Whatcom Community College
Home MenuThe Equity Project
Each year, The Equity Project (TEP) offers faculty and staff ongoing opportunities to engage in social justice education and work towards advancing equity at Whatcom Community College. Each year a topic is selected and TEP offers programming centered on a theme. Activities include keynote speakers, workshops, campus discussions, films, and more. Please check the WCC web calendar for upcoming programming and events.
- Increase student success
- Create opportunities for our institution to consistently commit to racial and social justice
- Develop tools to recognize, expose and replace harmful practices
2023-2024 Theme
Building Retention: Cultivating Culturally Responsive Communities
"Beloved community is formed not by the eradication of difference but by its affirmation, by each of us claiming the identities and cultural legacies that shape who we are and how we live in the world." - bell hooks
Motivation and Guiding Questions:
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How do we create and maintain a sense of belonging for everyone here?
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How can we cultivate culturally responsive communities?
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How can we help each student and employee feel seen, heard, and valued?
TEP Scaffold for the year:
Fall Quarter:
- Form pods
- Explore multimodal texts and activity options based on pod interests
- Develop a central question for your pod around “Belonging” (e.g. how do we cultivate belonging for ourselves and students?)
- Grapple with chosen question
- Think about possibilities of how to develop an answer/response
Winter:
- Develop a plan for some action or intervention in response to your question to implement in the Spring (and beyond!)
- Share and workshop your plan with TEP support people at a series of design clinics/workshops
- Implement plan (pods will make at least one demonstrable move to create more belonging in their campus area)
Early Spring:
- Prepare an artifact to share your plan, process, and results in a college-wide “Belonging Showcase”
The Equity Project Team
Jason Babcock, Setsuko Buckley, Katherine Burns, Brian Cope, Justin Ericksen, Yusuke Okazaki, Rob Pedicone, Hadia Rezai, Jackie Rumble, Anna Wolff, and Tanya Zaragoza-Rosas