PRSD unveils new multicultural framework for schools, teachers
Prairie Rose School Division laid out Tuesday specific goals and check-offs for a renewed multicultural framework in all PRSD schools.
Assistant superintendent Reagan Weeks presented the framework to an attentive board of trustees. The framework had four separate parts: Content integration, Knowledge construction, Equity pedagogy and Empowerment.
Content integration means showing or studying representations of diversity in a school environment. Knowledge construction focuses on giving teachers training to address controversy with confidence, and students critical tools to question common misconceptions or prejudices in society. Equity pedagogy encourages a school to take concrete actions to close gaps in equitable educational outcomes across a diversity of cultures and perspectives.
Empowerment means conscious inclusion of multicultural histories and perspectives in the curriculum to foster the well-being of all students and cultures represented in Prairie Rose School Division, and to provide measurable outcomes for schools and teachers.
“It is important teachers feel confident and equipped to help students address these issues in schools, and further it is critical our teachers exemplify characteristics of good teaching and design transformational learning experiences,” Weeks told the trustees. “It is one thing to talk about theories of multicultural education but we have to put them into action.”
Weeks said, from her perspective, Equity pedagogy and Empowerment were the two most critical aspects.
“We want our kids to intellectually engage from a position of strength,” she said. “It’s not enough to just put a few cultural references in. That’s really the entry level. Moving on from there is when concepts and perspectives are further embedded into the curriculum. The transformative approach and the social action approach is where (students) can take those ideas, run them through their own critical lenses and make a change.”