A Process Guide for Equity-centered Instructional Materials

In the constantly and rapidly evolving landscape of higher education, it is important to seek opportunities for continuous evaluation and improvement. The equity review tool is designed for educators striving to create more validating and affirming learning experiences and environments for students who are Black, Latino, Indigenous, poverty-affected, first-generation, non-male-identifying, LGBTQIA+, and/or disabled. To do this well, it is critical to understand the intersectionality of these identities and how that may affect a student’s experience.

One important aspect of creating a more validating learning environment is ensuring that the instructional materials being used in college courses are conceptualized and constructed leveraging equity-minded competencies and processes. Using this tool, educators will be able to develop and evaluate their resources and the language they use to ensure they are asset-based and supportive of a more equitable teaching and learning process.

The equity review tool goes beyond the basics to help educators explore the “why” of a) developing instructional resources that amplify minoritized and marginalized voices and support optimal learning for students of a broad range of diverse backgrounds and b) using asset-based language that privileges, empowers and accurately represents students who have historically been excluded and marginalized in higher education due to their race, cultural background, etc. This tool poses critical questions that help surface and confront privilege, bias, exclusion, and/or misrepresentation and promote the use of equity-minded language. Rather than a simple checklist, the tools, resources, and processes provided are meant to be a continuous journey to enable reflection and discussion as often as possible during the process of creating or revising instructional materials.