Equity plays an important role in our lives and experiences, especially in education. In an ideal world, everyone would have the same advantages. Students would enter school ready to learn and personal and social barriers wouldn’t exist or interfere with student learning. Unfortunately, we don’t live in an ideal world where everyone has the same advantages and abilities. Some students have personal and social circumstances that interfere with their learning and other students have personal and social circumstances that make it easier for them to excel. As a result, understanding what equity is and how to create conditions for equity in your school is important.
We share care about equity because the nations demographics have changed.
“Equity is referred to as fairness,” (Glossary of Education Reform, 2014), justice, and freedom from bias. In education “equity is the process in how we ensure every child has access to a high quality education” (Cannon, N.D/ Equity Meets Education). This means ensuring that the resources, opportunities, and supports for success are based on the student's needs. When educational equity occurs, barriers such as personal and social circumstances do not interfere with students' academic achievement. These circumstances are understood and addressed to ensure the success of the student.
Equality and equity are often used interchangeably even though they are two different concepts. This often occurs because many people believe that equity means everyone receives the same thing. This is a common error and supports the need to distinguish between the two concepts to improve equity at the school level.
Equity, as we learned earlier, is providing each student with the resources and opportunities they need to be successful. Although equality and equity are closely related, important in social justice, and deal with resources, equality is providing the same or equal resources for all. Equality is often associated with treating people the same and providing them with the same opportunities and resources.
Think about the differences between equality and equity. How would you as an administrator explain the key differences to a colleague or teacher who used the terms interchangeably? Record your response in your notes.
Take a few minutes to read the following real-world examples. Identify the examples as equality or equity and provide a rationale for your decision.
(Milken Institute of Public Health, 2019)