Mairead Sullivan

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DEI and Curriculum

By: Mairead Sullivan 

In his June 2020 address, LMU President Tim Snyder committed the University to anti-racist action “Beyond Words.” In addition to institutional and structural change, President Snyder assured that an LMU education “must be unequivocally inclusive and anti-racist.” Indeed, these commitments became a cornerstone of LMU’s strategic plan in the “Learning for Justice, Inclusion, and Transformation” spotlight initiative. The flashy language and aspirational goals of a strategic plan set a guidepost to which we strive. Rarely, however, do the glossy promotional material point to the gritty on-the-ground work of reaching those goalposts. 

As the CTE fellow with the Office of DEI, I have been tasked to work with colleagues, especially the Core Curriculum, to anticipate structural and cultural barriers as we chart our path to action beyond words. To this end, and to support new faculty and new courses in the core, I held a number of workshops in the lead-up to the core course proposal deadline early this spring. 

Following on this work, and with the hope to reach the wider campus community, the Office of DEI and the CTE will jointly sponsor another Teaching Toward Justice workshop series. In this series, held this year over three days in May, faculty will be supported to develop new courses or rethink existing syllabi, or design a major assignment that places anti-racist learning and practice at the center. As we look towards the fall, I hope to convene groups of faculty to think beyond our individual classrooms to how we structure our curriculum. The pace of the university can, at times, seems glacial. The seemingly slow pace of change can often mask the small structural changes that make the flashy end goals possible.