
Develop an awareness of your own cultural and ethnic background and acknowledge differences in the culture between you and your students.
You can do this by incorporating instructional strategies into your school’s curriculum that are sensitive to cultural differences such as: text books, planned activities and field trips, print rich environments which can include key/everyday words which represents the various ethnicities of students in your classroom or invite students to contribute something from their different cultural backgrounds towards the classroom displays to help build a sense of belonging, feeling valued and a voice.
Promote tolerance and understanding of cultural differences – as a teacher or parent you can promote this in many ways:
Incorporating fun learning projects that teach about diversity, wellbeing, mental health and resilience through.
PSHCE discussions or peer and group collaborations using task cards. I have created some wonderful resources which can be used to help children recognise the value they bring to the group and to understand the role they play in keeping well and mentally healthy for both primary/early years and middle school/upper primary.
International day celebrations – children, staff, parents and members of the community can contribute to events like this to promote diversity, equality and respect.
Teachers and children could plan activities together with their parents to showcase a country for a day/week. Together you may all choose to dress up in the traditional clothes of that specific country/culture for a day, learn a new song, poem or read aloud in the language and present it. Inviting guest speakers, or watching a film together are also other hands-on ways you can promote and celebrate diversity in your classroom or school.
But why stop there?
As a teacher you can work together with schools in other countries and collaborate on a mutual interest with your students. The aim here is to expose the children to cultures and ways of doing things that are different from their own by instilling tolerance, respect, reflection and developing the understanding that although some people may look, dress, and speak differently than they do they each have a uniqueness that should be valued and celebrated.
What can we do as educators, parents/guardians and caregivers to support resilience?
Instil in children a sense of values while respecting other viewpoints.
Encourage good nutrition, exercise, diet and physical fitness for example you can include yoga or breathing exercises as part of your brain breaks with students during class times.
Teach gratitude and a recognition of blessings in life, as teachers we probably do this every day. We often ask our students to reflect on their lesson by checking their targets or filling in smiley faces.
Why not include wellbeing and resilience as part of that gratitude too?
You could create a reflective/wall of gratitude which could be placed on a wall or door to the exit. Students can then write something they were thankful for at the end of the year and add it to the wall as they leave for the day.
Another way to incorporate this could be creating a wall of gratitude in a padlet and students can fill in one thing on the wall as a home activity. It can also be a useful sharing tool for weekend activities.
Provide opportunities for friendships and a social support system to develop. As adults we know how important it is to have good, strong and dependable social groups from adults we trust and can count on.
The same goes for children and teenagers, as adults we should ensure that the children entrusted in our care know where to go to for help if they need it and are not afraid to ask for it too. Encouraging opportunities for social support systems with friends and trusted adults is a good way in which to do this. School counsellors, homeroom teachers, social support groups within the school or community are all ways in which we can promote this.
Try to encourage children’s ability to figure out life through trials, error and success. A lot of children because of cultural norms, low self esteem or socio economic status are under pressure “ to not accept failure” or grow up hearing that failure is unacceptable from the adults who are sworn to protect them.
Failure is a big part of success and growth, therefore young children and teenagers NEED to know that it is okay to fail. After all it is how we learn, and acceptance of that failure is paramount to the next step which should inevitably be success.
As adults it is equally important to take care of ourselves too.
Find ways to take care of yourself based on what you enjoy doing, for me going on long walks in nature or reading usually does the trick.
Be mindful of how your thinking is helping or hurting your situation. Always be careful of your thoughts, for what you believe have the tendency to become.
Find comfort in the small things and gratitude in your own accomplishments and contributions. This can be as simple as acknowledging out loud something you are successful at or grateful for each day.
Be a lifelong learner, find enjoyment through learning new ideas.
Promote ways to feel competent, connected, and to have life satisfaction.
And finally Instil a sense of pride in your family as well as your cultural traditions and rituals.
