**Co-published with
**
How can I apply learning and social justice theory to become a better
facilitator?
Should I prepare differently for workshops around specific identities?
How do I effectively respond when things aren't going as planned?
This book is intended for the increasing number of faculty and student
affairs administrators - at whatever their level of experience -- who
are being are asked to become social justice educators to prepare
students to live successfully within, and contribute to, an equitable
multicultural society.
It will enable facilitators to create programs that go beyond
superficial discussion of the issues to fundamentally address the
structural and cultural causes of inequity, and provide students with
the knowledge and skills to work for a more just society. Beyond theory,
design, techniques and advice on practice, the book concludes with a
section on supporting student social action.
The authors illuminate the art and complexity of facilitation, describe
multiple approaches, and discuss the necessary and ongoing reflection
process. What sets this book apart is how the authors illustrate these
practices through personal narratives of challenges encountered, and by
admitting to their struggles and mistakes.
They emphasize the need to prepare by taking into account such
considerations as the developmental readiness of the participants, and
the particular issues and historical context of the campus, before
designing and facilitating a social justice training or selecting
specific exercises.
They pay particular attention to the struggle to teach the goals of
social justice education in a language that can be embraced by the
general public, and to connect its structural and contextual analyses to
real issues inside and outside the classroom.
The book is informed by the recognition that "the magic is almost never
in the exercise or the handout but, instead, is in the facilitation";
and by the authors' commitment to help educators identify and analyze
dehumanizing processes on their campuses and in society at large,
reflect on their own socialization, and engage in proactive strategies
to dismantle oppression.
