Co-Planning and Support for Teaching Courses on Diversity and Reflexivity: Reflections from Early-Career Faculty

Background: Diversity, equity, and inclusion education (DEI) is under scrutiny in our country; nine U.S. states have recently passed legislation which limits training, education, and hiring related to anti-racism and DEI at institutions of higher education. Concurrently, the Council on Social Work Education (CSWE) has developed standards which require competency on anti-racism and DEI among social work students. Contradictory mandates leave social work degree programs and faculty in a bind – with a desire to uphold the social justice value imperative of social work, alongside the realities of legal tenuousness. These dynamics are particularly complex for early career faculty, who are often non-tenured and may have limited training on facilitation and pedagogy in their graduate programs. Thus, we must gain a better understanding of faculty experience teaching DEI related courses and the specific practices that support them.

Methods: This auto-ethnographic case study follows two early-career faculty at a public social work degree institution in a state which passed anti-DEI legislation during the course term in which they taught. Through weekly pre-class planning sessions and post-class debriefs, the faculty tracked the specific practices that supported their teaching experiences, assessed classroom attitudes, and tracked key learning takeaways from class time and students’ written reflection assignments.

Results: We found that a lack of a course lead impacted student and faculty experiences. Faculty experienced chronic physical (e.g. migraines, exhaustion) and psychological stress (e.g. rumination and imposter syndrome). They also questioned the bounds of their role in social justice education and the protections afforded faculty. Regular pre- and post- class debrief sessions between the faculty authors and other faculty and program administrators offered necessary support and mitigated stress. Students often equated discomfort with lack of safety, expressed discomfort and strong emotional reactions during disagreements and discussion of difficult topics (e.g. race, oppression, privilege) in class, and expressed a preference for guided small group discussions. We noted the need for the creation and continual revisitation of classroom norms during every class session.

Conclusions: Education around DEI and racism can elicit strong reactions from students and faculty. Central planning that considers faculty identity and positionality, critical pedagogy, and the political and school climate is integral to student learning, the classroom experience, and for future social workers to weather difficult conversations. We suggest that social work PhD programs offer courses on critical pedagogy along with required classroom teaching to best prepare early-career faculty for these teaching roles. Further, we suggest that social work degree programs– especially those situated in states which have passed anti-DEI legislation – have strong course leads, regular meetings with instructors, extensive facilitation training (especially on how to facilitate conversations on Whiteness and White fragility), and small class sizes. Recognizing the many changes that have been underway across U.S. state legislatures and the impacts on social work institutions and faculty, we hope that this paper offers insight into how social work faculty can support themselves and one another while educating our students and living into the social justice value of the social work profession.