The Harvard Graduate School of Education includes a thriving, ever-changing landscape of organizations and initiatives built around principles of diversity, equity, and inclusion. These groups and initiatives are energized by the work of students, alumni, faculty, staff, and all members of the HGSE community.
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Students/Alumni
Equity and Inclusion Fellows
The Equity and Inclusion Fellows Program provides a range of learning and leadership opportunities for a diverse group of students who are invested in collaborating across differences to catalyze change. Fellows work proactively to drive diversity initiatives at HGSE and across Harvard.
Alumni of Color Conference
The Alumni of Color Conference (AOCC) is an annual milestone at the Harvard Graduate School of Education — an ambitious gathering designed by HGSE students to bring awareness to the educational issues affecting communities of color. Launched by a visionary group of students in 2002-2003, AOCC aims to inspire and transform education by convening educators, researchers, policymakers, student,s and change-makers of all varieties concerned with issues of race, class, and education, particular as they pertain to communities of color.
Contact HGSE's Alumni Relations team to get involved.
Diversity Innovation Fund
HGSE's Diversity Innovation Fund awards small grants to support student-initiated ideas and projects that broaden the conversation at HGSE and allow for more and varied perspectives, experiences, and forums for exchange.
Student Organizations
Student organizations enrich the HGSE community and form a major part of the student experience at HGSE. Each year, there are more than 30 officially recognized student organizations, ranging in focus from entrepreneurship to international issues to such affinity groups as the Black Student Union, Communidad LatinX, Future Indigenous Educators Resisting Colonial Education (FIERCE), the Pan Asian Coalition for Education, and QueerEd. Student group have a home in HGSE's Office of Student Affairs, which welcomes and supports student interest in starting and sustaining them.
Faculty
With support from the Teaching and Learning Lab (TLL), HGSE faculty members can engage deeply in conversation, training, and collaboration as they develop their instructional practices and enrich their course design in ways that actively prioritize diversity, equity, and inclusion. The TLL offers an array of teaching consultation and support services to assist faculty members, teaching fellows, and all HGSE educators as they create high-quality learning experiences and spaces for reflection and growth.
Conversations on Race and Racism
The purpose of the Conversations on Race and Racism group is to create space for reflective, honest conversations about racism and its implications for our personal and professional selves. The group operates like a Critical Friends Group, using various forms of the consultancy protocol to explore and learn from dilemmas of practice that occur in our HGSE teaching.
Faculty of Color Affinity Group
The faculty of color affinity group is a space to build community and connection, exchange ideas, and provide support for faculty of color. They provide a space for faculty to learn from one another and reflect on their experiences, instruction, and other topics specific to being a person of color at HGSE. This group was developed and is facilitated by faculty of color.
Anti-Racist Teaching and Advising Initiative
The Anti-Racist Teaching and Advising (ARTA) Initiative is a multi-year project aimed at helping faculty members further develop the dispositions, knowledge, and skills to engage in anti-racist practices, to disrupt and dismantle racism in our own institution, and to empower students to do the same in their own work. Governed by faculty and academic leaders representing many racial identities and faculty ranks, the initiative hosts activities that range from individual coaching sessions to systemic development experiences.
Developing as Anti-Racist White Educators Learning Community
Developing as Anti-Racist White Educators (DARWE) is a learning community for white-identified faculty who want to learn more about how their whiteness impacts an understanding of race and racism — and how they can grow as anti-racist white educators working to dismantle white supremacy culture in themselves, their teaching practices, and their communites.
Chen Yidan Visiting Fellows Program
The Chen Yidan Visiting Global Fellows Program actively promotes the exchange of ideas across national borders. The program brings a diverse group of international leaders and scholars from a variety of sectors to HGSE to create curricular and co-curricular experiences for students. Fellows expand the HGSE community's global and cultural awareness, promoting comparative thinking and perspective-taking for U.S.-based students and international students alike, and creating the potential for lasting partnerships and continued global education exchanges.
Staff
HGSE values diversity in all forms and believes that each employee brings a set of diverse experiences and identities to the workplace that make the institution stronger, more innovative, and more collaborative. We aim to foster a diverse, inclusive, respectful, and professional work environment — one that offers opportunities to learn, grow, develop relationships, and be challenged. Here are some of the developmental opportunities we've designed to nurture a community culture that centers diversity, equity, and inclusion.
Equity Ambassadors
The Equity ambassadors Program provides select employees a professional development opportunity to serve as key facilitators for Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion workshops. Equity Ambassadors immerse themselves into engaging practices geared towards advancing the equity-centered work at HGSE.
Professional Development Workshop Series
Our workshops are designed to raise awareness, enhance interpersonal skills, and highlight the value of collaborating with people across difference. We cover topics that include but are not limited to gender, ethnicity, race, sexual orientation, age, religion, physical and mental ability, and socioeconomic status.
Affinity Groups
The HGSE staff affinity groups are racial affinity groups designed to build community amongst staff. These spaces are opportunities for employees to provide individual and collective support to the members of the affinity group. In addition, the space contributes to personal and professional development in the workplace.
Staff Common Reading Group
This group provides informal lunch time opportunities for staff to engage in conversations related to a common reading that centers topics related to diversity, equity, and inclusion. The books chosen are based on staff suggestions and provided by Gutman Library.