About the author:
Tasha is a lead primary teacher in KS1| mum of two boys | Designated Safeguarding Officer | ELT Materials writer. With a specialisation in Early Childhood and Psychology, she has more than 16 years of experience in young learner education, starting in pre-primary and primary in Trinidad & Tobago (Caribbean) before specialising in TEFL to young learners. She has lived and worked in 9 countries across the world, working in teaching, teacher training, assessment and educational development. When she is not teaching, she enjoys spending time with her family playing football, basketball and nature walks.
In Search of Great Governance
Written by Rosemary Hoyle
Primary School Governor and Chair for over 20 years.
Inspired to write this post by a recent online event held as part of the Freedom to Learn Festival I have been prompted to draw together all my recent thoughts on diversity and the role of governance. In the opening remarks one of the speakers stated that it is a ‘schools’ purpose to create the next generation of global citizens’ and, not to give the game away too soon, that is surely why diversity matters! Looking back over earlier posts that I have written about the core functions of governance and, in particular the one about vision, values and strategy, I can see immediately how the board can lead in this area. In the strategic aims of the school I chair, agreed by the board after consultation with children, staff and the community, we felt strongly that there was a need to make diversity explicit so we state that we want to be –
A school that is at the heart of the community; a good neighbour and engaged with community groups of all ages. A school that builds on our pupils’ own experiences, interests and strengths and helps to develop their sense of identity as local, national and global citizens.
In order to do this, we state that we want ‘A curriculum that exposes children to other cultures and offers opportunities to explore a wide range of ideas’. After listening to the presentations at the Diverse Educators event I think this needs to be even stronger, wider and bolder in its aspirations. It isn’t just learning about others is it? Another of the speakers at the online event talked about being able to be your own authentic self and, surely, in order for that to happen you have to believe that your own ethnicity, your own culture and religion, your own sexuality, your own gender identification or your own disability has a place and is valued and represented in the world around you.
So, let’s get back to the beginning – Yes, for this very important reason diversity matters and it matters to the whole school community. It matters in the curriculum we teach our children and it matters in the resources that support this work. It matters in the public information, the displays and the literature that families see about our schools. It matters in the workplace, in the leaders and staff that the children (and staff) see around them every day in school and it matters in the board of governors. It is part of the ‘ethic of everybody’. (1) It should be a thread that runs through every part of our education system and we, as governors, have a big part to play in leading this. Mary Myatt suggests that governors ‘might ask themselves whether their work is underpinned by doing right by everybody?’ (2) Any boards that have been involved in the Ethical Leadership in Education Project will have given a lot of consideration to this recently but take a moment to look around the boardroom table for there are real dangers in group think from a board that lacks diversity. In the 2019 NGA survey 93% of respondents identified as white and only 10% reported being under 40! (3)
Then look up from that table and look at the school you lead, support and challenge, and ask yourselves are we really inclusive – does diversity matter here? (4) (5)
Here are a series of questions that we governors should ask
-of ourselves:
- How does our board reflect the diversity of the school community it serves?
- Is valuing diversity explicit in our vision and strategy?
- Do we/Should we have a governor who is focused on diversity?
- What training have we undertaken as a board to challenge and reflect on our understanding of diversity?
- How often have we talked about this at a board discussion?
– of our school:
- Does our public information reflect the diversity around us?
- How and where is diversity evident in our curriculum – right from the Early Years?
- Do we have resources for our children from Early Years onwards which have a full range of representation – books, dolls, displays around the school?
- Are our staff confident to answer questions and continue conversations with children about diversity – do they know what language to use?
- What CPD have they been able to access to help them with this?
