Blog

by Luke Lara, Ed.D.

When I go shopping for eggs at the local grocery store, I open the egg carton and check every egg. If I find one that is ever so slightly cracked, I put the carton back and begin the search process all over again. One time I went through my routine, bought a dozen eggs, and returned home. The next morning, when I took out an egg, I discovered that there was a very long and obvious crack along the bottom of the egg. I had not lifted and checked each egg at the store. I had only observed the top halves. My fatal flaw was that I did not check the underside of each egg. Luckily, I learned my lesson, avoided salmonella, and have modified my routine.

In this blog I write about my personal observations of leaders in regard to issues of equity (for students and employees). I describe three fatal flaws and provide examples for each one. A fatal flaw reflects a crucible moment in which a leader displays anti-equity mindedness attitudes or behaviors, thus disorienting the equity momentum or movement at their college.

Fatal Flaw #1: All Lives Mattering Issues of Equity

Most community college leaders agree that diversity, equity, and inclusion are worthy goals. In California, there are funds dedicated to improving the retention and completion rates of our students. Colleges have to create and submit a detailed plan of how the funds will be spent. Colleges were asked to identify student populations (e.g., race/ethnicity, gender, age, veteran status, socio-economic status, disability) that experience disproportionate impact in areas of access, course completion, basic skills, transfer, and degree attainment. Once a group is determined to experience disproportionate impact, an intervention and plan is created for the specific student group and area. However, we make the fatal mistake of arguing that the resources should provide equity for all students. This is akin to detractors from the Black Lives Matter movement insisting that “all lives matter,” whose claims negate the disproportionate number of unarmed black and brown bodies murdered by police. Institutional data indicate that not all students need more resources to succeed. For example, there is disproportionate impact experienced by Black, Latinx, and other racial and ethnic groups at the community college. Therefore, we must boldly and directly address race, racism, systemic racism, and White Supremacy. When we “all lives matter” issues of equity, we conveniently ignore issues of race, which also intersect with gender and socio-economic status.

Bottom line: Leaders, lead bold discussions about race, racism, systemic racism, and white supremacy. You may not be the expert, but you are the leader. Reach out to those that can help you deliver the message to the various constituencies on campus and off-campus. Avoid “all lives mattering” equity work.

Fatal Flaw #2: Not Protecting the Community

Free speech is a hugely debated topic in higher education. Many college leaders hide behind the rhetoric of protecting free speech, while alienating students and employees affected by vile speech (e.g., not harsh enough to be a hate crime, yet enough to create harm to the community). In many instances, these leaders’ responses are reactionary and are often done because an internal community pressures the administration for a response. Leaders and institutions of higher education are averse to negative publicity.

The University of California, Santa Barbara is a great example of how a university has been proactive in an age of hate. In the summer of 2016, campus leaders came together to discuss creating a discourse campaign that would be a positive and proactive measure in the heat of the presidential election season. They called it: “Resilient love in a time of hate.” As soon as student leaders arrived in the fall of 2016, they were incorporated into the development and implementation of the campaign. A series of events were created with renowned scholars, artists, and leaders. Stickers and shirts were printed. The campaign sought to promote conversation and creative work forged in a love-driven response to hate, hurt, and fear. I heard about this at the National Conference on Race and Ethnicity (NCORE) in higher education. The workshop presenters shared multiple stories of how issues of free speech were supported, while creating an environment for authentic discourse and diffusing the potential for alienation and marginalization. In essence, a community was created around a campaign of love.

Bottom line: Leaders, if you are only reacting, you are not creating community, you are contributing to the hurt and pain caused by the protection of free speech. Remember, create and sustain community so that issues of free speech can be dealt with in an environment that supports authentic discourse. People come first.

Fatal Flaw #3: Marginalizing Equity

Equity work is often seen as the responsibility of specific individuals (e.g., chief diversity officer, dean of equity programs), specific departments (e.g., student equity office, sociology department), or specific committees (e.g., committee on equity-minded practices). In other words, equity work is not centered institutionally as a core value that is upheld by everyone, every department, and every committee. By relegating equity work to a small few, leaders marginalize equity. This may not be intentional. However, the results are damaging. For example, equity work requires examination of and changes to structural and systemic policies and practices. Few individuals, if any, can make substantial changes to historical structures. The eventual fallout includes burn out and low morale by the individuals involved within this marginalization of equity work. However, it is important to identify a responsible person/committee/department to facilitate the equity work of the campus, but only in an environment where it is understood that the work is collective and driven by the institution’s core values.

Bottom Line: Leaders, agree to center equity as a core value, then present and apply a clear and consistent message to every corner of the institution: We will center equity and everyone is responsible for identifying the changes that need to be made.

by Luke Lara, Ed.D.

Many community colleges are grappling with the notion of diversity, inclusion, and equity. Often, these three words are strung together, as if they are one thing. Leaders must be clear on these terms and steer their institutions so that they reflect the needs of their students. Clarity comes from understanding the history of higher education in the United States, especially the development of America’s community colleges.

