go there we go there we go there we go
all right I know it’s right after lunch
and everyone’s in a food coma but we’re
gonna try to keep you awake and keep you
entertained this whole time as you looks
like a lot of people are still eating
lunch so this is your lunch time show I
guess lunch in a show I love it all
right so let’s see make sure this is
going there we go all right I wonder how
many more people could be successful if
we tear down the barriers that prevent
them from being successful in the first
place now tearing down barriers isn’t
exactly a new concept right we’ve
probably all heard it before let’s tear
down these barriers that hinder people
and affect them in negative ways but
what I find is that we rarely ever
actually focus on tearing down those
barriers what we do is we continuously
come up with new ways to overcome the
barriers that are in place but we rarely
ever actually focus our attention on
identifying what these barriers are why
they hinder people and working to
prevent them from the very beginning and
so let’s start with this image here this
image is from the interaction institute
for social change and what it’s doing is
it’s demonstrating the difference
between equality and equity essentially
what we’re talking about here is
distribution of resources and what
they’re arguing is that you can’t just
give everyone the same exact resources
and expect that to universally help
everyone overcome their barriers and be
successful well you have to do is you
have to give people the amount of
resources and the types of resources
that they actually need as an individual
person to overcome their barriers and be
successful equitable distribution of
resources not equal distribution but the
problem with always focusing on
resources is that resources are really
limited we only have so much staffing so
much funding we can really only provide
so many resources which in the end means
that we can only really helped so many
people be successful and so let’s take a
look at this next image here this one is
from the center for story based strategy
and it’s the same sort of concept here
you can see the
quality in the equity but they’ve added
a third component to this image you can
see in this third component there are no
more boxes or in other words there are
no more resources and there are no
resources because the fence has been
removed from the image and the barrier
that was preventing these people from
being successful is no longer part of
the equation and so now regardless of
staffing regardless of funding
regardless of how many boxes each person
has the system is set up so that
everyone can be successful without
having to rely on our limited number of
resources and so let’s talk about some
examples I work in education I work here
at Kent State University whew there it
is all right there it is so I work in
education and unfortunately a lot of my
students struggle in math and so we
provide all kinds of resources to help
with math right we have tutoring peer
mentoring webinars workshops all kinds
of different things that are supposed to
help students be more successful in math
but even with all of these resources we
still have a lot of students who
struggle in that subject and so what if
we thought about things differently what
if instead of creating yet another
tutoring program what if we actually
looked at the structure of these math
classes and tried to figure out what the
barriers are that are actually
preventing these students from being
successful for example our students who
score lowest on their math placement
tests are put into what we call
developmental math and developmental
math is supposed to give you the basic
skills that you need in order to be
successful in your college level math
classes the issue with these classes is
that they’re not taught in a
face-to-face environment with really
individualized instruction that’s proven
to be really helpful for students these
developmental courses are taught in a
computer lab and so we sit students down
in front of a machine and we say alright
do these online homeworks do these
online tests and quizzes and we’re
basically expecting these students who
have already proven that they’re not
that good at math we’re basically
expecting them to teach themselves math
and then we wonder we’re like well they
have all these resources they have all
these tutoring programs all these things
why aren’t they being successful
maybe the issue here is that it can’t be
fixed with yet another tutoring program
we have to look at the structure of this
online self-taught environment and
wonder why it’s not working and if we
look at that barrier that is this online
environment and we start to tear that
down and we start to rework those
classes and we start to incorporate more
face-to-face individualized instruction
would more of our students actually be
able to be successful in those math
classes another place that we see this
is standardized testing oh I heard some
groans there that’s that’s good that’s
good right standardized testing right a
lot of people struggle with standardized
testing but there’s lots of resources
out there to help you there’s books
there’s DVDs you can pay for these two
hundred dollar classes to take you can
do these online PowerPoint type things
that help you but even with all of these
resources there are still a lot of
people who do poorly on standardized
tests so again what if we thought about
things differently what if we tried to
figure out what is the barrier there
that’s actually preventing these
students from successfully completing
these standardized tests perhaps that
barrier is that we expect every single
person regardless of who they are to
demonstrate the knowledge that they have
in one standardized way which let’s face
it that’s not very realistic we all have
different strengths different weaknesses
different learning styles and so if you
demonstrate your knowledge in a slightly
different way or maybe if you’re just
not a good standardized test taker
you’re pretty much set up for failure
right from the very beginning regardless
of how many resources you take advantage
of and so if we looked at standardized
testing and we tried to break down that
barrier that is this one standard unit
for everyone and we tried to come up
with different testing mechanisms that
adapt to people’s learning styles that
let everyone regardless of their
strengths and weaknesses demonstrate the
knowledge in the way that works the best
for them would more people be able to be
successful in standardized testing
something that I see a lot in the work
that I do is that we continuously try to
convince our students to engage and what
we call high-impact experiences now
high-impact experience could be lots of
different things
but things like studying abroad for a
semester in another country or maybe
doing an internship to get real-world
practical experience in your field of
interest a high-impact experience is
basically anything that makes your
college experience even more beneficial
than just going to class everyday and we
give students all kinds of resources and
information about what these high-impact
experiences are and how to take
advantage of them and how great it would
be if you did it hooray let’s do it but
for some reason there’s so many people
who don’t engage in any of these
opportunities and their time that
they’re in school what are the barriers
that are in place that are preventing
them from doing so perhaps it’s that
they’re worried about it fitting in
their course sequencing and delaying
graduation maybe we’re not setting up
our curriculum in a flexible enough way
that actually allows time for these
experiences or maybe students are
looking at study abroad and going oh man
there is no way i can afford that it’s
way too expensive maybe we’re not
creating enough cost-effective options
for study abroad that don’t cost a
million dollars to be able to go do them
or maybe we’re not advertising study
away experiences enough where you can go
study in another part of the united
states which is so much more cost
effective in studying abroad to another
country but it’s just as beneficial as
doing that or maybe it’s a really
fundamental barrier maybe a student
doesn’t want to do an internship because
they don’t have a car and they can’t
drive to that internship maybe we’re not
doing a good enough job of finding local
internships that are within walking
distance to campus or having enough on
campus internship so it’s all students
regardless of that barrier if they have
it can engage in those experiences if we
work with our students and we identify
these barriers and we work to break them
down how many more of our students would
actually be able to engage in these high
impact experiences that are proven to be
so very beneficial for them now all of
my examples are in education right
because that’s where I work that’s the
field that I know this is what I know
best but shifting our focus to actually
tearing down the barriers that hinder
people that’s a concept that can be
applied to really any field and so I
challenge you think about the field that
you’re in or maybe the field that you
want to go into someday are there people
in that field who worked so hard and we
give them all the resources and all the
information and all the support that
they could ever need but for some reason
they still aren’t able to be successful
what are the barriers there that are
preventing them from doing so because if
we stop putting all this time and energy
into creating new resource after new
program after new workshop and we start
just universally tearing down these
barriers that are blocking people in the
first place just imagine how many more
people could actually be successful
thank you [Applause]