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Equity and Inclusion Virtual Speaker Series

Learn With Us!

POCIS Northwest’s Equity and Inclusion Virtual Speaker Series offers our communities and beyond the opportunity to connect, learn, and engage in topics about equity, inclusion, and antiracist education and action.

The purpose of this series is to raise awareness, challenge ourselves, deepen understanding, and empower our communities to advance their efforts to actively recreate systems into equitable, inclusive, and antiracist institutions. The program invites 4-5 speakers throughout the academic year, providing access to recognized authors and speakers who engage participants in complex topics through dialogue and cross-cultural communication.

The virtual speaker series is intended to lead to a deeper understanding of the impact racism and oppression have in our institutions and the greater society. These virtual events are free and accessible to all regardless of POCIS Northwest membership.

This Year’s Speakers

In this keynote, Dr. Gholdy Muhammad offers a unique, culturally, and historically responsive approach to cultivating genius and joy in education. This approach is essential for accelerating the growth of all students and uniquely youth of color, who have been traditionally underserved in learning standards, policies, and school practices. She will present her equity framework, called the HILL Model, to help educators develop students’ histories, identities, literacies, and liberation. Participants will learn and understand history and policy and personal and instructional factors that justify the need and purpose for culturally and historically responsive education.  Additionally, participants will see sample lesson/unit plans across grade levels, moving theory into action.

Dr. Gholnecsar (Gholdy) Muhammad is an Associate Professor of Literacy, Language, and Culture at the University of Illinois at Chicago. Dr. Muhammad’s scholarship has appeared in leading academic journals and books. She has also received numerous national awards and is the author of the best-selling book, Cultivating Genius: An Equity Model for Culturally and Historically Responsive Literacy. She also co-authored Black girls’ literacies: An Edited Volume. Her Culturally and Historically Responsive Education Model has been adopted across thousands of U.S. schools and districts across Canada. Her newest book, Unearthing Joy, is the sequel to Cultivating Genius and provides a practical guide for putting culturally and historically responsive education into curricular practice.  Learn more HERE

In this virtual keynote, participants will learn how to use a number of strategies to cultivate the kind of emotional resilience needed to build equitable schools. Participants will anchor in their values and purpose, explore how to navigate uncomfortable emotions, and learn why emotional resilience is the missing element in most equity endeavors. Participants will recognize and appreciate the connection between cultivating their own resilience and building equitable schools, learn how to use simple strategies to cultivate their emotional resilience when building equitable schools, and understand the critical importance of emotional resilience when building equitable schools. 

Elena Aguilar is an author, coach, and CEO. Elena Aguilar has worked in education since 1994. Her years of teaching, coaching, and leading teams in the Oakland, CA public schools deeply inform the eight books she’s written and the trainings she designs and facilitates. Elena is committed to creating equitable schools and organizations where everyone thrives. She founded Bright Morning in 2017 to advance this vision. See Elena’s Bio HERE and learn more about Bright Morning HERE. 

Past Presenters