Safe spaces to talk about racism – observations from my ALT Sep 2021 conference presentation – Reshaping HE

This post is written based on my observations during my presentation entitled “When learning technologists tackle sectorial racism via recruitment and staff development“.

The presentation itself was centred around the Action Learning Sets (ALS), organised by the Recruitment & Staff Development (RSD) subgroup of the Antiracism & Learning Technology group (A&R LT).

The focus was on the importance of ALS to provide a safe space for talking about workplace racism. Three members of the Recruitment & Staff Development team undertook training to be an ALS facilitator, specifically focusing on tackling racism (Read more about “Training to become an ALS Facilitator“).

When the A&R LT group was formed, it was clear that the community wanted to talk about their experience and many were reluctant to talk since learning technologists tend to move around organisations and know each other quite well, a member even raised concerns about chat messages potentially be copied for retaliation purposes.

The idea of having ALS was first proposed by one of the founders of the group, also member of the RSD group. The ALTc presentation was based on the experience of piloting ALS, but most particularly why have ALS as a safe space to talk of racism.

Watch the full presentation recording on ALT’s YouTube channel.