Notes:
- Dame Alison Peacock quoted in Mary Myatt, Hopeful Schools,2016, p 60-62
- Mary Myatt, Hopeful Schools,2016, p 61
- National Governance Association, School Governance in 2019, [online] at https://www.nga.org.uk/Knowledge-Centre/research-(1)/Annual-school-governance-survey/School-governance-in-2019.aspxaccessed 21/08/2020
- The Ethical Leadership Commission, Framework for Ethical Leadership in Education, [online] at https://www.nga.org.uk/ethicalleadership.aspxaccessed 21/08/2020
- National Governance Association, Everyone on Board, NGA [online] at https://www.nga.org.uk/News/Campaigns/Everyone-on-Board-increasing-diversity-in-school-g.aspxaccessed 21/08/2020
Not spoon-feeding: Teaching essay writing and helping students to plan their work is a decolonising practice
Written by Dr Anna Carlile
Head of the Department of Educational Studies at Goldsmiths, University of London.
This blog was the subject of a picket line teach-out during the UCU strike at Goldsmiths in March 2020 and was first published at https://inclusiveeducation652853906.wordpress.com/
Why should we embed essay writing and other academic skills into our university teaching?
If you are a student looking for guidance for yourself, or a lecturer seeking to embed academic skills into your own teaching, scroll down below the article for guidance on the following:
- Plan your work schedule
- Learn exam revision skills
- Learn exam strategy
- How to write a literature review
- What goes in a methods section?
- How to write a data-with-analysis/findings section
Teaching academic skills is a decolonising pedagogy
How did you learn how to write a literature review?
I have heard people say that by teaching academic skills in the university classroom, we are spoon-feeding our students. But this misunderstands the poor educational service many of our students have experienced before they come to university.
If we are looking at the BAME (albeit an inexact and problematic acronym) award gap in HE, for example, we can’t ignore the impact of institutional prejudice on some students’ educational histories. So what can we do about it, beyond decolonising our reading lists (Goldsmiths library is amazing on this)?
Students who go to elite schools are being prepared for university. They are taught how to write research essays and how to prepare for exams. Some state funded schools do this too, but many arrive with us from institutions which have not been seriously preparing them for university. These institutions have been preparing students for servitude. The education system is set up so that working class students are coached to leave school as working class adults, and middle class students are hot-housed to leave school as middle class adults. Anyone who is perceived to be ‘a risk’ to the project of neoliberalism- in other words, anyone unlikely to leave school a highly effective consumer- is liable to abjection and exclusion.
Academic skills are taught fabulously by library staff at Goldsmiths. Our Academic Skills Centre runs a programme on decolonising study skills. However, low waged students, parents, carers and others with complicated lives may not have the extra time to go to library sessions. And we need to make our academic skills teaching specific to our disciplines, courses, modules and assignments.
But this is where we can decolonise our pedagogies. Instead of assuming students have all had an elite form of education before coming to us, we need to recognise that we may need to rectify the disadvantage built into the system. This is not spoon-feeding. It’s decolonising. In Educational Studies, we recognise this and consistently embed academic skills into all of our teaching.
Below are some examples of decolonising study skills support, together with sample documents and narrated PowerPoints. Feel free to use them for yourself, if you’re a student, or to embed them, change, update and tweak them for your own teaching, if you’re a university tutor or lecturer:
A. Plan your work schedule
Students with busy, complicated lives may feel daunted by the number of essays they need to write. I’ve had students who are living in homeless hostels, who have severe anxiety disorders, who are working two jobs, raising five children alone, contending with domestic violence, or caring for grandparents. Those students need help to plan out their work. I often sit down with a student one-to-one to help with this. You can use this strategy with several months or just a couple of weeks to go before submission deadlines.
How to make a work plan:
- Work out how many months you have left
- Create a calendar grid with four weeks per month
- Add in the weekdays
- Add in all your activities. Include self care, relaxing and socialising.
- Identify the gaps where you will have time for assignment writing
- Make a list of your assignments, with deadlines. Add the deadlines to the calendar.
