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Putting Equity Into Practice: Open Pedagogy

Created By:
Achieving the Dream (ATD) in partnership with Every Learner Everywhere® diciembre 2023

Topic: Effective Teaching Practices Equity in Higher Education Evidence-based Teaching Practices Inclusive Course Design

Role: Administrators Faculty Instructional Support Staff

Open pedagogy is an instructional approach that views learning as a participatory process that builds and refines as students and faculty actively engage in understanding the discipline. Faculty and learners move beyond a content-centered approach (Cronin, 2017) and engage in the creation and sharing of learning content. Rather than the familiar process of broadcasting information to students who then complete quizzes or papers to demonstrate understanding, with open pedagogy, students interact with the content, faculty, outside experts, and each other; relate learning to their lives; and place lessons within a wider social context to create artifacts of value beyond the classroom.

The student-centered focus and flexibility of open pedagogy makes it easy to approach it with an intentional focus on cultural responsiveness, supporting equitable student experiences and outcomes. Learners bring their whole selves to the learning environment (Pascivicius & Irvine, 2019) and Black, Latinx, Indigenous, and first-generation students bring their cultural identities and lived experiences with them into the context of the course, rather than leaving their authentic selves “at the door” as is the case with status-quo teaching methodologies. Being able to choose course design, content, assignments, assessments, and instructional approaches based on the context of the learners and the current events of the times allows students to relate all areas of the course to their lives and equitizes their experiences and outcomes.

This guide is designed to support faculty with operationalizing open pedagogy through a culturally responsive lens. The three main strategies presented are:

Renewable assignments
Co-created and student-generated content
Open assessments

Download Putting Equity into Practice: Open Pedagogy

Watch a webinar on the resource, featuring faculty who practice open pedagogy.

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Putting Equity Into Practice: Equity-Minded Professional Learning

Equity-Minded Professional Learning cover

diciembre 2023

Through professional learning, faculty can develop their capacity to be change agents both inside and outside of the classroom. This guide clarifies what it means to create opportunities for professional learning that are explicitly equity-minded.

Putting Equity Into Practice: Social Justice Education

diciembre 2023

Advancing social justice in education requires establishing educational spaces that foster students’ critical consciousness and ability to analyze systems, policies, and practices that lead to inequitable and unjust experiences and outcomes. A social justice approach to education involves two strategies that will be featured in this guide: anti-racist teaching and abolitionist teaching.

Putting Equity Into Practice: Culturally Responsive Teaching and Learning

Culturally Responsive Teaching cover page

diciembre 2023

Culturally responsive pedagogy is a framework that is inclusive of culturally responsive and relevant teaching, and culturally affirming and sustaining instructional methodologies that validate and engage students’ cultural identities. These practical instructional strategies and practices guide the implementation of culturally responsive teaching and learning into educational spaces.

Recommended citation:

Kinnison, S., Keith, H.R., Garth-McCullough, R. & Hampton, M. (2023, July) Putting Equity into Practice: Open Pedagogy; Equity-Minded Digital Learning Strategy Guide Series. Every Learner Everywhere®

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