Diversity, Equity, Inclusion, & Justice

The Wesley School prides itself on cultivating a community of students, families, and employees with diverse identities, backgrounds, experiences, and needs. All students benefit from the relationships, knowledge, and experience a diverse community provides, both inside and outside the classroom: what we know and can do is deepened and broadened in a diverse school community. Differences in racial and/or ethnic identity, family structure, socioeconomic status, gender expression, and other indicators lend differences in position and perspective that cultivate empathy and compassion and make collaboration, communication, and problem-solving more authentic and more profound. This diversity is reflected throughout the curriculum so that students see their own and each others’ experience and perspectives included, represented, and valued throughout their educational experience. 

As an independent school that adheres to the National Association of Independent Schools standards, we are accountable for respecting, affirming, and protecting the dignity and worth of each member of our community. This means we set policies and procedures in place to ensure all community members are treated inclusively and proactively not only with fairness, but also with a cultivated understanding of and responsiveness to the needs and goals of the individual. Equity is not the same as equality: the support one child, teacher, or parent might need or deserve to be successful at Wesley is not identical to another child, teacher, or parent. The Wesley School actively examines its institutional systems and structures (such as admissions, student support services, financial aid, etc.) to identify inequities. 

We choose not only to ‘honor diversity’ as an abstract value or general aspiration in our community, but also to teach the understanding and the skills that will help children to thrive in our world and to help create a better one. To serve as guiding principles for anti-bias education at Wesley, we have adopted a framework developed by accomplished educators and researchers under the aegis of Learning for Justice (formerly ‘Teaching Tolerance’). The Social Justice Standards (aka The Anti-Bias Framework) provides a set of anchor standards in the areas of identity, diversity, justice, and action with which teaching in all areas of the curriculum is imbued. Principles of inclusivity are also cultivated informally in such settings as classroom community circles, in which respectful relationships are cultivated, individual experiences are acknowledged, and both intellectual argument and social conflict are navigated to ensure mutual respect and support. Throughout their educational experience, students are encouraged to explore new and unfamiliar ideas and experiences.

Social justice unites a diverse and inclusive community in a common purpose to create a better world, both inside and outside the school’s gates. It requires the assurance that individuals are not only held accountable to their roles and obligations in the community but also provided the opportunity, access, and support to discharge those roles successfully. At the core of children’s learning and at the heart of their relationships, social justice thus becomes a catalyst that ensures students become creative and collaborative problem-solvers, empathetic friends, engaged citizens, discerning advocates, and productive contributors to a global society. 

"Learning about social justice, identity, diversity, and action in Kindergarten helped me open up and develop my voice. It helped me explore and learn and read more so I could make sense of what wasn't making sense." 
-Current Wesley Student

Indigenous Organizations