Critical Consciousness as a Tool for Advancing Racial Equity
in Community Colleges

Presented by Raina Dyer-Barr

This webinar explores the concept of critical consciousness and its integral components, paying particular attention to how it can be utilized as both a transformative and educative tool to advance racial equity in community colleges. The session explores the ways that community colleges can and should encourage and foster the development of a strong critical consciousness among its administrators, faculty, staff, and students.

Raina Dyer-Barr holds a Ph.D. from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign in educational policy studies. Her research interests center around exploring the educational experiences of postsecondary students from historically and traditionally underrepresented and/or underserved groups, and the factors that impact their persistence and retention in higher education. Additionally, Dr. Dyer-Barr is interested in work that focuses on improving the educational equity gaps that exist in both access and outcomes for members of underrepresented and underserved populations. Prior to becoming the project coordinator for Equity Conscious Community College Pathways, Dr. Dyer-Barr was project manager for a large-scale, multi-year, federally funded research project that explored the experiences of underrepresented students in STEM fields and the factors that impacted their enrollment, persistence, and completion in these fields.

Equity's Unspoken Dilemmas: Setting Priorities for Racial Justice

Presented by Heather McCambly

This webinar talks about what equity is and whom it is for. It also covers why the education system isn't currently equitable and how individuals can use available resources to change that. Lastly, host Heather McCambly discusses how society will know when racial justice is served and what evidence matters to determine that.

Heather McCambly is a Ph.D. candidate in the human development and social policy program, a Presidential Fellow, and a fellow with the Institute for Policy Research at Northwestern University. She also serves as a consultant at the Office of Community College Research and Leadership at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign. Her research traces the processes by which an increasingly influential set of policy actors—grantmaking and philanthropic organizations—develop and select frames reflective of variedrace and class ideologies, and the causal effects of these frames on the development of higher education policies. McCambly came to Northwestern after nearly a decade of working in education policy, including in state government and national nonprofits, where she focused on policies intended to reduce the institutionalized disadvantages affecting minoritized college students.

Community College Can be a Battlefield for Black Faculty: You Don't Have to Get Ready if You are Ready

Presented by Evelyn Reynolds

This webinar explores the racial battle fatigue perspective as it relates to Black faculty at Community Colleges. Examples of racial battle fatigue will be discussed in this context as well as ways to cope while simultaneously challenging and dismantling its existence. Reflective questions are explored such as: What psychological and emotional impact does devaluation and microscopic critique have on competent Black faculty? How can Dubois’s double consciousness be used as both a tool for analyzing the Black faculty experience and a weapon for eliminating subjugation?

Evelyn Reynolds is an associate professor of sociology at Parkland College in Champaign, Illinois.  She graduated with a Master of Science in sociology from Illinois State University in 2009 and has taught college courses for more than a decade. Before joining the Parkland College faculty, Evelyn taught sociology at Illinois State University, Heartland Community College, and Illinois Central College. She is a community activist, founder of the Black Lives Matter Champaign-Urbana chapter, and an active member of the Global Black Lives Matter Network. She has had articles featured in publications such as The Huffington Post, Next Avenue (a PBS syndicate), and TruthOut.org. Additionally, Reynolds has spoken about social issues on numerous radio broadcasts, including on WILL via National Public Radio.

For Us By Us: Creating and Maintaining Fugitive Spaces in Hostile Educative Landscapes

Presented by Asif Wilson

College staff, faculty, and administrators of color are forced to navigate hostile educative landscapes bound in white supremacy, capitalism, and patriarchy. Navigating these oppressive structural elements, oftentimes as one of a handful of other people of color on campus, can be fatiguing, if not fatal. This webinar explores the role of fugivity and collective care in creating and maintaining contexts for staff, faculty, and administrators of color to name, connect, and move beyond the pain experienced as a result of their institutional responsibilities and aspirations.

Asif Wilson, Ph.D., serves as associate dean of instruction at Harold Washington College in Chicago. He has more than 10 years of experience teaching, designing curriculum, and conducting education research—from elementary school through postsecondary contexts. Dr. Wilson’s educational interests include popular education, teacher and preservice teacher education, justice-centered pedagogies, trauma and healing, and education history. He has written a number of published articles, book chapters, and curriculum for in-school and out-of-school settings.