The roots of community colleges are a mix of seemingly opposed grassroots and elitist movements in higher education to create access to the populace and also maintain the intellectual rigor of the university, respectively (see Cohen and Brawer). Community colleges now have a multi-pronged mission to serve the community through workforce development, associate degree and certificate attainment, preparation for university transfer, and lifelong learning. Over the last century, the American community college has gained prominence in contributing to local workforce development and creating greater access to higher education for minoritized communities. For instance, in 2009, president Barack Obama announced “The American Graduation Initiative: Stronger American Skills Through Community Colleges” that called for five million additional graduates by 2020. Thus, recognizing the strength of community colleges in advancing economic prosperity to millions of Americans.

There are roughly about 1,200 community colleges in America. Half the students in higher education in the United States are enrolled in a community college and the majority of students in the community college are non-white (see the American Association of Community Colleges Fast Facts 2018). Across most measures (completion, degree attainment, etc.), community colleges and four-year institutions struggle to close the racial achievement gap. Shapiro and colleagues (2017) found that “while almost one in four Asian students and one in five white students had completed [a] transfer pathway by the end of the six-year study period, just one in 10 Hispanic students and about one in 12 black students did” (p. 2). In other words, when disaggregated by race, retention and completion outcomes for minoritized students are less than those for white students. These data points are critical in understanding why community colleges are grappling with the notion of diversity, inclusion, and equity.

Some colleges are beginning to close the racial achievement gap. For example, with the support of the Achieving the Dream Network (ATD), Texarkana College has dramatically increased graduation rates for their Black students (by 18 percentage points from 2011 to 2017). They attributed their success to “an institutional commitment to evidence-based decision making, part of a holistic change model the team learned from their work with Achieving the Dream” (para. 7). The ATD’s vision, mission, and values are grounded in a commitment to equity. ATD “expects colleges to dismantle the barriers facing underserved students” (para. 12). While some colleges are making a difference in regard to equity, many are not. Yet, the equity movement is on the rise.

Have you seen this image before?

Three people reaching for some apples hanging from a tree. One person is tall, then second person is of medium height, and the third person is the shortest of the three. Only the tall person can reach the apples. The label on this image is equality. It demonstrates that all standing on the same ground equally, yet only one can reach the apple. The picture labeled equity shows the same three people. However, in this image, they all attain the apple. The shortest person receives two additional crates to stand on and the medium sized person receives one additional crate to stand on.

If you search for images related to the word “equity,” you’ll see a variety of interpretations of this concept of equality vs. equity. What also appears in a search for the term equity is a definition stating that equity is “the quality of being fair or impartial.” One of the synonyms listed is “egalitarianism.” The fiction that higher education is egalitarian is rooted in the idea that by providing access to higher education is enough to create present and future opportunities for a student willing to put in the effort to be successful. As a primarily open access institution, the community college has prided itself on providing opportunities for communities that otherwise would not have access to higher education (e.g., minoritized student populations such as Black/African American, Latinx, and Native American students). However, in the age of accountability (since the 1980’s), institutions of higher education have been pressured more and more by outside forces such as the public, legislatures, and accrediting agencies to be more accountable to outcomes including graduation, transfer, and job placement rates. The equity movement seeks to scrutinize these outcomes further and decidedly change the structures that create these outcomes.

Bensimon, Dowd, and Witham (2016) argued that to do equity work, one must be equity-minded. In other words, to be equity-minded is to have “an awareness of the ways in which many groups within US society have been historically excluded from educational opportunities, or marginalized within the structures and institutions that house those opportunities” (para. 1). They explained that this approach “foregrounds the policies and practices contributing to disparities in educational achievement and abstains from blaming students for those accumulated disparities” (para. 1). Thus, equity-mindedness requires educators to recognize that higher education has never been an egalitarian system.

The simplistic imagery of the three people picking apples leaves out a critical step. Leaders and stakeholders must engage in discussions about WHY we are generating inequitable outcomes (e.g., contemporary analysis, historical reflections). We must ask: What institutional structures disenfranchise our minoritized student populations? The self-examination can be performed through hiring external entities or from within the colleges. The results must be actionable plans that fundamentally reshape the institutions and improve the students’ experiences through the college that include instruction, advising, and co-curricular opportunities.

Diversity and inclusion are not pronouncements. They must be action oriented and radical interrupters of the status quo. Diversity must be about reflecting the people you serve (e.g., proportional representation). This is important because in higher education, the vast majority of employees are White, while the growing majority of students are racially and ethnically minoritized students. The disparity is even more so within the faculty and administrative ranks. However, having proportional representation must also be accompanied by a meaningful culture of inclusion. Inclusion requires on-going access to power structures, prominence in voice, and acceptance of difference for and by all members of the community. Thus, to create an inclusive culture there needs to be a foundation of equity principles that drive the work of sustaining a diverse environment. Equity requires dismantling structures of oppression and creating new structures that truly allow for inclusion and diversity. To achieve equity, we need to understand how we became inequitable.

It is no wonder that diversity, equity, and inclusion are often conflated. These are three separate concepts that are inextricably connected. Many leaders confuse these terms, treat them as one concept, or only focus on one at a time. A great leader will work on all three at the same time, understanding the nuances of how they interrelate, and engage in equity-minded practices.