Racial Literacy Workshop Series

Racial literacy is a necessary life skill to be able to understand, process, and communicate around issues of race/racism, white supremacy, colorism, etc. CWRU Greek Life has partnered with Joey Oteng, a social justice educator, to help community members engage in self-reflective dialogue, interpersonal communication, and take action institutionally for anti-racism and racial justice. Through the spring 2021 semester community members will get to participate and increase their familiarity and confidence with the aspects of racial literacy - history/language, intrapersonal reflection, and interpersonal engagement. This workshop series consists of four workshops that seek to cultivate the skills for racial literacy through meaningful activities, vulnerable dialogue, tangible takeaways, actionable steps, and continual self-evaluation to track progress. Those workshops are as follows:

Me vs. Other Me: Embracing Discomfort & Vulnerability
Welcome to the Neighborhood: Social Justice 101
Breaking the Fourth Wall: Anti-Racist History + Race & Greeks
Into the Multiverse: Breaking Down Racial Barriers
Workshops are an hour to an hour and a half giving community members time to be fully present, practice the related skills, engage with one another, and to ask questions.

Program Learning Outcomes:
• Gain a working understanding of racial literacy and how to further develop the skill set.
• Practice having dynamic dialogue around race and racism in vulnerable ways.
• Identify practical ways to intervene in racial bias incidents.
• Cultivate confidence in having conversations and taking action for racial justice.
• Name institutional and organizational racism, oppression, and prejudice + develop plans to address exclusivities

Community members have two opportunities to get involved – join the trainer program to learn how to facilitate the above workshops for others, or participate in the workshops.

Train-the-Trainers Series
For community members interested in furthering their skills in public speaking, non-verbal communication, understanding group dynamics, diffusing tension, quick thinking, emotional literacy, and storytelling among other things the train the trainer series is an opportunity to do all of that and to be the at forefront of leading your communities in the development of their racial literacy. Trainers will have three other workshops:

Chaos Control: Mastering the Art of Facilitation
Flip or Flop: Personalizing Facilitation
Plot Twist: Navigating Facilitation

To refine their facilitation skills. Trainers will go through the racial literacy workshops themselves and learn how to facilitate them including figuring out pacing, how to answer questions, leading activities, engaging people with heavy topics, etc. Trainers will schedule with their communities times to facilitate the workshops in turn, and come back together to give feedback about their experiences leading them. The goal is to train more people on being able to lead conversations and give guidance to others as they develop their sense of racial literacy, get active for racial justice, and practice anti-racism.

Timeline:
Open to feedback and dependent on participants – facilitate the first two train-the-trainer workshops, and at least one racial literacy workshop in January with the other three workshops spread out every couple or few weeks in February and potentially through March. The goal is to learn a workshop, and to give a two week period to schedule it and facilitate it with other community members, get feedback, and repeat.
January 15th 2-5pm Est
Session Topics: What is Facilitation and Personalizing Facilitation

January 22nd 2-5pm Est
Session Topics: Me vs. Other Me (Vulnerability) and Social Justice 101

February 20th from 12-3pm est
Session Topics: Navigating Facilitation and Racial History

February 6th from 12-3pm est
Session Topics: Breaking Down Racial Barriers

April 10th from 12-2pm est
Session Topic: Debrief

Community members interested should indicate so by filling out this form. For more information, please contact GLO Associate Director, Amie Jackson, jxa122@case.edu.