Equity Audits as a Change Management Tool

Diversity trainings have been critiqued as inadequate for shifting educational practice, despite their ubiquitous presence (Bezrukova, Spell, Perry, & Jehn, 2016). Equity audits can be a powerful alternative. As a change management tool, equity audits can spur reflection, clarify shared values, and connect values to action (Harris & Hopson, 2008). While there are many guides supporting their use in K-12 education (eg, Skrla, Scheurich, Garcia, & Nolly, 2004; Green, 2017), they remain underutilized in higher education.

In 2021, the Center for Project-Based Learning at Worcester Polytechnic Institute conducted an equity audit to advance our commitment to addressing structural inequities. As pedagogical leaders, we recognized the Center was upholding practices that reinforce privilege. An equity audit allowed us to engage in structured, evidence-based exploration of how to shift our operations to better enact our values. For example, we found that we partner with a disproportionately high percentage of Minority-Serving Instiutions, yet have relatively few workshops demonstrating culturally-responsive teaching through PBL. The experience of conducting an equity audit surfaced new ways of thinking about how anti-racist practices fit into our center.

In this presentation, we will provide guidance for how to conduct an equity audit. Strategies, resources, and lessons learned will be organized into four phases: 1) planning and committing to an equity audit, 2) identifying the right questions to ask, 3) making sense of data to surface new questions, and 4) addressing new questions with action. Within each phase, attendees will hear how we used the process of conducting an equity audit to initiate and manage change.