Overall Rating Silver
Overall Score 53.56
Liaison Georgeann Moss
Submission Date Dec. 22, 2021

STARS v2.2

Dallas College
EN-7: Employee Educators Program

Status Score Responsible Party
Complete 1.31 / 3.00 Lori Delacruz Lewis
Assistant Director of Sustainability
Sustainability Department
"---" indicates that no data was submitted for this field

Total number of employees:
7,503

Total number of employees served by a peer-to-peer sustainability outreach and education program:
1,061

Percentage of employees served by a peer-to-peer sustainability outreach and education program:
14.14

Name of the employee educators program (1st program):
Reframing the Curriculum: Social Justice and Sustainability

A brief description of the employee educators program (1st program):

Reframing the Curriculum: Design for Social Justice and Sustainability is 1 of 8 programs of the Equity in Education League (EEL). It’s an initiative to train faculty and staff how to utilize existing curriculum and assignments with a social justice and sustainability lens. This practical, hands-on framework guides participants into weaving the concepts of healthy communities, democratic societies and social justice into academic disciplines.

Participants explore narratives shaping the future, both in and out of classrooms, and then consider the larger story and respond with curriculum makeovers that engage students in solving problems in their schools, communities and the world. Participants utilize tools and resources to bring environmental, economic and equity concepts into their classrooms. The initiative began in May 2019 with a series of three workshops for facilitator training, resulting in 15 faculty and 14 staff trained by the author of the book, Susan Santone.

In 2020-21, the Assistant Director for Sustainability Education Lori Delacruz Lewis started a faculty cohort and hosted five workshops. Upon completion of the training, faculty and staff serve as sustainability experts in their disciplines and departments.

View the introduction video by Susan Santone, https://dcccd.yuja.com/V/Video?v=3931138&node=13392672&a=2028040043&autoplay=1


A brief description of the employee educators program’s target audience (1st program):

The target audience is faculty and academic staff.


Number of trained employee educators (1st program):
29

Number of weeks the employee educators program is active annually (1st program):
3

Average or expected number of hours worked weekly per trained employee educator (1st program):
3

Total number of hours worked annually by trained employee educators (1st program):
100

Website URL where information about the employee educators program is available (1st program) :
Name of the employee educators program (2nd program):
Equity in Education League (EEL)

A brief description of the employee educators program (2nd program):

The Equity in Education League (EEL) is a semester-long, virtual series of supportive, professional learning communities where full- and part-time faculty learn from one another through asking questions, challenging assumptions, and pursuing actions that support equitable practices and outcomes for all groups.

The goal of the EEL is to build a community of equity-minded practitioners who are committed to lifelong learning and systemic change. Reflective practice over time builds capacity around our efforts to tackle racial and other social inequities that impact our students, our colleagues, and ourselves. We believe that strong professional learning opportunities for faculty are catalysts for a wide range of improvements in the classroom experience.

Each EEL series meets 3 to 6 times, and they are organized by intended audience, topic, and level of experience. Participants engage in reading and reflection work between meeting dates. These sessions are eligible for professional development credit. List of current and past EEL Offerings is included in the attached supplemental documents of this STARS credit. EEL is also included in the Dallas College Faculty Handbook.

EEL has 9 facilitators who engage their peers in virtual discussions around topics related to diversity, equity, inclusion and belonging. Some of the topics include culturally responsive teaching, implicit bias, systemic racism, racial identity development, and intersectionality. These sessions provide opportunities for faculty to collaborate with other equity-minded colleagues, question their biases in a growth-centered space, and reflect on guided questions through small and large group discussions. Accountability, self-reflection, and care are foundational to the success of these faculty learning communities.

Equity is considered by American leaders as "the" central concept to achieving the SDGs, according to the 2nd Annual American Leadership in Advancing Progress on the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) during the 2020 U.N. General Assembly. https://www.brookings.edu/blog/up-front/2020/11/12/american-leadership-in-advancing-the-sdgs-to-achieve-equity-and-sustainability/

Current EEL Offerings

1. Becoming Culturally Relevant, Responsive and Ready
What is culturally responsive teaching? These active sessions are designed to teach the rationale and strategies that support a more culturally responsive classroom through discussions, breakout sessions, and personal reflection. Content will explore Zaretta Hammond’s book, Culturally Responsive Teaching & the Brain: Promoting Authentic Engagement and Rigor among Culturally and Linguistically Diverse Students.

2. Course Contextualization
This three-part series will highlight innovative ways to contextualize a course. Course contextualization fosters creativity by aligning your existing course curriculum with unique themes to enhance the student experience. The sessions will highlight culturally responsive teaching practices as part of the contextualization process.

3. Men and Allyship
In so many ways, the lion’s share of equity work is supported by the very people who are most severely impacted by the inequitable outcomes this work is designed to eliminate. This community seeks to change/update that narrative – Together, we will explore the vital role of male representation in equity PD efforts, implications for women and other marginalized groups, and the benefits of supporting these efforts, especially in the college setting. This group will help build momentum for effective allyship in the equity space.

