Tag: UCI

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Inclusive Teaching 2.0: The Challenge of Equity in Anti-DEI Times

These days American universities find themselves at a peculiar crossroads. With the stroke of a pen, federal actions have swept away diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) programs at institutions dependent on government funding. Yet in this moment of apparent retreat, one might discern not an ending but a beginning, creating the potential for a more profound transformation in how we understand the art of teaching itself.

The moment demands reinvention, not retreat. For decades now, inclusive teaching has been quietly revolutionizing classrooms, operating not by privileging some students over others, but by ensuring all students can thrive. The principle, though deceptively simple, borders on the radical: every learner deserves access to tools that support their academic growth. This principle can guide institutions toward a universal model of excellence, grounded in research, focused on outcomes, and aligned with the values of higher education.

Never has the need been greater. Today’s college student defies easy categorization. The stereotypical image of young adults attending full-time classes on residential campuses has given way to something far more complex, with  students juggling work commitments, family responsibilities, and extended degree timelines to manage costs.[1] This demographic shift demands nothing less than a pedagogical evolution, one that acknowledges students’ multifaceted lives while maintaining academic rigor.

Enter Universal Design for Learning (UDL), an evidence-based framework offering a compelling vision for the future. UDL is defined as “a framework developed to improve and optimize teaching and learning for all people based on scientific insights into how humans learn.”[2] Grounded in cognitive neuroscience and educational research, UDL principles encourage educators to present information in multiple ways, offer students various methods for demonstrating understanding, and foster engagement through real-world relevance and autonomy. Continue reading “Inclusive Teaching 2.0: The Challenge of Equity in Anti-DEI Times”

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Elsewhere in America: The Crisis of Belonging in Contemporary Culture (Routledge, 2016)

It’s not always easy living up to one’s ideals, either personally or as a nation. Americans like to think of the United States as a welcoming place where everyone has equal chance. But historical baggage and anxious times can make such generosity difficult.0001Behind the America’s mythic open door, newcomers often find that civic belonging comes with strings attached––riddled with conditions, limitations, and in some instances, punitive rites of passage. And for those already here, new rationales emerge to challenge civic belonging on the basis of belief, behavior, or heritage. This book uses the term “elsewhere” in describing conditions that exile so many citizens to “some other place” through prejudice, competition, or discordant belief. Even as “diversity” has become the official norm in American society, the country continues to fragment along new lines that pit citizens against their government, each other, and even themselves.  Yet in another way, “elsewhere” evokes an undefined “not yet” ripe with potential. In the face of daunting challenges, elsewhere can point to optimism, hope, and common purpose.

Elsewhere in America uses the concept of “belonging” to frame a uniquely multidisciplinary exploration of division and marginalization in the U.S.––in a study encompassing material conditions, discursive contexts, and affective states. Through 12 detailed chapters, Elsewhere in America applies critical theory in the humanities and social sciences in examining recurring crises of social inclusion in the U.S.  After two centuries of struggle and incremental “progress” in securing human dignity, today the U.S. finds itself riven apart by new conflicts over reproductive rights, immigration, health care, religious extremism, sexual orientation, mental illness, and fears of terrorists. Why are U.S. ideals of civility and unity so easily hijacked and confused? Is there a way of explaining this recurring tendency of Americans to turn against each other? Elsewhere in America engages these questions in charting the ever-changing faces of difference (manifest in contested landscapes of sex and race to such areas as disability and mental health), their spectral and intersectional character (as seen in the new discourses on performativity, normativity, and queer theory), and the grounds on which categories are manifest in ideation and movement politics (seen in theories of metapolitics, cosmopolitanism, dismodernism).