October 2020: EDI, antiracism, decolonization, and diversity statements for faculty hiring

Meeting Facilitators: Dr. Meghan Corella and Dr. Ryuko Kubota

This caucus will focus on hiring practices, particularly diversity statements, which are one among many concrete strategies for evaluating candidates’ commitments and contributions to advancing social, racial, and linguistic justice.

Below are the discussion questions and materials that will guide this session. Please take some time to look through these before our meeting.

(Optional reading about race-based caucuses: For those who haven’t attended a race-based caucus before and want to learn more about them, here is one good resource.)

Discussion questions:

  1. What do we mean by equity, diversity, and inclusion (EDI)? Social justice? Racial justice? Antiracism? Indigeneity? Decoloniality?

 1a) How do these ideas relate to one another and to the ways we describe LLED’s mission and commitments in the following 2 texts?:

  • Text A (from recent job ads):

“The Department of Language and Literacy Education (LLED, www.lled.educ.ubc.ca) is a vibrant, multidisciplinary group of outstanding researchers committed to excellence in scholarship, teaching, community engagement, and professional leadership. Our research and teaching are responsive to Canada’s multicultural, multilingual contexts and the changing global and transnational influences on languages, literacies and cultures as well as Indigenous priorities. Department members engage in research collaborations with educational communities at the local, national, and international levels to advance theoretical understandings, practical knowledge, and the study of the teaching and learning of language, literacy, literature and culture in their broadest sense. A major emphasis of the Department is on issues of equity and justice in a range of educational contexts and across a range of cultures. The department contributes to the Faculty’s Teacher Education Program and Master of international Educational Technology, Early Childhood Education, and offers Master’s and Ph.D. programs in Literacy Education, Teaching English as a Second Language, and Modern Language Education.”

 

“The Department of Language and Literacy Education is a community of educators committed to social justice in scholarship, teaching, and service. We are interested in the many ways that humans make meaning through language and other symbolic resources. In our courses and our research, we see language and literacy as activities that make consensus possible, but that may also lead to inequity and injustice. In addition, conscious of ever-changing technologies for knowledge mobilization and the need for multiple and malleable literacies, we study and teach communication as a multimodal activity.

Our commitment is enacted through our study and teaching, especially in five interrelated areas of interest and expertise:

  • Language, literacy, and literary learning across the lifespan and lifeworlds.
  • Pedagogies, digital media, and learning in networked multimodal, multilingual contexts.
  • Theories, technologies and methodologies for the study of literacies and languages.
  • Critical studies in languages and literacies.
  • Creative studies in literacies and languages.”

 

  1. Bearing in mind the ideas generated by our discussion of question #1, what would—and should—you/we expect to see in job candidates’ diversity statements and other application materials? How might we make these expectations clear to applicants and to search committees?

2a) To begin, consider the following examples from job ads in various universities and departments in which it is a common practice to require diversity statements:

2b) Next, consider some excerpts from example anonymized and redacted diversity statements (from https://quod.lib.umich.edu/cgi/t/text/idx/c/currents/17387731.0001.112/–promise-of-diversity-statements-insights-and-a-framework?rgn=main;view=fulltext except where otherwise noted):

  • Example 1: “Because I have never experienced, nor will ever experience, the negative consequences of sexism, racism, or other forms of systemic discrimination, the only way I can know what these consequences are is to listen to those who have faced them; without defensiveness, without denial, and without trying to rationalize the situation.”
  • Example 2: “As an educator in both public and private institutions with diverse student demographics, I made explicit efforts in my courses to bring intersectional discussions through classroom dialogues but also group projects. For example, the social observation assignment on the campus racial climate or the mini-ethnographic study on gender fluidity acceptance in students’ dormitories were designed to help highlight subtle forms of discursive racism and transphobia in the everyday life.”
  • Example 3: “My inclusion could serve to tear down certain stereotypes that present people of color as academically subpar when in fact, their lack of participation could be linked to such factors as exclusion, poverty, general lack of awareness etc. I strongly believe that mentoring would help significantly to inspire the younger generation of minorities towards rising above all preconceived stereotypes.”
  • Example 4: “My next project, an ethnographic study of mentoring relationships across two communities – a predominantly white, middle-class suburb and a racially diverse, working-class urban neighborhood – builds on my prior research exploring support for marginalized youth. I plan to build on the insights gained through this research to work with the university and local groups to cultivate more productive pathways and practices for mentors and mentees.”
  • Example 5 (from https://physicalsciences.ucsd.edu/_files/examples-submitted-diversity-statements.pdf): “As a Latino immigrant who lived in X, Y, and the United States, I am sensitive to the challenges that ethnic minorities face in academia. Thus, over the last years I have become determined to act towards creating an environment that is more inviting towards underrepresented minorities, women, and socioeconomically underprivileged students which I will expand as a Professor….As a faculty member at UC San Diego, I would propose the following activities in pursuit of a more diverse academic body: • As a research mentor, I would embrace and welcome Latino, African American, gay, and women students and postdocs into my group. • I would create support programs for Latino undergraduate students in STEM, inviting fellow Latino faculty, postdocs, and graduate students to offer guidance and support to upcoming undergraduate students…” [lists 3 additional areas]
  • Example 6 (from https://physicalsciences.ucsd.edu/_files/examples-submitted-diversity-statements.pdf): “My time as a graduate student and postdoctoral researcher provided a well-rounded experience working with wonderful people from all backgrounds, a leap from the small, mostly white southern town outside of X, where I grew up. I thrived living and working in one of the most culturally diverse areas in the United States while pursuing my doctorate at Y University. At Y I was a mentor for three years for freshmen and sophomore female students as part of the Women in Science and Engineering (WSE) program and served as the lead instructor for the Y atmospheric science section, which was developed to foster underrepresented minority middle and high school student interest in atmospheric science. As founder of Z atmospheric chemistry outreach program on indoor and outdoor air quality and current mentor of three outstanding female graduate student researchers, one Hispanic and another with diagnosed narcolepsy, and a post-doctoral researcher from D, I have learned how to effectively communicate with students from different educational backgrounds, abilities/disabilities, and from backgrounds that are very different from my own.”