Equity and Inclusion Life Design Working Group
After the murder of George Floyd, life design practitioners from across the continent came together to establish a working group to improve the efficacy of life design tools while considering how students engage with the material across a broad range of identities and social structures such as race, gender, sexuality, nationality, and social class.
Co founded by Julia Lang of Tulane University and Kathy Davies at Stanford, the group contains representatives from more than 30 universities and has been meeting on a monthly basis since July 2020. Operating both as a full team and in smaller breakout groups collaborating throughout the month the group actively reexamines readings and redesigns activities and homework assignments through an equitable and inclusive lens. The group has provided a powerful opportunity to exchange ideas and engage in conversation with folks invested in this kind of work.
Through this work, the group has compiled a list of new readings and resources including a wide diversity of perspectives and formats, and intentionally integrating resources beyond traditional readings to increase access and inclusivity.
The group continues to update existing modules and to consider what new modules might increase accessibility and equity for students as they approach life design. Some examples:
The Social Identity Reflection is a new foundational module built to support students in examining how their intersecting identities may inform their life design. This new activity:
Invites students to consider aspects of their own identity, and how those impact their experience and thinking.
Increases student awareness of the underlying narratives that may inform their experiences, thinking and approaches to the life design tools
Sets the foundation for later activities in the course, acknowledging and supporting the diversity of student experience.
Workview and world/lifeview assignments have been updated to invite students specifically reflect upon how their lived experience and identity may inform their views, and assignment instructions have been modified to directly address anxiety that may come up in writing these views.
Life Design Sketches are a more structured alternative to Odyssey Plans. This new 2-page online “sketch” format is intended to:
Create additional structure to relieve the anxiety that some students feel in creating Odysseys.
Specifically require students to use images to deepen their experience.
Recognize structures and constraints that cannot be changed while supporting students in exploring options.
We welcome practitioners to explore other areas of work through our Google Drive. If you are a life design practitioner and are interested in joining the group, please add your name to this contact list.