- Work out how many writing days you have for each assignment
- Decide if you want to do each assignment in a block or work on them all in rotation
- Assign an equal number of writing days to each assignment
- Include days at the end of your calendar for editing (see writing in red on the example)
- You could also break down each writing day into specific part of each essay (see writing in blue on the example)
- Stick to your plan, and reward yourself each day
Here is a Sample Work Plan
B. Learn exam revision skills
Many students have never been shown how to revise. Here is one way of doing it. I used this to stuff my head full of pages and pages of case law for my law degree (which I didn’t really use, but hey…)
- work out what you do and don’t need to revise by finding out how many topics might be on the exam
- read through your lecture notes, making a summary of them as you go
- turn each main point into a question and answer
- create a quiz out of your questions and answers
- Revise by answering your questions:
(i) in whole sentences (the first few times, feel free to look at the answers)
(ii) in shorthand
(iii) verbally, with a friend holding the answer sheet
- Identify the areas which are really hard to remember and create a special quiz for these
- Look at and practice old exam papers. Time yourself.
C. Learn exam strategy
I often invigilate exams and I am shocked how many students leave the room before the end. Don’t leave the room! Use all the time you are given. Here are some ideas for best practice in an exam situation:
- When you get in the room, read through the whole paper. You might find you have to answer more (or less) questions than you thought.
- Make a note of how long you have, and specify a timing for each question. Leave five minutes at the end to read through and edit your answers.
- Decide which questions you will answer and quickly jot down the key points you need to include (eg quotes, dates, references). This will allow space in your head to actually write without having to remember facts
- Stick to your timings and write as neatly as possible, leaving plenty of space for edits
- In the last five to ten minutes, read through everything you have written and edit for sentence structure, accuracy and clarity
- Never leave before the end. If you have time left over, read through, edit and add to your answers again
D. How to write a literature review
(PowerPoint here:How to write a literature review GENERIC_recorded (3)– click on ‘Slide Show- Play from start’ and you’ll hear my voice narrating the steps)
1.Start by identifying themes
Come up with three to five themes for your research (eg race/class/gender/parent’s views/teachers’ views/children’s views/policy/faith/food/hair etc).
Open a Word document and write down the themes as subheadings.
- Themes might be framed around the sub-questions that emerge out of your big question
- New themes might emerge from the literature
- Additional themes might emerge as a surprise from your data- you’ll need to come back to revisit your literature review if this is the case
- They are ideas which you hope to learn or have learned from your research
- One main theme may be an overarching idea you will use to think about your research: eg feminist theory, queer theory, or critical race theory
2. Library search
- Spend a good two hours doing a library search for three to five article or chapters for each theme. Try to stick to peer reviewed articles published within the last five years. Download them into folders labelled by theme on your desktop. You may not find articles relating exactly to what you are writing about, but find a ‘best fit’. Your job is to explain how they link to your project. Ask a librarian for help if you can’t find anything.
3. Build the lit review around quotes from the literature. This prevents you from polemicising, or making a point from memory and then searching around for some literature to back it up.
- Pull out a lovely quote from each of the three to five articles or chapters and write it down under the theme heading. Include year published and page number. Eg: ‘…institutional prejudice underpins some of the causes of permanent exclusion from school’ (Carlile 2012, p.178).
- Each theme heading should now have four or five quotes from the literature underneath it.
4. Add words to introduce each quote, or paraphrase it:
- Eg: Carlile (2012, p.178) explains that ‘…institutional prejudice underpins some of the causes of permanent exclusion from school’.
5. Add joining sentences
Eg: Another person who wrote about school exclusion is Kulz (2018), who point out the racial bias in the ways in which her students were pulled out of her classroom by senior management.
(Side note- Christy Kulz’s book Factories for Learning, about the neoliberal and exclusionary practices of a very disciplinarian secondary school, is one of the best ethnographies I’ve ever read).
