Introduction

About LWTech and the Diversity & Social Justice (DSJ) Requirement

This book is a compilation of resources from the Spring quarters of  2021-2024 LWTech DSJ faculty training. It includes a variety of resources for teaching diversity and social justice in a community and technical college setting. The approach and conceptualization of DSJ education are discussed in the first parts of the book.  The DSJ requirement was organized around 3 categories of learning outcomes, which are the focus of the other parts of the book. A variety of resources and lesson plans are embedded in both. All contributions are used with permission and the original authors have been credited.

Lake Washington Institute of Technology’s mission is to prepare students for today’s careers and tomorrow’s opportunities. In today’s culturally diverse global workforce, this mission goes beyond teaching our students the technical skills they will use in their industry. It is important that our students have the knowledge and skills that prepare them for the multicultural workspace they are entering.

In fall 2020, the Lake Washington Institute of Technology (LWTech) decided to add an academic requirement for all students. This new requirement focuses on diversity and social justice and it applies to all programs of the college. The requirement reinforces the college’s commitment to diversity, equity, and inclusion while aligning our standards with many other colleges in Washington State. ​The LWTech DSJ requirement dives deeper into diversity and social justice in either an entire course dedicated to or contextualized around diversity and social justice.

To be approved and designated as a Diversity and Social Justice course, student learning outcomes and course content must satisfy four outcomes from the following three categories (two outcomes from the first category and one outcome from each of the other two categories):

I. Power, Privilege, Inequity (choose two)

• Define and apply key terms and concepts of diversity and social justice.
• Identify how power, privilege, and inequity are or have been reinforced and challenged at the individual, institutional, and systemic levels.
• Identify specific ways in which individuals and social and artistic movements attempted to disrupt systems of power, privilege, and inequity.
• Analyze and apply the ethical practice in relation to diverse communities and cultures for the promotion of equity and social justice.

II. Difference (choose one)

• Discuss and analyze how categories of difference are or have been created, maintained, and experienced through power, privilege, and inequity.
• Describe and demonstrate how cultural differences and commonalities among people have been/are reflected in different time periods, institutions, and social systems.

III. Communication (choose one)

• Communicate one’s own intersecting identities of difference and how one positions oneself in relation to power, privilege, and inequity.
• Engage in intentional communication with awareness of intent and impact. Explain different types of knowledge and how knowledge construction maintains power, privilege, and inequity.
• Apply the principles of effective and ethical intercultural communication and demonstrate how individuals and institutions could more effectively communicate across differences in human communities and cultures for the promotion of equity and social justice.

Professor Sharon Raz, Summer 2024