I have always shared a bit more than just home interiors here on my blog, so today I want to share a project I have been working on ‘behind the scenes’ for the past 9 months: DEI Newsletters. The DEI Newsletters are essentially a monthly newsletter or collection of resources revolving around a specific monthly theme relating to diversity, equity and inclusion with an ‘educator’ lens (meaning it is catered to educators).
I’m sharing this because I believe this resource might be helpful to others– you can borrow formatting and resources to share with schools and communities wherever you live!
As I mentioned in my last post, last year I took on a more active role volunteering in my children’s school district, and one of those responsibilities I took on was coordinating DEI efforts among all the schools that have a DEI position in the PTO/PSO.
That is how the idea of these newsletters was born!
I saw a need and said to myself, “If not me, who?”
I first created an inclusive calendar of events and holidays, which can be found here: Inclusive Calendar for 2021/22
Then I realized almost every month already had a theme that was relating to DEI, and often a heritage or ethnicity. Since St Louis is quite diverse with lots of ethnic restaurants, I thought it would be great to create a collection of restaurants and/or local events that relate to the theme!
Each newsletter includes all of the monthly holidays/events and also explains each one. Of course I wanted to include children’s books that fit within the theme, as well influential Americans, and a parent interview.
The parent interview is as important part of the DEI Newsletters because it shares personal perspectives on the impact of efforts celebrating diversity, creating equity in education, and striving to be more inclusive. It not only is informative to understanding another’s experience, but has the ability to foster empathy.
I know how busy teachers and staff are and how little time they have to do anything ‘extra’… so I figured if they could read through a newsletter quickly, they could pull out information, mention holidays or important dates, or gather new book titles easily without the cumbersome sift-through of Google search results. They could use as little or as much as they wanted! I send these out on the first of every month to all my children’s teachers and admin, as well as share with other parents in our district to do the same in their kid’s schools.
So with all of that explanation, here are the newsletters from the past 9 months, each 4 pages long.
September: Hispanic Heritage Month
Download the PDF of September’s DEI Newsletter HERE
October: Disability History & Awareness Month
Download the PDF of October’s DEI Newsletter HERE (has clickable links)
November: Native American Heritage Month
Download the PDF of November’s DEI Newsletter HERE
December: Interfaith Awareness Month
Download the PDF of December’s DEI Newsletter HERE
January: Poverty Awareness Month
Download the PDF of January’s DEI Newsletter HERE
February: Black History Month
Download the PDF of February’s DEI Newsletter HERE
March: Women’s History Month
Download the PDF of March’s DEI Newsletter HERE
April: Arab American Heritage Month
Download the PDF of April’s DEI Newsletter HERE
May: Asian American and Pacific Islander Heritage Month
Download the PDF of May’s DEI Newsletter HERE
I’m sharing free access to these newsletters for PERSONAL USE ONLY. Meaning, you can distribute them however you like for use in your homes, schools, communities, copy the format and add things specific to your community, etc, but are not to be used for professional or monetary gain.
Let me know if you have feedback– how you could see them improved, or what you think!
xo, Rachel
I love everything about these newsletters! Thanks for sharing!
Absolutely love these newsletters! Thank you for sharing. I’m going to use them as a model for the newsletter I’m creating for my district. How did you find the parents for the interviews?