The Center for Innovation in Teaching & Learning maintains a number of Emerson-specific resources for the creation of course syllabi. Additionally, on this page you'll find information on classroom best-practices and Teaching for Diversity & Inclusion. The materials included in this guide are intended to supplement materials available via the CITL website.
In November 2020, Hossna Sadat Ahadi and Luis A. Guerrero, both of Palomar College, submitted an article to the Academic Senate for California Community Colleges. Their article begins: "The reality today is that black indigenous people of color (BIPOC) are finding themselves having to lead anti-racism conversations and actions to change their institutions. Simply having white allies and college administration holding town-halls and meetings and listening to the BIPOC community is no longer enough. Academic institutions should all have a call to action to address racial inequities and to be accountable to meet the transformational change that society needs."
In order to "engender discussion and consideration," Ahadi and Guerrero also include a list of reflection questions to guide faculty interested in implementing antiracist pedagogy and creating course syllabi within a "decolonized and anti-racist framework." The following questions are drawn directly from their statement.
To reconstruct a course syllabus within a decolonized and anti-racist framework, faculty should reflect upon the following:
Teaching of Psychology 33, no. 4 (January 1, 2006): 228–31.
Abstract: This article reports on the development and use of an inclusive process to select a departmental textbook for general psychology. It describes a method for developing department-specific instruments to narrow the available textbook choices and an in-class textbook trial used in the final selection. Reported advantages of this method include "buy-in" by faculty, student evaluation of the books and ancillary materials, and classroom testing. We also provide several recommendations to assist other departments in employing our rubric.
We encourage you to consider writing your own Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion statement for your syllabi or course policies. Anecdotally, we know that students see boiler-plate syllabus language as window-dressing, rather than identifying it as an intentional commitment on the part of faculty to be transparent and accountable. By adapting boilerplate language to the specifics of your course and outcomes, and reminding students of that connection throughout the semester, we make such statements meaningful for our students.
In an effort to establish more inclusive language practices that recognize all students’ experiences and
identities related to gender, the Rothenberger Institute provides the following statement to enrolled
students in every course syllabus. This statement outlines the Rothenberger Institute’s practices for using
gender-neutral language and pronouns, as well as gender binary language use to accurately report the data
and research cited from relevant, published findings.
This rubric for creating an anti-racist classroom environment was created by Cole M. James for the Otis College of Art and Design in Los Angeles, CA.
Link: https://otis.libguides.com/tlc/anti_racist_rubric
Universal Design is the design of products, environments, and communication to be usable by all people, to the greatest extent possible, without adaptation. To practice Universal Design for Learning (UDL) is to design a course that is useful by default to students with visual, hearing, or other challenges. By doing so, your course becomes more useful to ALL students. For example, captioning a video helps English language learners, students who are watching while on a bus, and students who need extra help to reviewing unfamiliar terms.
An accessible course provides all students the opportunity to acquire the same information, engage in the same interactions, and enjoy the same services with substantially equivalent ease of use. Canvas as a platform is 508-compliant, with appropriately contrasting colors, clean designs, and tab-navigable menus. However, it’s up to you to ensure that the content you create within Canvas is accessible.
This page contains the info you need to make your course compliant with the accessibility guidelines found in Emerson's Teaching Guidelines During Covid-19.
Self-Paced Canvas Course: Getting Your Materials Online (ITG)
Each module includes:
An Overview of one of the three UDL principles, with central questions and objectives prompted by that principle.
UDL-based Strategies that address specific needs of international and multilingual learners.
Technical tips for implementing each strategy in your own courses.
Tools & resources to expand your UDL repertoire.
Thousand Oaks: SAGE Publications, 2020. Accessed April 13, 2021. ProQuest Ebook Central.
Description:
When it comes to the hard work of reconstructing our schools into places where every student has the opportunity to succeed, Mirko Chardin and Katie Novak are absolutely convinced that teachers should serve as our primary architects. And by “teachers” they mean legions of teachers working in close collaboration. After all, it’s teachers who design students’ learning experiences, who build student relationships . . . who ultimately have the power to change the trajectory of our students’ lives. Equity by Design is intended to serve as a blueprint for teachers to alter the all-too-predictable outcomes for our historically under-served students. A first of its kind resource, the book makes the critical link between social justice and Universal Design for Learning (UDL) so that we can equip students (and teachers, too) with the will, skill, and collective capacity to enact positive change. Inside you’ll find: Concrete strategies for designing and delivering a culturally responsive, sustainable, and equitable framework for all students Rich examples, case studies, and implementation spotlights of educators, students (including Parkland survivors), and programs that have embraced a social justice imperative Evidence-based application of best practices for UDL to create more inclusive and equitable classrooms A flexible format to facilitate use with individual teachers, teacher teams, and as the basis for whole-school implementation “Every student,” Mirko and Katie insist, “deserves the opportunity to be successful regardless of their zip code, the color of their skin, the language they speak, their sexual and/or gender identity, and whether or not they have a disability.” Consider Equity by Design a critical first step forward in providing that all-important opportunity. “Our calling is to drop our egos, commit to removing barriers, and treat our learners with the unequivocal respect and dignity they deserve.”
Designed by the Center for Urban Education (CUE), the "online syllabus review guide is intended to help instructors review often taken-for-granted syllabi content through a race-conscious lens and identify areas that can be leveraged to better support students from minoritized racial/ethnic groups." The Syllabus Review tool "is an inquiry tool for promoting racial and ethnic equity and equity-minded practice."
The Syllabus Review Guide includes five self-paced learning sections. These sections promote faculty inquiry into teaching approaches and practices, by asking faculty to engage in self-assessment from a racial/ethnic equity lens. This self-assessment is intended to help faculty consider changes that result in more equitable teaching approaches.
Description drawn from "How does Syllabus Review work?, CUE Syllabus Review Tool.
The Peralta Equity Rubric is a research-based course (re)design evaluation instrument to help teachers make online course experiences more equitable for all students. The rubric’s criteria include: addressing students’ access to technology and different types of support (both academic and non-academic); increasing the visibility of the instructor’s commitment to inclusion; addressing common forms of bias (e.g., implicit bias, image and representation bias, interaction bias); helping students make connections (e.g., between course topics and their lives; with the other students); and following universal design for learning principles.
The Peralta Equity Team periodically reviews and revises the rubric to address feedback and updates to equity-related research. The current rubric was launched in October 2020.