Equity in Education: Building Awareness and Taking Action

In this episode, Dr. Dean announces an exciting shift in focus for the podcast, diving deeper into equity in education. With a commitment to posting weekly episodes, Dr. Dean aims to provide valuable insights and actionable strategies for educators seeking to integrate diversity, equity, and inclusion into their classrooms.

Dr. Dean emphasizes the importance of starting with self-awareness as the foundation for equity work. By reflecting on our own identities, biases, and privileges, we can better understand how they shape our interactions and perceptions within educational spaces.

She discusses the concept of intersectionality and how acknowledging the complexity of individual identities is essential for creating inclusive environments. Dr. Dean challenges the notion of colorblindness, highlighting the significance of recognizing and valuing the diverse identities of students and staff.

Throughout the episode, Dr. Dean addresses implicit biases and microaggressions, urging listeners to notice, interrupt, and shift harmful language and behaviors. She encourages action as the ultimate goal, providing resources and exercises to facilitate personal reflection and meaningful change.

Learn more about resources and actionable steps to disrupt systems and move towards #socialjustice Engage with #equity work. 

📅 Interested in learning MORE and getting a customized plan for you or your educators? Set up a FREE call with me to discuss your personalized plan. https://tr.ee/hdwhOsdTkf

Transcript

0:32

Hello everyone. And welcome to another episode of the dragon fly rising podcast with me, your host, Dr. Tammy Dean. I am so excited today. To just bring a little announcement. Um, I've been thinking a lot about this podcast and it has launched in such an amazing way., in 2023 and in 2024, I'm going to, I'm going to shift it up a little bit. I just wanted to give you a heads up as the listener. I'm going to be moving to and pray with me and be with me. Um, this is a big task, but I am looking start posting weekly. Podcast episodes. to really dive into the work. Around equity and education and thinking about what certain concepts are and how you can, start putting those into action. Inside your classrooms inside your schools, and really begin facilitating those spaces. So, but I am of course, still going to have some guests. So those will be some extras, throughout the month. Having a guest podcast episode. Um, We'll look and see once or twice a month. I kind of get a flow for how it's going, because I absolutely love highlighting and sharing the work that educators are doing in our educational spaces. So I'm really excited about this shift and this change and. Please share this podcast with other educators that you know, so our reach and our influence, to promote equity in education. Can be expanded. Am really excited about our episode for today. I want to come back to the basics. I discussed this a little bit. In the community episode. Around awareness and how awareness and equity is really the starting point. For this work. Um, And so awareness. Is really, very much like what it sounds like it is. The awareness around yourself. Oftentimes I have seen in my experience, people. Trying to. Dig into. Equity work with the best of intentions, but it really becomes somewhat performative or surface level. In that because really. Deep. And essential equity work begins with yourself. And having to do some reflection and interrogation around. Who you are to start with, because if we're not having an understanding around self and the different components that make up. Yourself. It is challenging. To really reflect and see. And acknowledge. What others are experiencing. And. To have a really good dialogue to really move into deeper work where we're looking and analyzing systems and structures. Uh, how our own life experience influences our understanding. And interpretation. And our experience. Of those systems and structures. Is really important. Because we all come with this intersectionality. Right. And intersectionality is, is just the overlapping of. Our self and our multitude of identities, that frame who we are. So for example, I identify as a cisgender female. I'm a mother, I'm an educator. I'm an aunt. I'm a daughter. And I could keep going on. Right. There's a lot of different identities. That I can encapsulate, right. I am a multi-ethnic multi-racial person. And that is actually a really important part. Because it influences. How I see the world. Right. And even in that space, There were challenges. With that identity, especially growing up when I did. And I've, I've talked about that too, in the meet Dr. Tammy episode. Um, I also can recognize. That I've also come from a space of privilege. The educational environments, I had access to the ability to continue to go to school. But then, you know, at the same time I was working on my doctorate as a single mom with two small children. My, my kids were three and four when I was working on my doctorate. And then there's the historical concepts of like a lot of my family. Right. So I'm not going to dive in too much around myself, but I just, I share that to give you an example of. How there is an intersectionality between all of those pieces and. Knowing and identifying all of those parts of my identity. Really helps me. Recognize. Bias as it presents itself in my life and interactions and. I want to, I want to take a moment and talk about bias. Okay. Because. There's a couple different types, right? There's explicit bias. There's implicit bias. My personal bias. Humans in general. Just because of the nature of how we function. We tend to try to categorize. We want to group things, because that is part of how we make sense of our world. Okay. So to have biases, to be human. The important piece here. Is knowing and understanding what my bias is. And recognizing it so I can make a change or intentionally. Counteract. That bias. So I may have some explicit bias and you may have some, and you know, I'm not going to. You don't need to tell me here, but