CEE Anti-Racist Pedagogies Program: Healing from Racism Journey

Overview

The Healing from Racism Journey (HRJ) is a collaborative program designed through an anti-racist pedagogy framework. The program is organized in four parts and is intended for a small group of 12 SFU faculty and sessional instructors with a clear action-based orientation.

To apply for the Summer 2022 HRJ cohort, please complete this short online application form by May 31, 2022.

Schedule

The HRJ program is one step, whether the first or the 100th, in your lifetime commitment to antiracist work as an educator. For the purposes of this program in particular, our cohort is organized into four parts.

Summer 2022—Synchronous Virtual Reading Circles 

Six synchronous, weekly reading gatherings (1 hour and 30 minutes each). Summer virtual reading circles include materials to engage with anti-racist pedagogy frameworks and activities. In addition, this program provides one-on-one consultation as needed and voluntary opportunities to connect and build a community of practice around anti-racist teaching with current and past cohorts.

  • Zoom meetings on Wednesdays, June 8, 15, 22; July 6, 13, 20 at 10:30 a.m.–12:00 noon

Fall 2022—Self-Guided Work

Asynchronous, self-paced work to develop a plan of action to embed your learning experiences from Part 1 into your future teaching practice. Support will be provided through Canvas as well as consultation with CEE and SFU Library facilitators.

  • 5 modules on Canvas Course, self-paced learning of approximately 4 hours total (required)

Fall 2022—In-person meeting (required):

Attend one in-person meeting on Dec 11:30 a.m.–1:00 p.m.

Spring 2023—In-person meeting (optional):

Attend one in-person meeting in April 11:30 a.m.–1:00 p.m.

Each HRJ participant will receive an honorarium upon completion of the HRJ program*, as well as all the required books, one-on-one consultations, and submission access to the HRJ journal.

* Completion of HRJ includes attendance at all five synchronous sessions, one project proposal  submission, and presentation at the December 2022 meeting (note, there is flexibility to the format of this presentation and modality of sharing).

Additional information

The HRJ program will engage with both foundational and current leading work under four basic premises (Singh 2020):

  1. Our world is steeped in racism—a system of oppression that relies on beliefs that one race or group of people is superior to another […] White supremacy is the key driver of racism and designates White people as superior to people of colour, which is just not true.
  2. Everyone learns explicit and implicit stereotyped messages in families, schools, and communities about who people of colour and White people are. People of colour have their lives limited by unjust barriers while White people participate in a system that advantages them.
  3. You can begin healing from racism through changing your individual actions and interpersonal interactions.
  4. You can step into a journey of being an antiracist: “someone who is expressing an antiracist idea or supporting an antiracist policy with their actions, and I define an antiracist idea as any idea that says the racial groups are equal” (Kendi 2019).

How to participate in the Summer 2022 HRJ cohort

To apply for the Summer 2022 HRJ cohort, please complete this short online application form by May 31, 2022.

Facilitators

Bee Brigidi, CEE | bianca_brigidi@sfu.ca

Sarah Ford, CEE | slt5@sfu.ca

Ashley Edwards, SFU Library | avandijk@sfu.ca

RA in Knowledge Mobilization: TBC

Testimonials from HRJ cohort 2021–2022

"The HRJ series offered an opportunity to bring together scholars with diverse backgrounds from a variety of disciplines to learn more about integrating anti-racist pedagogies in our classrooms. The thoughtfully chosen texts shared themes that challenged us in our roles as academics, instructors, and administrators and continue to transform how we view the world around us. The program has built a community of practice with like-minded people, something we don’t always get in our home units. I am confident that all HRJ participants would send heartfelt thanks and gratitude to Sarah, Ashley, and especially Bee, each of whom brought their whole selves to our deep and meaningful conversations in support of our evolving understanding of “how to be an anti-racist.” This series has led to profound personal and professional growth.”

—Dr. Sheri Fabian, Criminology at SFU

“The HRJ workshop has helped me develop my pedagogical practice in ways that I could not have predicted! The things I learnt from the workshop and adapted to my teaching and research are simple and yet effective as demonstrated by student feedback I have received. For instance in the workshop we were asked to think about how to value and amplify the diverse lived experiences of people (both students and lecturers). I used this in my class discussions to ask students to reflect on how their lived experiences and positionality changed the way that they read and approached texts. Just the act of reflecting on this out loud, allowed the entire class to hear how, even in the same space, when reflecting on the same text, people can have vastly different experiences based on what they have experienced and how they have been socialized. Much like in our HRJ workshop, the learners became teachers. These discussions do not always go as planned, but they have brought so much depth to my classroom, and would have been impossible if it had not been for the way we were taught, in the HRJ workshop, to get learners to think about their positionality and the structures of power that may be invisible, but still affect how they assign value to things in the world. Thank you lovely people at CEE for organizing this!”

—Dr. Anushay Malik | Department of Labour Studies and Department of History Simon Fraser University 

More HRJ participant experiences can be read about in Healing from Racism Journey's first year comes to a close on the AVP Learning & Teaching Stories webpage.

Program syllabus available upon request.

 

Questions?

Contact Bee Brigidi at bianca_brigidi@sfu.ca