Month: June 2025

Here are my reflections on the readings we were presented with for this assignment. 

The essay by Alice Bradbury left me feeling frustrated as there is so much evidence but so little action. There is something about how it is framed (I might have misread) about policy and assessment that doesn’t sit well with me.  Even if these policies clearly illustrate the gaps and issues students face, what is the purpose of focusing on assessment of models and criteria? The question should be “How do I make sure my students are getting good grades?”, it should be “How am I making sure they are getting a good education?” 

(Table of questions from Bradbury’s Essay, getting people to honestly answer these might be uncomfortable. But maybe it is incredibly helpful to face that feeling together?)

No policy will matter unless we take action to create better opportunities for students to catch up and provide better financial support so that students can focus and stay interested in their studies.  

Rhianna Garretts essay is given more context thanks to the video by James Orr. Of course, there will be differences in career trajectory for global majority academics if they are faced with hostile staff like James Orr who simply claims institutional racism does not exist. The boldness in James Orr’s claims makes me think about the potential inaction of his peers who take on the role as the naïve and/or bystander in his presence (Wong Et Al, 2024). 

Also the Telegraph can go to hell 🙂

Asif Sadiq and James Orr’s video talk about how training is a waste of money. Orr claims that it is not needed while Sadiq states that it is a waste of money because it does not work. After seeing how my peers and managers continue to act after having done mandatory anti racism training, I am very much in Sadiq’s side of the argument. His talk was very helpful to motivate me to put my intervention into practice next academic year, to prove to peers how an embodied manifesto exercise can go a long way as long as you are adaptable and open to change based on student’s needs. 

Research questions after reviewing these resources: How can we help teachers become more adaptable and confident? In the end, they were all students with diverse needs and are now adults with diverse needs. So how can an adult who doesn’t communicate their diverse needs get students to do it? Maybe all teachers need a workshop on improvisation? 

All of this makes me think of building transformative justice into my teaching. (Need to email practitioner Alex Johnston and ask for an interview.) This would help staff with the fear of saying the wrong thing. “Creating psychological safety to have conversations”. (Sadiq, A. 2023) 

Asking what people would like is helpful to hear as it adds to my intervention. We own our own journey of learning, and we need to allow it to be uncomfortable.

Note to remember: How do I communicate to students the appropriate channels for them to raise concerns about me? I currently do not tell students how to do this.

Action: Add point of contact to my manager in all emails in case students want to raise issues around my teaching. 

Bibliography: 

Bradbury, A., 2020. A critical race theory framework for education policy analysis: The case of bilingual learners and assessment policy in England. Race Ethnicity and Education, 23(2), pp.241-260. Read pages 241-247.  

Garrett, R. (2024). Racism shapes careers: career trajectories and imagined futures of racialised minority PhDs in UK higher education. Globalisation, Societies and Education, pp.1–15. Read pages 2-5 & 7-11. 

Sadiq, A. (2023) Diversity, Equity & Inclusion. Learning how to get it right. TEDx [Online}. Youtube. 2 March. Available at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HR4wz1b54hw 

Orr, J. (2022) Revealed: The charity turning UK universities woke. The Telegraph [Online]. Youtube. 5 August. Available at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FRM6vOPTjuU 

Billy Wong, Reham Elmorally, Meggie Copsey-Blake, Ellie Highwood & Joy Singarayer (2021) Is race still relevant? Student perceptions and experiences of racism in higher education, Cambridge Journal of Education, 51:3, 359-375, DOI: 10.1080/0305764X.2020.1831441 

Reflections from the films and readings: 

What I got from this talk by Kwame Anthony Appiah was that there is no point in arguing whether a religion is good or bad as all religions has examples of both. It is more helpful to focus on the power structures behind religions and the people who wield them and to what benefit. 

One thought I had in relation to Kwame’s story of King Rattray, who is presented as someone who thought his actions were purely religious, but they were of course also political. The idea that people put faith in traditions to uphold their sense of reality feels valid today, I think the way people uphold traditional ways of operating within an institution often think that their world will crumble if they were to change their ways. Maybe it would? But maybe that would be a good thing? 

Haifaa Jawads essay about “the case of visible Muslim women” was an interesting read.  

She explains that many modern-day views on Muslim women (and men) come from a “lack of knowledge and understanding of each other’s lives” (Jawad, H 2022). On a personal level I can draw many parallels to how my experience as a queer person often faces hostility due to people simply not knowing anything about me. This feels very aligned with my goals for my intervention, which I hope can lead to students getting to know each other and filling gaps in knowledge together. 

In this essay, she presents dressing and presenting in certain ways as a form of “embodiment of faith”. I know faith often has a religious connotation, but I cannot help to connect that to how I or other queer people choose to present publicly. When I dress colorfully, color my hair or paint my nails I often think of that as me embodying my faith or belief in queerness. I need to continue reflecting on this, but I think it could be quite helpful to use the idea of an embodiment in my intervention. Maybe for unit 3? 

Simran Jeet Singh talks about his education practice in America and how he acknowledges the country’s colonial and racist history and how it is still prominent today. He is frank about the urgency and importance of holding these discussions alive in the classroom, and how we can do that by including examples and dissecting the multiple ways people look at social issues.  

He appears to have practice within political studies, so I am trying to reflect on how to do this within an illustration context. An example could be by showing a piece of my work (which is incredibly homosexual and graphic) and explain who would find joy in this work and with honesty explaining that this work angers some to the point of threatening with violence against me and my community. Not a finished thought. 

These were the most prominent reflections I had from the references. 

Blibliography:

Appiah, K. A. (2014) Is religion good or bad? (This is a trick question). Youtube [Online]. 16 June. Available at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X2et2KO8gcY

Jawad, H. (2022) Islam, Women and Sport: The Case of Visible Muslim Women. [Online]. Available at: https://blogs.lse.ac.uk/religionglobalsociety/2022/09/islam-women-and-sport-the-case-of-visible-muslim-women/ 

Trinity University (2016) Challenging Race, Religion, and Stereotypes in the Classroom. [Online]. Available at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0CAOKTo_DOk