Being in Community With Communities: A Critical Autoethnographic Exploration of Equity in Educational Field Experiences

• In Event: Navigating Relationships, Tensions, and Solutions in Clinically Based Field Experiences

Abstract

The AERA 2021 call reminds us that “accepting educational responsibility requires honest acknowledgements among citizen scholars.” As citizen scholars, we answered this call by honestly (and humbly) reflecting on our individual and shared commitments to community engagement, racial justice, and educational equity in our work as teacher educators primarily engaged out in the field. Employing critical autoethnography (Boylorn & Orbe, 2014) from a transformative learning theoretical framework, we interrogated and renewed our own commitments, and (re)imagined a new model of supervision, utilizing guided inquiry and humanizing pedagogy. This co-constructed narrative explores the issues and possibilities of teaching and learning for equity through field experiences and mentorship, developing teacher candidates prepared to be in community with the communities they work in.

Authors

• Jennifer Doyle, University of Kentucky

• Toni M. Williams, University of South Carolina