Diversity Course Research Articles

Awakening Consciousness: HESA Graduate Students’ Perspectives on Consciousness-Raising Pedagogical Practices

ABSTRACT Despite incorporating diversity coursework into most higher education and student affairs (HESA) graduate programs, HESA graduate students report feeling underprepared to enact social justice work. Current pedagogical approaches introduce students to foundational concepts but fail to develop reflective, justice conscious administrators. This qualitative case study explores what pedagogical practices promote HESA graduate students’ critical consciousness development during a diversity course.

“Doin’ diversity” in teacher education: beginning Black teacher discourses on learning to teach for diversity

The voices of Black preservice teachers are largely missing from discussions about teacher diversity, and one place this is evident is in teacher education diversity coursework. This article shares findings from a qualitative study using critical race methodology with five novice Black teachers’ experiences in teacher education courses focused on diversity in education. Three semi-structured life history interviews were conducted for each teacher and data were analyzed using zoom model analysis. Findings revealed that during their preservice experiences in teacher education diversity courses, Black teachers experience such learning spaces in alienating ways despite entering the program with strong commitments to improving education outcomes for Black children. Findings demonstrate that teacher educators and teacher education programs must raise the expectations for engaged learning in the diversity course in order to better support Black teachers and contribute to diversification of the teaching force in meaningful ways.

Comparing Students’ Multicultural Awareness Development in Online vs. Face-to-Face Diversity Courses Before, During, and After COVID-19

Creating a global workforce is a driving need for our time. Higher education institutions are prioritizing helping students develop an awareness of their own and other cultures, as they are expected to participate in a diverse workforce. This study examines a large data set of learning assessment data for undergraduate students from an agriculture course focused on diversity and social justice, using the Beliefs, Events and Values Inventory (BEVI) instrument to assess the multicultural awareness development of the students. The study compared the impact of the medium of instruction (face-to-face versus online) in helping students develop multicultural awareness. The results revealed that students did not differ much in multicultural awareness across the medium of instruction. Moreover, to understand the multicultural awareness of the students in the pre-COVID period, during COVID and in the post-COVID period, the pre-test BEVI scores of the students were compared using ANOVA. The goal of this analysis was to capture the change in worldview of the students from the pre-COVID period to during COVID and post-COVID periods. The results revealed that pre-test BEVI scores for the pre-COVID period showed a lower degree of multicultural awareness than students during the COVID and post-COVID times. Also, there was no significant difference in the pre-test BEVI scores for the students in the COVID and post-COVID periods. Overall, the study makes important contributions to higher education literature as it reveals that (1) medium has negligible impact on the multicultural awareness of the students, and that (2) student worldviews have shifted significantly since the height of the global pandemic.

Critically Conscious Early and Elementary Educators: Towards Abolitionist Education in Teacher Preparation

How do teacher preparation programs re-culture themselves so that we can supply educational settings with teachers who work toward liberation from racism and other systems of oppression? Abolitionist education is one strategic framework that can be utilized to support this systemic re-culturing. I share my experiences in re-designing and facilitating a diversity course in an early childhood education (ECE) teacher preparation program toward abolitionist education through culturally and historically responsive learning, social justice teaching frameworks, Chicana/Latina feminist philosophy, and abolitionist pedagogy. The course explored four units: Identity, Justice and Anti-Bias, Intergenerational Genius, and Freedom Dreaming and Abolition. In-class and at-home projects included positionality statements, analyzing characteristics of white supremacy culture operating in ECE, studying abolitionist movement organizers, and transforming mandated curriculum based on social justice for young children. In this article, I share the context of the course redesign, my facilitation, and reflexive ideas for moving toward abolitionist education as a field of teacher preparation.

Race and Whiteness in the Research Literature on Diversity Courses, 2000–2022

This paper examines the literature on diversity courses in institutions of higher education to assess how scholars have conceptualized and studied diversity courses, with particular attention to the normative and unmarked nature of whiteness in these works. A review of fifty-seven journal articles and book chapters, published between 2000 and 2022, reveals that more researchers conceptualize diversity courses as multicultural education than as social justice education, with nonrequired diversity courses much more likely than required diversity courses to frame diversity with an anti-racist lens. One of the key findings of this study is the near absence of studies on the content of diversity courses, which makes it difficult to discern whether and how existing courses conceptualize diversity education. The review also reveals that research on diversity education is based largely on the experiences of white students, with researchers seldom prioritizing or even including the experiences of Students of Color in their studies. The findings are clear that most researchers conceptualize diversity courses as an unstated public good for white students rather than an educational right that Students of Color have consistently demanded. This literature review calls attention to the importance of connecting demographic diversity and epistemological diversity—to value, promote, and reward not only representational diversity but also diversity of knowledge.