6. Intro and conclusion
- Add an introduction to your lit review, reminding the reader about the main topic of the assignment, and then laying out the themes you will be addressing in the section
- Finish it off with a conclusion, pulling the main threads together
E. What goes in a methods section?
(Narrated PowerPoint here: How to write a methods section_recorded (2) Click on ‘Slide Show- Play from start’ and you’ll hear my voice narrating the steps).
1.Start with an introductory sentence referring back to your main research question and explain why the method is appropriate to the question
- My question is therefore…
- In order to answer this question I did this… (brief summary)
2. Add literature/references to your methods section
- Other people have written the following about my chosen method…
- This method is appropriate for my research focus because…
3. Say what you actually did
- I did my interviews/observations/focus group/text analysis in this context/with these people/on these websites…
- We met in a café/at university… because…
- These people/websites/locations were appropriate for this research because…
- Access issues included…
- I recorded the data on a voice recorder/in a notebook/using photography…
Nb don’t waste a whole page on explaining generic concepts like ‘qualitative research’ or ‘interviews’. Be specific to your own chosen approach.
4. Limitations (but don’t spend too long saying what you didn’t do)
- Limitations to my methodology were…
5. How did you analyse your data?
- I analysed my data by (eg arranging it into themes, which emerged from the literature/my initial question/the respondents themselves… coding it according to the main issues that arose…)
6. Ethics
- Ethics follow on from the methodology
- Ethical issues arising from the research included…
– Confidentiality
– Informed consent
– Sensitivity
- I dealt with these issues by…
– Interviewing in a neutral location
– Using open questions to allow the respondent to raise any sensitive issues
– Participatory methods
– Using an informed consent information sheet
F. How to write the main paragraphs of a data-with-analysis/findings section
(Narrated PowerPoint here: How to write a data section_recorded (3) click on ‘Slide Show- Play from start’ and you’ll hear my childlike voice narrating the steps)
Your findings section will need its own introduction and conclusion. Main body paragraphs can be built up as follows. If you follow this structure you will be ideally ticking all those evidence, reference, and analysis boxes you need to get a decent mark.
1.Writing a data-with-analysis paragraph
- Introduce the themes or ideas emerging from the data (these themes should ideally reflect those used in your lit review)
- Give an example of the theme or issue which is arising from your data
- Bring in an author (from the corresponding theme in your lit review) who talks about the theme or issue and quote or paraphrase them
- Reflect or comment on the author’s idea which you have just quoted or paraphrased
The second and third step could be repeated in the paragraph if you had a couple of good examples.
2. Sample text (from this book): a data-with-analysis paragraph:
It seemed from my observations that a permanent exclusion option must have a negative effect on pupils and professionals. For example, Cherry Tree School’s head teacher told me angrily, ‘Michael Johns: I have had enough of him!’ Because exclusion was an option, this head teacher could afford to ‘have enough’ of one of her learners. This shut down her ability to creatively think about other ways to support him. As Searle (1996) explains, ‘The abolition of corporal punishment gave teachers the opportunity to develop skills in … strategies of counselling and community liaison that they had not thought possible … An end to ‘permanent exclusion’ (except in the most dire and unavoidable circumstances) would have the same positive effect’ (p.41). In other words, the existence of permanent exclusion from school limits teachers’ behaviour management skills.
3. Let’s break it down a bit…
(a) Identify the themes or ideas which are emerging from your data. These might follow the theme headings you decided on when you structured the literature review. They might be new for you, emerging as a surprise from your data. They are ideas which you have learned from your research
Examples of emerging themes or ideas:
- Parents are a big influence on what children like to do outside…
- Musicians tend not to see informal learning taking place but consider what they do to be ‘work’…
- Dance classes are often marketed toward white middle class people, unless they are called ‘street’ or ‘urban’…
Adults who have been excluded from school as children often find themselves in the criminal justice system later on…
- What are some of your emerging themes or ideas?
- What do you predict might be some of your emerging themes or ideas?
