Equity & Inclusion Institute

Monday, June 21–Thursday, June 24, 2021
This year's institute will be virtual!

About

About the Equity & Inclusion Institute

Designed to promote personal and pedagogical growth, the Equity & Inclusion Institute encourages innovative approaches to implementing equity-minded education and emboldens educators to disrupt the status quo in the service of creating transformational change.

A supportive and brave space that provides

Foundational knowledge of social justice and equity to inform your teaching practice
Concrete strategies and tools for implementing a social justice educational model into your classroom and pedagogy
An opportunity to practice self-care while exploring your own identities and biases in the company of other educators committed to creating equitable educational environments

Why attend?

To gain a nuanced understanding of systemic oppression
To examine your own identity in the context of your teaching practice
To identify steps you can take in your everyday practice towards collective liberation
To build a community of committed social justice educators
To learn how to implement a critically conscious pedagogy
To gain a rich foundation for further learning and growth in these areas
To learn how to incorporate self-care into your social justice practice

Who is this event for?

This institute is suitable for all PreK–12 educators, especially:

Teachers interested in integrating a social justice framework into their teaching practice
Counselors hoping to better understand how to support equality and inclusion in their schools
Administrators hoping to transform their school and better support their faculty/staff engaging in this work

A Note about the Virtual Format

While we will be shifting to the Zoom platform this year, the Institute is still a place for you to be immersed in a dynamic, supportive, social justice community. With that in mind, it is important that you plan to attend the entire institute. Please commit to being available each of the four days from 10 a.m. to 3:30 p.m. PDT. This timeframe will include both on and off-screen time. You should also expect to dedicate a modest amount of additional time each of the first three days, for self-directed “homework” that will include a combination of reading, viewing and reflecting.

Objectives

By the end of the Institute, educators will

Have a working understanding of how systemic oppression functions and how the various forms of oppression intersect
Have explored, analyzed and applied how the power dynamics between privileged and targeted identity and cultural groups manifest and function to maintain oppression
Understand the necessity of doing one's own internal work as it relates to issues of identity, bias, power, and privilege
Have had the opportunity to look at their current teaching practice and set goals for incorporating social justice more meaningfully into their daily teaching
Have the opportunity to connect with other educators as a means to further understanding, provide inspiration, and promote healing

A poster with the words "Together we stand" with fists crossed across the middle

Social justice is always grounded in transformation
At times, this transformation may be slow, the way water wears through stone – inevitable and unceasing. Other times, transformation is abrupt and startling like the sudden rush of air when one surfaces from beneath a wave – the effect both life-affirming and discombobulating. Whatever its place, transformation is ultimately the goal of social justice and social change movements. While these movements often seek legislative and economic change, at thier core, they are seeking to transform the hearts and minds of people and the very fabric of that culture. That said, we also know that when it comes to issues of privilege, oppression, and justice, there is always room for growth and a need to deepen our practice as educators.

What Participants Say

The Equity and Inclusion Institute was the best professional development training week I have participated in as an educator with 10+ years of international experience. The institute was conducted in a manner that made it possible for anyone to access the information regardless of their experience with these thought-provoking topics. I left with a tool kit ready to apply to my own teaching methods and infuse into our school's curriculum."

Megan Shelton
Middle School Teacher and Spanish Curriculum Coordinator at Spring Hill School

The Nueva Equity and Inclusion Institute was a unique experience that only lasted a few days, yet has left an ongoing impact in my Diversity Equity and Inclusion (DEI) work. As part of a DEI committee at my school, I find myself often sharing in meetings or proposing new ideas with the starter sentence of, "We could try something I learned last summer at Nueva." The facilitation and tone of the entire institute was so welcoming and engaging, all while exploring hard topics such as the various systems of oppression and how we, as educators, can teach and live in more critically conscious ways. I value the time I had at the Institute and continue to use many of the resources, knowledge, network and language I received there."

Reyna Smith
Middle School Counselor at Francis W. Parker School

The Equity and Inclusion Institute gave me the opportunity to explore how systems of oppression can affect both my life and everyone else's lives in America. Through this exploration of the ways that we are divided, I found myself feeling incredibly connected to the other attendees – almost as if the semi-transparent curtains of our daily lived experiences were able to be drawn to the side after they had been so clearly identified. This connectedness, this feeling of spontaneous community – that's what makes me want to come back."

Sam Modest
Sxith-Grade Teacher, The Nueva School

As a white educator, this was the most informative, reflective, and empowering workshop on equity and inclusion I've ever been to!"

