Spotlights 2022
Educators Advancing Equity
As part of our year-end evaluation, NorCal ELC asked participating educators how their understanding of advancing equity evolved over the course of the year. Many responses were like the ones that follow and show real change from equity learning within 21CSLA. I hope these educator statements inspire your equity work.
• When I started NorCal ELC, I had a sense of what equity meant, but it has really evolved and
solidified in my mind over the two years. There are so many different kinds of equity and finding the inequities in my school has been eye-opening.
• We have to accept the fact that we all have blindspots and include biases that negatively impact students. Educators must be intentional about uncovering biases, bringing them into the light, and honestly working to end them. It's the only way to establish a truly democratic education system.
• That my filter, experience, and perspective have to be worked on, continually re-iterated to better uplift and empower our brothers and sisters who have had to push hard(er) against systems and "isms"... that I don't know what's best necessarily, but that through continued learning and proximity and connection, we can be of help to one another.
• I feel like I already knew a good amount about equity before, but this year helped me further that understanding specifically the things we do in education, subconsciously or otherwise, that are inequitable for many of our marginalized students.
• I honestly hadn't thought about equity much prior to NorCal ELC. Now, I look at everything I do
with the lens of "is this equitable for everyone?" I have come to realize that it means so much
more than having diverse books on the shelves or using preferred pronouns.
• I have always felt equity is important but I have been able to develop a clearer vision of how to do the work to advance it.
• I feel that my equity lens is always on. Before, I would have to think to review something with that lens and now, it is the only way I look at things.
• Equity means so much more than being equal. It's more about giving all of our students and staff the ability to succeed and thrive than it is about providing equal opportunities.