After receiving a Powered by Publics competitive seed funding award last December, the Western Coalition of Powered by Publics (a list of institutions in this cluster is at the bottom of this post) launched a faculty learning community (FLC) to focus on equity in the classroom. The FLC convened faculty last summer to share evidence-based practices for boosting equity and collaborate around strategies for implementing changes to courses.

Led by a team of faculty development specialists from Boise State University, faculty examined data on equity gaps in their classes and implemented proven approaches for addressing these gaps and improving student success. Using disaggregated DFW data to help faculty identify how underrepresented populations were doing in their classes, faculty then redesigned their courses fully or partially to reflect what they learned during the FLC.

Faculty universally reported the value of the FLC and the impact they saw in student responses to ideas learned at the FLC. Now, the Western Coalition is scaling this work. Using seed funds provided by APLU to support the original FLC, the University of Hawai’i System brought the Boise State University’s faculty development specialists to Hawai‘i to hold a four-day workshop version of the FLC with faculty from across the UH system.

The University of Hawai’i System will now work to expand the opportunity to engage in this data-driven equity minded FLC. It recently received a grant to help create an online version of the FLC allowing faculty to access class-level data on DFW rates so that gaps in success rates for underrepresented populations can be more clearly identified and remedies at the course level. Over 50 faculty members have signed up to beta test the online version of the FLC once it is developed.

The Western Coalition is comprised of Boise State University, the University of Montana, University of Alaska System, University of Alaska Fairbanks, University of Hawai'i System, University of South Dakota, and Washington State University.