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Lesson Plan — The Inclusion Illusion: Smiling Faces Don’t Mean Equity

Students examine how “smiling faces” in university marketing and campus culture can create an illusion of inclusion while masking inequitable structures. This lesson challenges learners to look beyond friendliness and analyze how institutions maintain or resist equity.

Learning Objectives (with examples)

1. Objective 1: Students will identify how institutional imagery can hide inequitable practices. Example: A student explains how diverse brochure photos do not reflect unequal advising access or workload distribution.
2. Objective 2: Students will evaluate whether inclusion efforts at a university are symbolic or structural. Example: A student compares a diversity event to actual hiring, promotion, or retention data to determine if change is real or performative.

Learning Outcomes (with examples)

1. Outcome 1: Students will analyze campus materials and detect signs of token inclusion. Example: A student critiques a promotional video and identifies missing groups, selective opportunity, or silenced dissent.
2. Outcome 2: Students will propose one structural change that improves equity for faculty or students. Example: A student recommends transparent criteria for committee appointments or advising access.

5E Learning Model

• Engage: Show two contrasting campus images—one cheerful and diverse, one showing data on inequitable outcomes. Ask: “What’s behind the smiles?”
• Explore: Students examine real or simulated campus materials (brochures, webpages, event flyers) and list what is shown vs. what is hidden.
• Explain: Students connect their observations to concepts: token inclusion, performative diversity, selective opportunity, unequal access, silenced dissent.
• Elaborate: In groups, students redesign one campus practice (advising, hiring, internships, committee selection) to make it structurally equitable.
• Evaluate: Students share their redesign and explain how it addresses inequity beyond imagery or friendliness.

Assessments

Formative Assessment: Exit Ticket — “Identify one smile-based illusion of inclusion and one structural change needed to correct it.”

Summative Assessment: Short Reflection (1–2 paragraphs) analyzing a campus practice and determining whether it represents genuine equity or performative diversity, supported by examples.

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