right. I want you to think about what that is and you, you could recognize it because you, you can feel the reaction inside yourself when a certain group of someones, when a certain something happens in a certain way. And. Your reaction in your person is like, Ugh. Right. No. That's something to attend to. Because that's potentially a bias when you start thinking or grouping. Using they. Or. I hear this a lot in educational spaces. Those kids. Okay, who are those? Quotes right kids. And if you start noticing how often. You say things like that around groups of people. You'll start to notice those biases. Okay. And sometimes. Those biases are so implicit because they're ingrained given. The social cultural, political atmosphere within which we all live. Right. So there are social structures. That exist in, and I'm just going to talk about the United States here for a moment, right? Um, Within the United States. And. Those systems have influenced. How we move in or act with the world, whether or not. We agree. With those policies and structures or not, they have influenced us. So example, colonialism. Right. Is one of those. Uh, patriarchy. Is one of those. Right. Those systems have influenced us. From birth because they exist in the larger society. So you're seeing a lot of pushback. Around a lot of these systems and structures. Okay. And the important part about all of this is I have awareness. I'm starting to reflect and think about myself. And now I'm starting to see and notice and wonder and ask questions. About the others around me. So. Oftentimes. People think colorblindness. Is the way to go. I hear things like I don't see color. I see people. I don't care if my students are red, yellow, purple, polka dot, or whatever. And. I believe. This comes from a good place of intention. And it is something we need to change. Because colorblindness. Is not allowing the opportunity to see. And acknowledge and interact with the whole person. With whom you're speaking about. So if you don't see. The racial, ethnic, cultural, social. Identities. Of your students or your staff, if you're a leader. Or your staff and students. You're not going to be able. To really make change. Because all of those pieces of someone's identity is an important and essential component. And. My belief around why this exists is because it's uncomfortable. It feels uncomfortable. To have some of these conversations because it's countered narrative. To the social structures in which you. Are surrounded by every day. And my task to you is to sit in your discomfort. Because part of this work is being. Uncomfortable, especially if you come from the dominant culture, it's going to feel uncomfortable. And on the other side of discomfort. And fear. Is growth, an opportunity. So just a couple of things. For you to think about. You know, a long, a close cousin as I'll call it. Of implicit bias. Our microaggressions. And microaggressions are. You know, and, and Dr. Kendi says this really well in his book right. He doesn't. He doesn't like the term microaggressions because they're really not small. They're big. They're they're big. Infractions and. It's. Those micro-aggressions that show up? And you need to start becoming aware of right. It's how we use language. And, and our words. You know, you may call one certain group of people. Oh, there they have a strong voice there being such a great leader. And then if that same. Tone behavior. Presence. Is seen from another group of people. They are disrespectful. They're loud. They're Not humble. They don't know when to be quiet. Right there disruptive. And you see this use of language. Consistently. in schools, out of schools. And so my second challenge to you is to try to notice. Interrupt and shift those microaggressions. Because the noticing and shifting is going to be one of the. most important pieces. I talked a little bit about being discomfort. And, and. That is great. It is okay. And sometimes. A lot of people try to move through that and they do a lot of reading. And learning and. Reading and learning and using resources. Is amazing. And I want you to continue to do that. And as you know, I share multiple books and texts and things like that. Of. Authors that. Are doing this work or sharing this great work. And if you need some more, please send me a DM. And reach out to me and I'm happy to share some, some resources with you as well. But. Reading is great. And I just wanna say, and. Action is the goal. So, what are you going to put in action? From what you are learning about yourself in awareness. What are you going to put an action? As you learn about bias as you learn about social systems and structures that cause an equities. Right. What is the action? And I talk a lot about using your voice and how to use your voice. And I'm going to, I'm going to give some clear examples in, in a, in a future episode. So tune in and stay in for that. Right. But ask yourself, how does injustice exist around me? And in my spaces. So you're going to name in equity and the injustice. Right. And then. We're going to think about how to take action. So, to help you do this, I am actually going to share a free resource out on my Instagram. So please head over to my Instagram dragon fly rising LLC. And find my post comments. And get the resource to help move through one. Awareness around your own identity. So it's going to have some exercises there for you. to do that. I will write some common definitions of some of the things I've shared today. just so we're all talking on the same language. an opportunity to reflect and then take action. So I'm going to lay it all out for you. how to start moving through some of the things I've talked about in today's episode. So again, head on over to dragonfly, rising LLC on Instagram. Download your free resource. And if you are interested in learning more or a personalized opportunity to do this work, please connect with me and set up your free discovery call. So it has been such a pleasure talking with you all today. Looking forward to our next episode, as we continue to build on. Our equity work and equity systems.