In the coming year I’ll go up for tenure, which is a time for clarifying my individual approach and contribution. As such I’ve been reflecting on our research group’s work together and what characterizes it. For start, of course, we named it Equity Research Group, and the concepts of equity and justice, creating research and insights that help shift systems of oppression and support marginalized individuals, are core to the work. But out of many other professors and research groups that also focus on equity topics, I’m thinking through a few of the other words that I think characterize the work. Here are some working thoughts:
Philosophy: As many people point out, each Ph.D. is actually a “doctorate in philosophy.” So not only should there be elements of empirical findings, but there should be insight, something more known from the study than just the sum of the study’s parts. I think my work, and the work I push our group to do, is always attempting to center that insight and take responsibility to be thinking more deeply about what all of the research means. What it means for us individually (reflection) and what it means for the rest of our readers (translation).
Translation: Left to their own devices, pure theorists can become esoteric, and a pure theorist of something like equity in engineering education won’t have much tangible impact. So I think my work / our group is always engaged in acts of translation, understanding the insight we hold individually and trying to represent that insight usefully to other stakeholders with different starting places and vocabularies.
Collaboration: Whether it’s a directly participatory project with student participants, or a project taking a broader view on engaging students and supporting student voice, I/we tend to collaborate across differences to create coalitions for change. My own sense of this is that I always want to challenge myself that I may not be the right voice, the right sole voice, or may not have the right team to speak to or uncover insight on an issue. With humility and reflection, I think that can be built into the research, the team-building, the collaboration, and the final product. Sometimes we only have our own voice on a topic and can still view our sense of collaboration with the broader community through citation practices, calling for / pointing to the work of others, and a sense of positionality.
Action: I think ultimately many of the most crucial things we can do are not going to be found in print, but our print versions document crucial encounters and interventions we forge elsewhere. I think equity-focused work should always be tied to action somewhere, directly in parallel with the paper or through broader collaboration with others well-positioned to take action. Writing is an action, but I think we also have to think about what that action entails—who is reading the work and what they might do more tangibly for issues of equity with what we’ve written. I think the equity research agenda needs to stay close to action, whether in parallel through action-oriented research or through translational work to provide the resources for others who are better poised to take action. Our work as mentors and teachers is one important form of action. By taking stock of the collective action we are helping enable we can ensure our work is not inert and esoteric.
So, if I had to define the Equity Research Group character, beyond our topical focus on equity, I would say we are a group that focuses on topics of equity through: (1) philosophy, (2) translation, (3) collaboration, and (4) action. Anything I am missing?