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Equity-minded teaching is a process of inquiry, so gathering focused data on students’ experiences is key to identifying the improvements that will make the biggest differences for them.

As we’ve proposed, critical self-reflection and student feedback are central to equity-minded teaching. Leading equity scholars Tia Brown McNair, Estela Mara Bensimon, and Lindsey Malcolm-Piqueux explain the connection in their text From Equity Talk to Equity Walk: equally important to gathering both quantitative and qualitative feedback, they write, is the process of reflecting on the data and using them to take action.¹ The fact that our most readily available data, SET results, are characterized by bias and limited in their connection to learning begs the question: How else can faculty gather student feedback as part of a commitment to more equitable student outcomes? That’s where this unit comes in. We offer suggestions on how you might collect additional information beyond SETs and how to respond to what you learn—reflecting the conviction that equity-mindedness is both evidence-based and action-oriented.²

This unit offers four general recommendations on additional ways to collect student feedback—from straightforward ones you can easily integrate into your practice to ones that require collaboration and planning. And we indicate which strategies you can implement independently and which would benefit from (or necessitate) collaboration with faculty colleagues, departmental leadership, and/or institutional research staff. The number of options offered is meant to provide you with choices, not to suggest that you try out many or most of them. In fact, we caution you not to begin collecting copious amounts of additional data and feedback all at once. Instead, try reviewing all of the options, identifying which strategy best meets your needs, and considering which data/feedback you’ll be able to engage with deeply. You’ll then be ready to commit to taking a small step each term.