I’ve wanted to write you all week and finding the time to collect my thoughts has been hard. Quite honestly keeping steady focus on any one thing right now is very hard. As you can imagine attempting to convey a message of hope and high regard for our organization to our staff during a time where yet another Black man is killed unarmed in our country is very difficult. And in this moment, I am experiencing the everyday patterns of race play out with you and our organization no differently than everywhere else I’ve worked.

Communication explains what needs to get done with an expectation that one can just do it. Engagement explains what needs to get done and assumes that an experience is necessary to try-on, understand, and feel the outcome or result. The information one learns from engaging diversity and inclusion work is imperative; insights regarding the capacity of team members to execute whatever the diversity and inclusion task, initiative, or program being asked of them are illuminated.

In our organizations, despite having new goals, our attachment to old and original ways of being surface regularly. Often, it sounds like: “But we’ve always done it that way.” Yet, collectively we have never had nor known systematically inclusive and equitable schools, colleges, or nonprofits. Building these kinds of places requires that we think outside of the box, imagine beyond what we have experienced, dream big, and create past what we presently know.

“No smoking on the metro.” “F___ you, lady. Ain’t nobody smoking.” Social identity dynamics underpin this exchange, making both an analysis of this situation and trying to answer the question: “What is one to do?” very interesting. I witnessed the exchange happen very fast, and felt compelled to do something. So I said one word: “Easy”. Perplexed by the exchange across race, gender, and age lines this is what and how conflict happens.

Today, part of the challenge of having conversations about race and racism, is that we have these conversations in an ahistorical way, as if it were only today that our race mattered. Yet, people of color can easily recount the first time we encountered race and racism. Noting this, people of color show up to conversations about race with previous experiences that white people must account for in how they engage people of color.

A major American holiday that conjures up many feelings for many people always leaves a question in the balance: should one say, Happy Holidays or Merry Christmas? In organizations, the debate manifest in the decision of what decorations to put up during the holiday season, if any. And, what to call the holiday party. Too often, the decision is presented as a zero-sum game without options that are agreeable for everyone.

Our tendency is to help people who to us meet certain requirements, whether or not we know we have set them. Unknowingly, we expect people to “show up” or “be” a certain way to receive our help. This tendency prevents honest reflection and thinking on the biases we carry. For educators, and those alike who are on the front lines of helping others, there is a need to deeply consider what biases we have that create barriers to our helping.

“As I man can’t I….” or “As a straight person, wouldn’t I…” In inquiries like these people are trying really hard to sort out a bad or hard experience they’ve had, while also trying to push their own understanding of how terms like oppression, privilege, racism, microaggressions, culture, and power work, I answer. To illustrate, I’ve included an email correspondence between myself and a session attendee who wanted to respond to a white person indicating that it is a microaggressions directed towards them when people say they have white privilege.

The everyday dynamics of navigating gender, ability, socioeconomic class, race, sexuality, and our other social identities is complex. Yet, bringing these interactions under the microscope to explore their impact in a way that holds our social identities at the center is helpful. As such what follows is a story about the (micro)interactions I experience with White people - at the social group level - that are deeply seated in and move through racist ideas, stereotypes, and generalizations.

Each year, many of us get this “day off,” yet do nothing to make meaning or better understand the contribution of Dr. King. Analysis, interpretation, and application of Dr. King’s words to American society are necessary today. He asks: “Why is equality so assiduously avoided? Why does white America delude itself, and how does it rationalize the evil it retains?” This question is a profound one as we continue to live in an unequal society. King’s assessment and reflections written here highlights the cost it would take to achieve equality.

Collectively, we shy away from listening to those who suffer. Yet people’s suffering must be engaged as it avails a more complete and accurate history for people to wrestle with and ponder. Through suffering the conditions of experience are told. Bridging to education, our students do not create their conditions in our classrooms, yet they are expected to learn. If you want to know the truth about your classroom, you must listen to your students.

The challenge in diversifying our organizations is that they were designed with a few kinds of people in mind. Ultimately, we build culture, systems, and ways of being on this original design. In this design for sameness, it is easy to blame someone for their differences. Yet, on the other side of one’s differences is the possibility of learning that may, in fact, inform, shape, and impact how we engage resulting in a stronger organization.

I am Michael Brown and Eric Gardner. I’ve known this. And, I must move through this to facilitate a dialogue program about Ferguson. The program seeks to offer People of Color, Multiracial, and White people committed to eradicating racism a space to explore, reflect on, and interrogate race, racism, justice, and resistance in the aftermath of the Ferguson decision.

Cultivating space is important. Leader must track how spaces are used across social identities as a way to advance equitable use of the spaces and buildings where education and work is to happen. We know that all who enter the halls of our workplaces and schools do not get the same outcomes when they exit. Interrogating space may prove to have to a meaningful benefit to organizational thriving.

A pressing question among education leaders is why don’t racial minorities participate in the same activities at the same rates as their White peers. For many historically underrepresented students, studying on college campuses or attending elite schools is like traveling to a new place. To some, these collections of buildings is “just where eduction happens,” but to marginalized students, this space can be different and foreign. When given the option on a college campus, some marginalized students – particularly students of color – move into the spaces that are familiar and comfortable to them. Spaces that remind them of home.

With some kind of incident or occurrence almost every day that stings of racism or some other form of exclusion, an organization could be called to write, acknowledge, or respond frequently. Most leaders are not prepared to respond. Specifically, they are not ready, have no criterion on which to base a decision to respond, and neglect the history of previous responses. Here I address all three, readiness, criteria, and history, as each is a necessary component to determining whether and how to respond as an organization to the next tragic or racist thing that happens in the world

So much of our focus in education, is on what we can do for others, it is not our tendency to be deeply reflective about ourselves. By asking ‘what is universal,’ we begin to see what is shared across constituent groups. If we ask what is universal for women, we may learn that regardless of whether women are faculty, staff, or students, they are not represented in leadership or feel like their issues are not represented. If this is true, we would then have a focal point around a concern of inclusion for women that accounts for students, staff, and faculty.

A realization has surfaced: it is not enough to diversify an organization ensuring there is representation, one must also ensure that historically marginalized people are having an excellent experience in the organization everday. The everdayness of one’s experience is built who they interact with, the stories they share, the food they eat, and what they see as they do it all. If we really want to be inclusive we must understand, measure, and act on how people are situated.

While each bit of airline travel is different even when the route is the same, so is our students’ experiences on what is supposed to be the same kindergarten to college journey. Who enhances the flying experience that is children’s education? What adjustments should be made to ensure a safe and enjoyable flight? Are those adjustments being made? Reflecting on these answers opens the doors to see learning spaces as places where education is happening differently, although we are striving to ensure the same outcomes.