Write them down using the sentence starters:
- The data suggests that…
- My findings point towards…
- One issue that emerged
(b) Give an example of the theme or issue which is arising from your data
- For example, in the first interview, Alice said that ‘…
- This was demonstrated during the first observation. Billy aged four ran across the room and…
- One of the websites showed this: the primary colours used suggested a focus on younger children…
What specific examples can you give regarding the themes or issues you see arising from your data?
(c) Bring in an author who talks about the theme or issue and quote or paraphrase them.
- Find a quote which relates to the theme or idea which emerges from your data
Write it down with the author’s last name, year published and page number: Eg…
- One theorist who discusses this is Jones (2012), who notes that…
- Smith (2014) addresses this issue, suggesting that…
- One idea Evans (2010) raises in relation to this is…
Reflect on the author’s idea which you have just quoted or paraphrased
- This suggests that…
- In other words…
- One conclusion that might be drawn from this is…
(d) What do you think of the quote or idea you just selected?
Don’t give someone else the last word. Finish the paragraph with your own summary sentence.
4. Another example:
Many permanent exclusions seemed to be about making an example out of the child. This was demonstrated in Alex’s case: although he had Tourette’s Syndrome and could not help himself, the school had still excluded him to demonstrate, as the head teacher explained, ‘zero tolerance to disrespectful language towards a teacher’. Osler and Vincent (2003) suggest that the government has an official ‘consequences’ discourse (34). The goal to reduce numbers of permanent exclusions had, they explain, ‘been replaced by a growing official concern about the need to address youth violence and criminal behaviour, in which exclusion from school was seen as an essential policy tool’ (34). One conclusion that can be drawn from this might be that children like Alex were being excluded from school to make a political point about being tough on crime.
5. Now you try
- Introduce the themes or ideas emerging from the data
- Give an example of the theme or issue which is arising from your data
- Bring in an author who talks about the theme or issue and quote or paraphrase them
- Reflect on the author’s idea which you have just quoted or paraphrased
6. Edit
Read the paragraph aloud
- …edit the paragraph
First published March 3, 2020
Inclusive Allyship
Written by Hannah Wilson
Founder of Diverse Educators
Allies:
noun. a state formally cooperating with another for a military or other purpose.
verb. combine or unite a resource or commodity with (another) for mutual benefit.
Allyship:
A lifelong process of building relationships based on trust, consistency, and accountability with marginalized individuals and/or groups of people. not self-defined—work and efforts must be recognized by those you are seeking to ally with.
Why do we need to be Inclusive Allies?
We are all humans. We are all equal. We all need to check our privilege. We need to empathise with the struggle that some people go through. We need to be aware of the obstacles and the barriers in the way of some people on their journey. We need to be aware of the impact of prejudice and discrimination.
#HeForShe and #WhiteAlly are two labels I have heard used in the last few years as the grassroots communities encourage supporters to join their movements for change.
Much like #DiverseEd aims to make connections between the different communities, we need a term to capture everyone who works with others to. At the #CollaborativeSupportForWomen event and our #DiverseEd event we have promoted the idea of Inclusive Allies:
Amy Ferguson spoke about Allyship at the Collaborative Support for Women event and the recording is here.
Patrick Ottley O’Connor spoke about Allyship at the Virtual Diverse Educators event and the recording is here.
Allyship is a process, and everyone has more to learn. Allyship involves a lot of listening. Sometimes, people say “doing ally work” or “acting in solidarity with” to reference the fact that “ally” is not an identity, it is an ongoing and lifelong process that involves a lot of work.
Inclusive Allyship is:
Men working alongside women to smash glass ceilings and advance gender equality.
White people working alongside people of colour to smash concrete ceilings and advance racial equity.
Heterosexual people working alongside Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender, Queer and Intersex people to smash the gay glass ceiling.
Able-bodied people working alongside disabled people to smash the glass disability glass ceiling.
How do we support as Inclusive Allies?
Allyship is about confronting othering, ‘isms’, privilege, prejudice. Allyship is about standing up and speaking out on social justice issues.
