The following is an excerpt of tips compiled by Cynthia Lee. Dr. Lee is a Lecturer in the Computer Science Department at Stanford. See https://bit.ly/inclusivecs for the complete list.
Mid-Term:
Email top performers on a recent homework or exam to congratulate them; be sure to include a diverse group. (Message students from Canvas based on their grade: https://community.canvaslms.com/t5/Instructor-Guide/How-do-I-send-a-message-to-students-from-the-Gradebook/ta-p/741)
Provide students with clear and timely feedback, including class-wide distribution data. Women and minority students often fear the worst about their position relative to the class and can be reassured by data.
After a midterm exam, step through the math showing the class that students can still pass the course even if they did poorly. It’s just some multiplication but take the time to talk about it. Be factual—no need to “sugar coat”—but provide facts that will help reassure students who think things are worse than they really are.
Reach out to students who have filed a disability accommodation form with you and ask them if their needs are being met in your class. See: https://studentaffairs.indiana.edu/student-support/disability-services/index.html Reaffirm your commitment to complying with their approved accommodations and your willingness to receive complaints if there is a problem.
Everyday:
Review today’s lecture slides to make sure that your slides are free from gendered pronouns, especially those used in ways that conform to stereotypes (e.g., “A programmer should always write comments in his code, so he can remember how it works”). Use of “they” (and their/them) as a singular pronoun is now widely accepted as a neutral alternative, and better than the awkward “he or she” construction because it also includes genderqueer and non-binary.
Start class today by renewing your invitation to students to come to office hours. Understand that not all students have had the mentoring necessary to know how you expect them to interact with you, so explicitly instruct your class on how to do it. For example: “You don’t need to have a particular question—you’re welcome to just stop by for 5 minutes to introduce yourself,” or “I’m not just here for homework questions—if you are considering changing your major to CS and want to talk about it, if you want to know what it’s like to work as a software engineer, or if you are thinking about applying to grad school but don’t know where to begin, I’m happy to discuss that kind of thing as well.”
Look around your office and/or lab space. Consider if there are things you could add or remove that would make the space more welcoming generally, and also signal welcome to a diverse student body (e.g., remove very masculine or heavily CS-stereotyped movie posters).
Actually write a tally of how many times you call on students of different genders in class today. People of all genders are prone to calling on men more often. You may do this unconsciously unless you consciously do otherwise.
Go through today’s lecture slides and add “alt text” written descriptions of all images and diagrams. If you’ll use a video clip today, transcribe it. You will need to do this for all your class materials when you have a student who requires these accommodations, so even if that doesn’t apply this term, doing it now is a good head start. Make sure that students who are red-green colorblind will be able to interpret all the graphs and diagrams in your slides. -(Note the Office of Disability Services (ODS) will provide video transcripts to videos you produce if a student who is deaf or hard of hearing is enrolled in your course and registered for ODS services. See: https://studentaffairs.indiana.edu/student-support/disability-services/index.html Additional resource: https://accessibility.iu.edu/creating-content/multimedia/transcripts-captions.html
Thinking about today’s lecture, do you plan on using any examples or anecdotes about your childhood or daily life that may cause students to feel excluded for economic reasons? (e.g., talking about pricey gadgets or vacation travel as normal) Even if you know that you did not experience these things and are simply using them as an example, students don’t know that and can assume you are referring to them in a normative way.