Principle 3: Inclusivity and Diversity
Develop and teach courses through inclusion of content from multiple perspectives, considering diversity in all its forms, as understanding differing experiences is critical for all students’ deep learning. Therefore instructors are encouraged to select content to support, facilitate, and interrogate barriers to inclusion. Knowledge experts from across disciplines have discovered critical gaps in their disciplines’ advancement and understanding based on conscious or unconscious exclusion of diverse experiences and perspectives, and therefore in both research and teaching it is incumbent upon instructors to actively counter disciplinary and other habits of bias through systematic evaluation of course content and pedagogy for diversity: in viewpoints, population focus, as well as author identity.
Incorporating Varied Perspectives in Course Materials
Understanding varied human experiences and viewpoints is critical for all students’ deep learning, so take time to select content to facilitate representative, heterogeneous perspectives.
Cultivating Student Success
Fostering students’ sense of belonging and ensuring they experience your class as fair, inclusive, and respectful of diverse perspectives can have a powerful impact on their learning and overall success.
Foster Belonging
Feeling like you belong — in a course or at the university — helps students succeed. Instructors can take small steps in course design and pedagogy to improve belonging in ways that help students persevere when classes and life become difficult.
Using Protocols to Deepen Conversation and Raise Intellectual Engagement
Adapted from a presentation by Prof. Patricia Virella, this guide will help you create an environment in which deep conversations about sensitive issues can flourish.
“Warming Up” Your Syllabus
Developing your course to be appealing and accessible in terms of content and assignments fosters belonging and supporting student success.
Mitigating Cognitive Bias to Promote Fairness
Understanding how cognitive bias works enables instructors to adopt strategies to increase their objectivity, reduce subjectivity, and promote fairness so all students are equally able to succeed.
Universal Design for Learning (UDL)
Design and deliver all course elements for maximum accessibility to support success for all students.
Last Modified: Monday, March 31, 2025 12:09 pm
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