I found a great website called Diversability which encourages us to think differently about allyship and I have lifted the below advice from The Guide to Allyship.
How to be an Inclusive Ally:
Take on the struggle as your own.
Stand up, even when you feel scared.
Transfer the benefits of your privilege to those who lack it.
Acknowledge that even though you feel pain, the conversation is not about you.
Be willing to own your mistakes and de-centre yourself.
Understand that your education is up to you and no one else.
Being an Inclusive Ally is about white people, straight people and able-bodied people being aware of our privilege. We need to do the work, the inner work, to reflect, to learn and to grow. As an Inclusive Ally there are different roles we can take on to move the conversation and the agenda for diversity, equity and inclusion forward.
7 ways to be an Inclusive Ally:
The Sponsor
The Champion
The Amplifier
The Advocate
The Scholar
The Upstander
The Confidant
Allyship will not always be comfortable. We need to get comfortable with being uncomfortable. We need to check our privilege and realise that our momentary discomfort is not comparable to the long-term discomfort that people live with. Trauma and tragedy are the lived experienced for many people.
The last few months have been emotionally-charged. Our colleagues, our communities and our children who come from diverse backgrounds have potentially been deeply affected by the tragic murder of George Flood. I saw potentially as we cannot assume that everyone has experienced and responded to the most recent Black Lives Matter incident in the same way. To deepen your understanding I recommend reading this article on How to be an Ally During Times of Tragedy.
Becoming and being an Inclusive Ally requires intention, commitment and action. We need to lean in to this space, no matter how hard, how painful and how uncomfortable it is.
What do we do to be Inclusive Allies?
THE DO’S
Do be open to listening
Do be aware of your implicit biases
Do your research to learn more about the history of the struggle in which you are participating
Do the inner work to figure out a way to acknowledge how you participate in oppressive systems
Do the outer work and figure out how to change the oppressive systems
Do use your privilege to amplify (digitally and in-person) historically suppressed voices
Do learn how to listen and accept criticism with grace, even if it’s uncomfortable
Do the work every day to learn how to be a better ally
THE DON’TS
Do not expect to be taught or shown. Take it upon yourself to use the tools around you to learn and answer your questions
Do not participate for the gold medal in the “Oppression Olympics” (you don’t need to compare how your struggle is “just as bad as” a marginalized person’s)
Do not behave as though you know best
Do not take credit for the labour of those who are marginalized and did the work before you stepped into the picture
Do not assume that every member of an under-invested community feels oppressed
For teachers and those working in education we need to consider the impact we can have in our classrooms and our schools. We need to be the change in teaching tolerance and acceptance, we need to celebrate diversity and create a sense of belonging for all identities. We need to ensure that our environments and physically and psychologically safe for everybody. We need to have the big conversations about the world to equip everybody with the knowledge, skills and values to navigate society.
There are 10 Things You Can Do to be an Ally:
Listen
Get educated
Get involved
Show up
Speak up
Intervene
Welcome discomfort
Learn from your mistakes
Stay engaged
Donate
There are some tips here on how to be a teaching tolerance ally here.
For leaders, being an ally is a journey. Even the most inclusive leaders admit they have room to grow. The work never stops, yet it is your choice to start, to practise, and to be better every single day. There is a training programme here you may be interested in on leading like an ally.
Following our most recent Diverse Educators conference in June we have a series of free training videos of the event available for staff CPD on the topics of Landscape, Curriculum, Culture and Leadership: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC3MxxcAlAy__4H5GiygV7fA?view_as=subscriber
I have also started a series of weekly webcasts with a HR and D&I specialist called #FastForwardDiversityInclusion available here: https://www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/fastforwarddiversityinclusion-a-weekly-webcast-tickets-111397462810
My #DiverseEdPledge from the event is to be a better Inclusive Ally. Let’s all be upstanders for what is right, not bystanders for what is wrong.