Summary by Kelsey Smith, OER Librarian, West Hills College Lemoore
On October 22nd, 2018, New America uploaded the first blog post in a five-part series that discusses how Open Education can support LGBTQ. The five postings can be viewed individually or in one single posting.
As student demographics in the United States become more diverse every year in both K-12 and higher education, faculty are turning their attention toward more inclusive teaching and learning materials to better support the wide variety of students in their classrooms. The New America blog series discusses ways in which our school policies are becoming more hostile towards LGBTQ students and highlights research showing that queer students that felt safe and supported were less likely to drop out and were more likely to maintain higher GPAs. One way in which queer students can be supported is by embedding LGBTQ histories, examples, and topics into the curricula. The blog series also covers several roadblocks to queer-inclusive curricula, like “no promo homo” state laws and school policies.
Both California and New Jersey are the first two states to require the inclusion of LGBTQ history in the curricula. Since there is not a standardized curriculum for this yet, there can be a vast difference in what is taught in each individual classroom and the cost of updating current textbooks to be more inclusive is costly and time-consuming. Since Open Educational Resources (OER) allow for free content adaptation and revision, they are being considered in place of traditional publisher material. Not only does OER save students (or K-12 school districts) money, they can be completely customized to reflect each institution’s student population leading to a more equitable and inclusive learning experience for all.
“Open educational resources could be a viable option for removing those time and cost barriers. OER are not only free to access, but free to retain, reuse, redistribute, and revise—meaning that teachers anywhere could not only obtain materials to help prepare them to teach LGBTQ-inclusive content, but they could download, share, and tailor those materials to the individual needs of their classroom. The ability to tailor content in particular, which is not possible with materials that are only free and not open, provides unique opportunities for exploring the immense diversity and historical breadth within the LGBTQ cannon”
Senior Program Associate, Education Policy Program, New America
Though more schools are beginning to see the benefit of more equitable and inclusive learning environments, there is not much guidance, support, or resources when it comes to including LGBTQ content into the classroom. The New America blog series is a step in the right direction to bring attention to the issue and leverage the use of OER to support queer students moving forward.