Messing with the Master Narrative: The Challenges of Challenging Meritocracy in Undergraduate Education “Diversity” Coursework

Higher education is working to diversify the undergraduate curriculum to support critical thinking and promote racial justice—pressing work, particularly at predominantly white colleges and universities. To support students’ critical thinking, we need to better understand their awareness of systemic inequities as they enter and exit undergraduate diversity courses. To inform the development of undergraduate curricula, we use iterative comparative analysis of students’ written work to investigate patterns in their thinking regarding issues of systemic inequalities in U.S. public schools before and after an undergraduate diversity course. We examine patterns in student language as they make sense of systemic inequities using course data that centers historic and systemic inequities in U.S schools. We find that students consider these data within their already-held narratives of meritocracy and individuality, resulting in troubled text regarding the role of race and class privilege, and the responsibility/culpability of systems versus individuals in educational attainment.

Navigating Controversy and Hot Topics in Required Diversity Courses

Navigating Controversy and Hot Topics in Required Diversity Courses

Pedagogical approaches for social justice and diversity in Canadian social work education

ABSTRACT This paper aims to explore social justice and diversity education in Canadian schools of social work. Using an online survey, we invited faculty members to share their teaching experiences in social justice and diversity courses. Participants included 24 faculty members who have taught either undergraduate or graduate students in accredited social work schools across Canada. Using descriptive synthesis and content analysis, the findings revealed various characteristics of social justice and diversity courses, as well as several categories around challenges and supports in teaching social justice and diversity courses. Three challenges are noted: (1) insufficient time to cover social justice and diversity topics with enough breadth and depth; (2) addressing students’ affects and preconceived ideas; and (3) increased burden for faculty members identifying as Black, Indigenous, and people of color (BIPOC) teaching social justice focused courses. Participants described three areas that need to be strengthened to teach social justice and diversity courses including (1) integrating social justice content across all micro and macro courses, as well as practicum; (2) creating a space and culture of community of practice (CoP) for social justice education and ongoing faculty training; and (3) institutionalizing social justice education for the professional accreditation of social work education.

Imagine paying for a course, then you end up teaching: Black woman doctoral students in equity, social justice, and diversity courses.

Imagine paying for a course, then you end up teaching: Black woman doctoral students in equity, social justice, and diversity courses.

Learning from each other’s lives: First-generation college students of color engaging with diversity course content

To explore the ways in which the learning and understanding of diversity course subject matter happen, this manuscript interviews and observed the experiences of 10 first-generation college students of color and their teachers from two diversity courses. Findings show that participants drew from their classmates’ prior knowledge and experiences to engage with the course content, as classmates’ lives offered examples of new ways of thinking about diversity issues and concepts.

Developing college student intercultural competence in a childhood diversity course: A pilot study

The primary aim of this study was to investigate pedagogical mechanisms that promote student understanding of diversity and intersectionality in national and global childhood experiences in order to foster openness, acceptance of diversity, and civic engagement. In this mixed-methods study, participants included 127 undergraduate students in a child development diversity (CDD) course and a control group of 63 undergraduate students in a research methods psychology (RMP) course. Students in both groups self-rated their knowledge of 18 diversity topics, their Openness to diversity, Acceptance of cultural differences, Awareness of racism and sexism, and Plans to advocate for others (OAAP variables). Quantitative results showed significant increases in CDD course groups’ knowledge of all topics from beginning to semester-end and greater knowledge compared with the RMP course control group. For CDD course students, diversity knowledge was positively and more strongly correlated with their OAAP scores. Qualitative written responses from CDD course students illustrate their perceptions of the importance of intercultural awareness and knowledge of childhood intersectionality and diversity, the effectiveness of specific content delivery methods, and how they relate to their advocacy and volunteer plans

Raising HESA Graduate Students’ Critical Consciousness Through Metacognitive Journaling

Higher education and student affairs graduate programs have attempted to prepare aspiring administrators to answer the call for increased multicultural competency through diversity courses, yet research suggests that new professionals feel ill-prepared to enact social justice work. Current instructional methods foster awareness but fail to cultivate reflective, culturally responsive practitioners. This qualitative case study explores how HESA graduate students’ conceptions of critical consciousness evolve during a diversity course and the pedagogical practices that foster consciousness-raising.