Alice Jessup
Second-Grade Teacher, San Francisco Day School

Attending the Institute was life-changing for me and has led to some immediate programmatic shifts at my school. Although the institute was designed for educators, I believe any person would benefit from attending.”

Jenny Rinn
Director of Lower School, The Brandeis School of San Francisco

What a wonderful week! The Institute allowed us to delve deeply into a range of Social Justice issues and how they relate to our work as educators. It also provided opportunities for individual introspection, personal reflection, and the building of strong connections and relationships with fellow educators and fellow diversity practitioners across the country. From personal stories to specific classroom tools, it was truly an enriching experience to be able to learn from so many others."

Ben Sobol-Chang
High School Spanish Teacher, The Nueva School

"The Equity and Inclusion Institute provided a great space for learning, reflection and action-planning focused in the areas of diversity, equity, and inclusion. The format of the institute is one that is non-judgemental, meeting participants where they are at and giving them tools to return confidently to their school communities with tangible skills. I still keep in touch with many of the participants that attended. That alone speaks to the safe environment that the Equity and Inclusion Institute provided."

Ralinda Watts
Director of Multiculturalism and Inclusion, Buckley School

I was so grateful for the space that Alegria, Sheri, and Alison created each day. From opening activities to closing conversations, I was consistently made to feel challenged, inspired, and thoughtful around deep questions of identity, race, class and gender. I loved connecting with the other participants and have continued working with them during the school year."

Tom McFadden
Middle School Science Teacher, The Nueva School

The Equity and Inclusion Institute is geared to beginners and experienced diversity practitioners and educators. The institute resonated for me because I appreciated the diversity within the facilitators and the topics presented. It was interesting, refreshing and reaffirming to hear various lenses of experiences presented at the conference while discussing the many layers of systemic racism and how best to dismantle. The practical exercises are wonderful takeaways I have incorporated in my work this year. The Equity and Inclusion Institute is a powerful week of learning and reflecting with a wonderful group of people."

Latoya Allen
Associate Director Lower School Admissions & Director of Community Engagement, Riverdale Country School

The Institute was life-changing for me. As a white woman who wanted very much to join the discussion about race and class, I didn’t know how and where to enter the conversation. Attending this institute gave me the language and understanding of systemic oppression to help me see the role I could play in affecting change.”

Tristen Strum
Second-Grade Teacher, San Francisco Day School

I learned so much in a safe, supportive environment. I feel empowered to start my school year with this important, necessary information to help create an even more inclusive classroom community!”

Diana Friedman
First-Grade Teacher, The Nueva School

Principles

"There is no such thing as a neutral education."

- Paulo Freire, Pedagogy of the Oppressed, 1970

Renowned educator and philosopher Paulo Freire believed education either prepares citizens to conform to current systems of inequitable power and privilege—therefore perpetuating those systems—or, it can serve as “a practice of freedom,” preparing citizens to challenge systems of oppression and “participate in the transformation of their world.”

With Freire’s work as our foundation, we propose an educator activist framework that includes seven "Principles of Critically Conscious Education." We believe that educator activists must actively confront the injustices of the past in order to reveal the inequities of the present and boldly envision and build a collective future together.

Principles of Critically Conscious Education:

Approach issues of identity and equity with courage and curiosity.
Understand the ways that systemic oppression was historically created and is currently maintained, resulting in present societal inequities.
Recognize the ways your social positionality informs your educational practice including your methods, materials, perspectives, reactions, and interactions.
Identify how current social inequities manifest within your classroom, school, community, and the lived experiences of your students and colleagues.
Boldly move beyond what is; to radically re-envision what could be.
Commit to critically conscious practices that intentionally and consistently uphold counter-narratives to systemic oppression.
Understand that this work is grounded in radical joy, healing, dignity and love in the service of the Beloved Community.

Gallery

Registration & Financial Awards

June 25 Add-on Workshop

"Design the Impossible: Using Liberatory Design to Create More Equitable Systems"
Friday, June 25, 2021

This add-on workshop, open to participants of either the Design Thinking Institute or the Equity and Inclusion Institute, will introduce liberatory design as a means to create transformational change.

We believe that many core issues of inequity are about access to power—where you live, where you learn, whom you love, and the color of your skin all inform how much access you have to power. You will begin to develop "power literacy" by using systems thinking to better understand how power functions in our society.

Through brainstorming and hands-on practice, we will utilize liberatory design practices and mindsets to consider how to redesign more equitable systems to redistribute power in schools, communities, and the nation. Our work will be fundamentally grounded in a mindset of joy, optimism, and liberation as we firmly believe that we must embody the world we seek to create.