4. Reframing the Curriculum for Social Justice and Sustainability
This series is a practical, hands-on guide to weaving the concepts of healthy communities, democratic societies and social justice into academic disciplines. In both synchronous and asynchronous lessons, participants explore narratives shaping the future, both in and out of classrooms, and then consider the larger story and respond with curriculum adjustments that engage students in solving problems in their schools, communities, and the world. Participants will discover tools (Ex. ArcGIS, EJSCREEN, National Equity Atlas, Social Vulnerability Index) to bring sustainability and social justice into their classrooms. Susan Santone’s Reframing the Curriculum: Design for Social Justice and Sustainability is the chosen text. https://dcccd.yuja.com/V/Video?v=3931138&node=13392672&a=2028040043&autoplay=1

5. Toward Racial Healing
In this self-reflective series about racial healing, participants will analyze their own racial identity development before diving into an exploration of how racism manifests in our society and, therefore, in ourselves. We will explore the grief and growth we experience as social beings living within a racialized hierarchy. In the end, participants will discover how to raise their own level of consciousness about race and help our students do the same in our lifelong journey toward racial healing. The workbook lessons in this series will focus on Anneliese A. Singh’s The Racial Healing Handbook: Practical Activities to Help You Challenge Privilege, Confront Systemic Racism, and Engage in Collective Healing.

Past EEL Offerings

6. DEI in the Performing Arts
In today’s environment, visual and performing arts must ensure that inclusion, diversity, equity, access, and success are a central focus in all aspects of higher education. Program planning should reflect the communities that visual and performing arts serve. These sessions will discuss, understand, and build consensus around practices and goals, establishing clarity across stakeholder groups, including faculty, students, and other community stakeholders.

7. Can We Talk about Whiteness?
As author Robin DiAngelo says, “Reflecting on our racial frames is particularly challenging for many White people because we are taught that to have a racial viewpoint is to be biased. Unfortunately, this belief protects our biases, because denying that we have them ensures that we won’t examine or change them.” This racial affinity group is designed to provide support for White faculty members to explore White privilege, which challenges efforts to advance equity, and White allyship which can serve as an antidote. Discussions will explore Robin DiAngelo’s book, White Fragility: Why It’s so Hard for White People to Talk about Racism.

8. REAL Series (where Responsive Equity Aspirations Live)
All levels of faculty are welcome to this community, which will explore the individual and collective responsibility faculty have in building capacity for conversations about race and equity. Participants will discover how our own relationship with and understanding of race impacts all students, but especially Black, Indigenous, and other People of Color (BIPOC). Discussions will also include the intersection of race with other identities. The aim for this group is to develop and practice an equity mindset to encourage a deeper sense of connection and belonging in the classroom.


A brief description of the employee educators program’s target audience (2nd program):

The target audience of this program is faculty, staff and administrators.


Number of trained employee educators (2nd program):
13

Number of weeks the employee educators program is active annually (2nd program):
24

Average or expected number of hours worked weekly per trained employee educator (2nd program):
3

Total number of hours worked annually by trained employee educators (2nd program):
312

Website URL where information about the employee educators program is available (2nd program):
A brief description of all other employee peer-to-peer sustainability outreach and education programs:

Cedar Valley Quality Teaching in Practicing Sustainability (QTIPS)
Faculty-led peer-to-peer teaching in sustainability certification was a campus-wide initiative resulting in the conversion of a large percentage of courses to the ‘green’ status. Green Courses, taught by Q-TIPS certified instructors, were available across several disciplines including Real Estate, Marketing, Government, Human Development, Biology, Philosophy, English, Spanish, Energy Management, and Residential and Commercial Building Performance Technology. More than 150 faculty have at Cedar Valley have completed the three-hour training online. https://hub.aashe.org/browse/casestudy/15157/Cedar-Valley-College-a-Center-of-Excellence-of-Sustainability-in-South-Dallas-TX

Gallup Strengths Core Facilitator training is the first step in preparing participants to facilitate the Dallas College series of strengths-based development sessions. This session helps participants build a greater understanding of the strengths themes, philosophy, guiding principles, and vernacular. In addition, participants learn to better utilize effective facilitation techniques such as storytelling, inquiry-based learning, and reflection. Gallup Strengths is a leadership development framework for individuals and teams. Gallup suggests that employee voices are important for all types of Environmental-Social-Governance (ESG) reporting. By continually supporting employee in leadership training and development, Dallas College is helping to empower employees to speak up about their successes and concerns especially major "ethical, social and environmental risks." https://www.gallup.com/workplace/348977/gallup-sustainability-five-index-esg-reporting.aspx


Number of trained employee educators (all other programs):
172

Number of weeks, on average, the employee educators programs are active annually (all other programs):
3

Average or expected number of hours worked weekly per trained employee educator (all other programs):
1.50

Total number of hours worked annually by trained employee educators (all other programs):
365

Grand total number of hours worked annually by trained employee educators (all programs):
777

Hours worked annually by trained employee sustainability educators per employee served by a peer-to-peer program:
0.10

Website URL where information about the employee sustainability educators programs is available:
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Additional documentation to support the submission:
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Data source(s) and notes about the submission:

The total number of employees served by the peer-to-peer sustainability education programs was determined by adding the total number of employees participating in each program:
- Reframing the Curriculum for Social Justice and Sustainability
- Equity in Education League
- Cedar Valley Quality Teaching in Practical Sustainability
- Employee Conference Day and Workshops


The total number of employees served by the peer-to-peer sustainability education programs was determined by adding the total number of employees participating in each program:
- Reframing the Curriculum for Social Justice and Sustainability
- Equity in Education League
- Cedar Valley Quality Teaching in Practical Sustainability
- Employee Conference Day and Workshops

The information presented here is self-reported. While AASHE staff review portions of all STARS reports and institutions are welcome to seek additional forms of review, the data in STARS reports are not verified by AASHE. If you believe any of this information is erroneous or inconsistent with credit criteria, please review the process for inquiring about the information reported by an institution or simply email your inquiry to stars@aashe.org.