Conceptualizing Race in the Leisure Studies Diversity Course

Diversity courses are integral to higher leisure education curricula and united by the following assumptions: (a) recreation programs involve encounters with “different” groups of people and (b) future professionals require a specialized set of knowledge and skills in order to manage those interactions. Although several scholars have critiqued these assumptions, those insights have not been applied to rethinking how the diversity course is taught. This article addresses that gap through an examination of how race is conceptualized and taught within the diversity course. Race is the focal point of this article because diversity initiatives most often focus on racial identity. Academics have often framed race as a relatively homogenous individual identity in the leisure studies diversity course. The purpose of acquiring knowledge about racial identity is to facilitate the students’ diversification of staff and users. However, this framing of race obscures the ways that diversification can expose the racialized other to new forms of violence and exploitation. I offer racial capitalism as a different framework through which race can be conceptualized and taught within the leisure studies diversity course. Racial capitalism encourages viewing race through intersecting relations of power, as a status created to maintain power and profit, and as deeply rooted in the past.

Diversity and Disconnection: Does an Online Setting Affect Student’s Understanding of Privilege, Oppression, and White Guilt?

Should educators teach diversity courses in online formats? Courses covering sexism, racism, ethnocentrism, or homophobia are increasingly part of the curriculum requirements for college students. This study compares student surveys from six sections of the author’s introductory Diversity in Politics course; three of these sections are taught asynchronously online, and three are taught in a face-to-face setting. Results reveal no difference between online and face-to-face students’ understandings of privilege and oppression, sense of belonging, or white guilt. However, although all Republican students increased their understanding of privilege and oppression from this course, Republican students uniquely entered the course with less knowledge of oppression and experienced increased growth compared to their online counterparts. The importance of partisanship suggests a more student-centered approach can be valuable in determining the transmissibility of online diversity courses and provides evidence for a successful model for political science diversity courses in online and in-person spaces.

New Research

Abstract Visible Assemblages: Six Affordances of Curating from the Peripheries In this article, the author offers a rationale of her understanding of self-curation. From her position as a native culture-bearer singer of Karnatik music from Southern India, now settled in Australia, a settler colonial country, she elaborates on the characteristics of curation that emerge as important from her perspectives on being and knowing. The key line of inquiry in this article is the role of artist-curators in giving voice to culturally diverse perspectives. Drawing on correspondences between theory and praxis, she proposes that curation is a transactional and interactive sphere of operation where the everyday lives of artists intersect with their roles as transnational creatives who must negotiate their migrant identities, cultural strengths, and multiple belongings. Curating Art/Archaeology: Excavating Through/With Material and Artistic Performativity The transdisciplinary practice of art/archaeology has created a new relationship between post-processual archaeology and contextual arts, allowing archaeologists and artists to strengthen their investigative and performative work. Curating art/archaeology presents new possibilities for experimenting with the present and the past. The performative gestures in art and archaeology challenge hegemonic perspectives and expand tools for surfacing narratives, presences, and absences. This essay presents an experiment in which curating art/archaeology methodologies were used to (re)interpret the archaeological spatiality, narratives, and artifactual records of the Ovil Mount, a proto-historical village in the northern region of Portugal. Through contemporary art formats and gestures, the static fixation of the past is resignified and mediated in dialogue with the present. The article serves to question the definition of artifact, archaeological objectivity, and the ways we relate to the creation of narratives in the past. It assumes the material and artistic performativity of the site and enacts its immaterialities. Curatorial Contemplations on the Conditions of Sound Arts in Diaspora This article is a revised version of an assessment I wrote before (Tabandeh 2022) in response to the conversations, debates, and shared concerns circulated among the participants of a music forum entitled Soundings: Assemblies of Listenings and Voices across the Souths that took place in August 2022 at the Akademie der Künste in Berlin. A few weeks after the forum, the outburst of urban manifestations and civil upheavals in Iran in search of gender equality and social justice, followed by the sustained resistance of the Iranian people against oppression, stunned the world. The events of the consecutive months, alongside the ongoing war in Ukraine and several other concurrent conflicts around the globe, support the conjecture that more and more artists will probably keep crossing borders to end up in diaspora. In contrast, many others struggle to avoid becoming strangers in their homelands. In this text, I describe the sounds and voices of both groups as migrant sounds: those who have actually migrated and those who manage to project their voices beyond the border, even if they have never physically crossed it. This predicament is, of course, common to all live artists who need the presence of performers who must deal with real dangers to themselves and others. Nevertheless, the sociopolitical complexities of our time and the many ambivalences in the art of migrant voices, especially those of sound artists and composers, still invite further inquiry. In this article, I aim to reformulate the arguments of my earlier report to investigate the subject matter from a curatorial standpoint: What can event organizers and curators learn from gatherings of artists and researchers such as the Berlin forum? What can such events tell us about the challenges of survivance in diasporic conditions? And finally, how might this knowledge help us to encourage and facilitate similar “intercultural” encounters between sound artists from different ethnographic backgrounds in a community of new audiences and collaborators? Hybridity within an Expanding Field: Entry Points To Curating Contemporary Music And Sound Art In this article, we take a closer look at the issue of (dis)placement from both the spatial and a symbolic point of view introducing to the contemporary music and sound art curatorial field the term “entry point,” broadly used in migration or border studies. This term, both spatial and symbolic, illustrates the Other entering the porous borders between countries and cultures, or borders between disciplines, genres, media, communities, practices, and forms of artistic expression. In our study, we use the term “entry point” to analyze the variety of the backgrounds (both professional and artistic) of the young curators entering the field, the participants of two Sounds Now Curating Diversity Courses taking place in Athens, Greece, and Viitasaari, Finland. We are particularly interested in their personal and professional motivation, responsibilities, and reasons to enter the field of curating as well as the challenges and issues they face.

