Henrico County Public Schools chief equity officer publishes paper promoting “Culturally Responsive Education Model”

Incidents


Henrico County Public Schools’ chief officer of “Equity, Diversity and Opportunity” published a paper through the Virginia Association of Teachers of English (VATE) that promoted the “Culturally Responsive Education Model” (CREM). The paper describes CREM as “a framework by which educators can recognize, digest, and implement cultural responsiveness in their classrooms and school communities.”

The school district’s chief equity officer uses her paper to promote “prejudice reduction” and “equity pedagogy” to educators. She describes “prejudice reduction” as “helping students develop more
positive attitudes about people from diverse groups and empowering them to identify and address
injustices.” She then describes “equity pedagogy” as “acknowledging diverse learning styles and intentionally identifying strategies that lead to higher achievement for students in diverse groups.”

The paper includes questions for educators in an effort to help them teach children using the “Culturally Responsive Education Model.” One question appears to push educators to direct students in how to think about political and social issues: “Do I encourage students to examine their own experiences and the experiences of others in order to identify bias/prejudice/inequity and work toward inclusivity?”