Educating for Equity and Inclusion
Educating for Equity and Inclusion
As post-secondary classrooms become increasingly diverse, instructors must ensure that their practices work effectively for all students in the room. In inclusive classrooms, students from all backgrounds feel welcomed and valued, particularly those students whose race, ethnicity, gender, sexuality, nationality, or perceived ability might have led them to feel excluded in other classrooms. In equitable classrooms, all students experience a curriculum that feels relevant and engaging to them, and students are able achieve their academic goals with support from their instructor.
This call to create inclusive and equitable classrooms raises a number of questions. How can we build connections with students both at the beginning of and throughout a course? What restrictive hierarchies might exist in post-secondary classrooms, and what can be done to disrupt them? How can we invite all students into the classroom conversation? Which materials and activities invite all learners to share their knowledge and learn from their peers? In this module, we’ll get some answers to these questions as we examine pedagogical techniques that help students feel welcomed, valued, and supported.
Module Pathways
The four pathways in this module highlight instructional moves that help educators create equitable and inclusive classrooms where all students succeed. Each of the pathways below lays out a series of pedagogical moves. By following the steps in each pathway, instructors can see how the different moves work together to bring equity and inclusivity to the forefront of any course.
Read Our New IM Book
In May, 2023, Harvard Education Press published Instructional Moves for Powerful Teaching in Higher Education. Supplementing IM website content with additional interviews and insights, this book -- reviewed here in Teachers College Record -- contains a toolkit of strategies to cultivate safe, inclusive learning spaces that encourage all students to do ambitious work.
Featured Faculty
Paola Arlotta
Professor of Stem Cell and Regenerative Biology
Course details:
"Got (New) Brain? The Evolution of Brain Regeneration"; Harvard College; 22 students
Relevant quote:
“I try to draw in students in a gentle way. Then, bit by bit, even a student who’s more shy at the beginning sees that everybody can raise their hands -- that I don’t really bite.”
Gretchen Brion-Meisels
Lecturer on Education
Course details:
"Partnering with Youth on Educational Research and Practice"; Harvard Graduate School of Education; 30 students
Relevant quote:
"My goal for the class is that we will grapple with hard questions that come up when you try to partner with youth…I want us to grapple with questions that are authentically hard for everyone in the room."
Brett Flehinger
Lecturer on History
Course details:
American Populisms: From Thomas Jefferson to the Tea Party + Trump; Harvard College; 38 students
Relevant quote:
"I often refer to the class as a “collective brain.” What we get out of a class is what we all put into it. I want students to have that kind of shared ownership."
Tina Grotzer
Principal Research Scientist in Education
Course details:
"Applying Cognitive Science Research: Principles to Learning and Teaching"; Harvard Graduate School of Education; 40 students
Relevant quote:
"Often I’m making instructional moves and then I'll tell students why I made the move. Sometimes I'll tell them why I didn't do something else because that's often just as informative."
Robert Kegan
William and Miriam Meehan Research Professor in Adult Learning and Professional Development
Course details:
"Adult Development"; Harvard Graduate School of Education; ~200 students
Relevant quote:
"One of the great glories of a class is that you build up a relationship with people over many weeks, and they come to count on you, and you get the dividends of those many weeks."
Dan Levy
Senior Lecturer in Public Policy
Course details:
"Advanced Quantitative Methods"; Harvard Kennedy School; 74 students
Relevant quote:
"I never want a student to not participate in class just because they feel they don't have the right answer."
Jane Mansbridge
Charles F. Adams Professor of Political Leadership and Democratic Value
Course details:
"Democratic Theory"; Harvard Kennedy School; ~30 students
Relevant quote:
"I don't see it so much as being immersed in uncertainty during the class discussion as I do fleshing out some of the possibilities and getting excited about those possibilities."
Timothy Patrick McCarthy
Lecturer on History and Literature
Course details:
"Stories of Slavery & Freedom"; Harvard College; 16 students
Relevant quote:
"Students are getting the most out of their learning when I can relinquish control of the classroom to them. But the only way to get to that place is being really engaged and devoted to modeling behaviors at the outset."
Christina “V” Villarreal
Lecturer on Education
Course details:
"Ethnic Studies"; Harvard Graduate School of Education; 23 students
Relevant quote:
"I'm a teacher, but I'm also a learner in this space. I'm a speaker, but I'm also a listener. In every curricular and pedagogical move I make, I am trying to communicate that philosophy."
Barbara Cockrill
Harold Amos Academy Associate Professor of Medicine
Course details:
"Homeostasis I"; Harvard Medical School; 40 students
Relevant quote:
"Our goal with cases is to have students come in and do the hard part of learning in the classroom, which is the application, the thinking, the wrestling with the material."
Todd Rakoff
Byrne Professor of Administrative Law
Course details:
"Legislation & Regulation"; Harvard Law School; 80 students
Relevant quote:
"I want students to build bridges from what they can do now to what is on the opposite shore. With some students, you can build the bridge pretty far back from the shore, for some you've got to get very close to it, and for others you have to say, 'Here's what the middle of the river looks like.'"
Eric Mazur
Balkanski Professor of Physics and Applied Physics
Course details:
"Physics as a Foundation for Science and Engineering"; School of Engineering and Applied Sciences; 60 students
Relevant quote:
"I thought it'd be nice if I could somehow return to my students the ownership of learning, so that they're not learning because I tell them it's good for them but because they actually want to."