Coursework, field-based teaching practices, and multicultural experiences: Analyzing the determinants of preservice teachers’ ethnocultural diversity knowledge

Based on a performance test of 819 preservice teachers from six different teacher education programs in Flanders (Belgium), the current study examined the links between preservice learning opportunities and future teachers' ethnocultural diversity knowledge. Multilevel regression analyses revealed a significant relationship between integrating diversity throughout education courses and preservice teachers' diversity knowledge. No relation was found between cultural diversity knowledge and stand-alone cultural diversity courses or field-based teaching experiences. The article concludes with a brief discussion of the implications for teacher education programs.

REFRAMING CULTURAL COMPETENCE AND CIVIC ENGAGEMENT: A REPLICATION STUDY OF HIGH IMPACT PRACTICES IN UNDERGRADUATE PSYCHOLOGY COURSES

Institutions of higher education require diversity courses so that students can increase their multicultural awareness, knowledge, and skills. Multicultural Psychology courses play a pivotal role in instilling cultural competence in students. The study examined differences in cultural competence and civic engagement for 1,053 undergraduate students exposed to different types of high-impact practices enrolled in educational psychology, multicultural psychology, and psychology internship courses. There was a significant Group x Time interaction effect for cultural skills. Post hoc analyses revealed that students exposed to diversity service-learning in a multicultural psychology course acquired cultural skills compared to students exposed to academic service-learning in the educational psychology course and those students exposed to fieldwork in an internship from the beginning to the end of the semester. Students in the multicultural psychology course were also intellectually challenged, reflected on the course concepts, and gained a deeper understanding of the course content more than students in the educational psychology course. Recommendations for teaching diversity courses are discussed.<p> </p><p><strong> Article visualizations:</strong></p><p><img src="/-counters-/edu_01/0091/a.php" alt="Hit counter" /></p>

The prevalence of diversity courses in the undergraduate psychology curriculum.

The prevalence of diversity courses in the undergraduate psychology curriculum.

Decolonization and trauma-informed truth-telling about Indigenous Australia in a social work diversity course: a cultural safety approach

ABSTRACT Actual accounts of the experiences of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples since colonization remain largely misunderstood and misrepresented within Australian education systems and the broader social consciousness. Culturally sensitive practice and ethnic diversity are challenging topics to teach social work students when truth-telling is absent. Social workers need to develop an understanding of intergenerational trauma experienced by Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples, critically reflect on perpetuated stereotypes, and confront internalized beliefs about peoples of diverse ethnic and cultural identities in preparation to work respectfully with Indigenous communities. A course focused on building students’ knowledge and skills for culturally responsive practice is described in this paper, along with suggestions for enhancing teaching and learning. The paper argues for the importance of truth-telling about Australia’s continuing racism in social work education to create cultural safety for service users.

MSW Curriculum Analysis

As the pandemic surges, the need for remote social work practice (RSWP) is urgent and ensuring that students entering practice are prepared to engage is paramount. Students entering the workforce must be able to demonstrate competency and educators must explore how they are preparing students for RSWP. A cohort of twenty-one MSW students were invited to participate in this study exploring curriculum exposure to RSWP and subsequent confidence and readiness to engage in practice. Only a subset of this cohort (n=13) agreed to participate in the study. This study explored exposure to RSWP concepts through a foundation-level MSW curriculum, practicum, and other program contacts. Results show that even though students were primarily exposed to RSWP in practicum and courses that focus on basic interpersonal skills, other courses, such as research and policy also provided exposure. Students reported that theory and diversity courses made no mention of RSWP. This is concerning because these courses are meant to educate students on practice frameworks and service contexts for underserved populations, like those that are commonly served via RSWP. Although limited, this study has implications for how social work educators embed RSWP throughout the curriculum, instead of siloing this topic in practice courses.