Group Facilitation Project Processing & Individual Reflection

1. How did your group decide upon your inequality project?

When my group got together, we decided that we wanted to focus on a subject that we had not
really covered in class a lot. We remembered from the mid-semester check-in that students had
expressed that they wanted to learn more about gender and sexuality related issues, as they
hadn’t been covered very much in class.
2. Describe the contribution and roles you and your group members assumed in the
development of your idea. Was work evenly distributed? Why or why not? How did social
identities impact your group experience?
The work was fairly evenly distributed. We all took on different roles. As a trans person, I did
feel that I had the ability to try to direct our efforts in the way I thought would be most helpful to
giving cis students some elementary knowledge about trans people. I was glad to see, still, that
my cis group mates did an excellent job of finding appropriate material to share with the class
and explaining identities.
3. What emotions or feelings (moments of pride, frustration, etc) did you experience before,
during, and even after your facilitation?
Before the facilitation I felt some apprehension, which is not unusual for me when I need to talk
about these issues with cis people. I was so encouraged, though, to see how the class
responded to our presentation. I was heartened by how eager my classmates seemed to be to
put what they were learning into practice and think about how to create spaces that are trans-
friendly in their residence halls.
4. Describe at least one area that you would have improved upon now that you have
finished facilitating?
I wish that I (and my group) had put more time into creating our presentation. There were
several things that needed to be mentioned that we did not put into our powerpoint. While we
were able to add these things in verbally and I don’t think it detracted much from the experience,
I do wish that we had spent longer making sure that everything we needed to say was in the
presentation so that the facilitation could run more smoothly.
5. How do you feel you have learned more about social justice, identity and inequality as a
result of having facilitated?
While I frequently introduce people to trans and gnc issues on an individual basis, this is one of
the first experiences I have had with facilitating a larger discussion with a group of (mostly) cis
people. I was really encouraged with how well this facilitation went. For me, the experience
really enforced something that I have been learning all semester: that fruitful facilitation comes
from drawing knowledge out of people, not putting it in. We began our facilitation with asking the
class to think about their own relationship to gender, using the gender unicorn. Members of the
class stated that this was really helpful in helping them approach this issue and think about the
concepts that we were introducing. I think I’ve been seeing throughout this semester, especially
in ALA, the way a lot of knowledge can be drawn out of people like this, and I hope to carry this
into my work as an RA.
6. On a scale from 1-10, how beneficial would you say this facilitation was for you? Please
elaborate.
I would say a 5. While it did teach me a bit about facilitation, I felt like I learned more from my
classmates facilitations, just in terms of learning new material.
7. Any additional comments of suggestion?
None!