How can you help create an inclusive environment for

high-achieving students of Color to thrive?

  1. About Us
  2. Who We Are

Who We Are

The Great Lakes Equity Center is a dynamic hub for professional learning and research, empowering educators to overcome challenges in achieving educational equity. We focus on issues like education disparities, educator shortages, and creating inclusive environments. Committed to positive transformation, we actively work to dismantle barriers and promote a holistic, equitable educational experience for all in both public and private spheres.

Mission and Vision

The mission of the Great Lakes Equity Center is Responsive, Equitable, and Just Education for All. Our vision is to leverage collaborations with campus, school, and community partners to facilitate relevant research and practice responses to eliminate racial and other intersectional injustices in schools and society. Accordingly, the Great Lakes Equity Center works across four activity domains:

  • Provide high-quality, research-based, low and no-cost equity-oriented professional learning opportunities, continuing education, and technical assistance to Pre-K-16 educators, administrators, and agencies.
  • Engage community stakeholders and partners in collaborative solutions toward equitable education.
  • Develop and disseminate research and other forms of public scholarship and resources toward educational justice and equity.
  • Develop and support future educators, including higher education faculty, who are committed and equipped to engage and lead educational equity and justice work in their own contexts.

Current Projects

 

  

 

What does the Great Lakes Equity Center do?

  • Our goal is to advance the rich capacities of each unique educational community to realize transformative change via individual and collective reflection and growth.
  • Our highly skilled team engages educational practitioners in mapping their system needs and resources to create sustainable approaches toward systemic change.
  • We provide on-demand support that increases in intensity and rigor.
  • We engage with educational practitioners on their unique equity journeys to realize high-quality, robust, safe, and inclusive learning environments for each student.
  

Why work at the Great Lakes Equity Center?

  • Engage in education system transformation in a quarter of our country’s public school districts, service agencies, and state departments of education.
  • Join a collaborative, interdependent, passionate, and committed team of colleagues.
  • Work toward and advance social justice.
  • Come to work as your full self, where your lived experiences, identities, and perspectives will be valued and believed.
  • Contribute to cutting-edge research and practice-based scholarship.
  • Experience supports and challenges for growth in designing and contributing to transformative adult learning experiences.
  

What is the Center’s impact?

  • 100% response rate to requests for assistance.
  • 93% of partners report an increase in capacity resulting from services.
  • 96% of partners report that our services are high quality and useful.
  • 92% of partners report an increase in their ability to understand and define equitable and inequitable practices.
  • 549+ customized professional learning products published.
  • 27,877 resources have been downloaded.
  • Half a million visitors to the website.

 

 

What do project partners say?

“This is my favorite partnership in the 26 years I’ve been in education…personalized one-on-one meetings, quality of resources and facilitation, we actually leave with strategies we can use…We not only got service within our MOU [Memorandum of Understanding], we got extra resources…Now I’d like to be engaged again. Every facilitator from the MAP Center that joined was equally good and had something great to share." -Cabinet Level Leader, (Naperville, IL, 2021).

“… I think we're on our 3rd superintendent. Over each evolution of that person [superintendent], the Center has been very adaptive in meeting the needs of what was happening at the time while at the same time, keeping us focused on the things that we originally identified as the reason we were reaching out for resources. We've gotten what we need to lead all of our culturally relevant resources, and now with our instructional framework [we’ve gotten what we need]. The professional development that has been provided… like anything that we ask [for], we get! Amazing support from the Center!"-Deputy Superintendent (Lawrence Public Schools, KS, 2019)

Engage more with our partner's thoughts on our services, expertise, and impact here: https://greatlakesequity.org/ta-partners-action