Welcome to the College of San Mateo's REAL Guide, a collection of cross-disciplinary samples and resources to support equity and accessibility in course design. The REAL Guide was developed at CSM by the faculty, staff, and students who planned and participated in our Redesign for Equity & Accessibility Lab (REAL) workshops in 2023-2025, funded by a Culturally Responsive Pedagogies & Practices Innovation grant from the State Chancellor's Office. Developed to be used as part of our REAL workshop series, the REAL Guide is being made available for faculty working independently to design or redesign their courses from the perspective of equity and accessibility.
For each area of course design accessed in the main menu (Curriculum/Course Outline of Record, Syllabus, Assignments/Assessments, Activities/Discussions, Grading Policies), you will find the following features:
Key Principles: Core concepts from the literature about achieving better outcomes for disproportionately impacted students.
Spotlight Videos: Short videos highlighting revisions and thought processes of CSM faculty participating in the REAL workshops.
Self-Assessment Tools with Strategies: A rubric designed as part of the REAL workshops. It can help you assess where you are on the path to "REAL" (or even "Liberatory"!) courses and includes multiple specific strategies implemented by CSM faculty, to get you to the next "level."
CSM Examples: A comprehensive list of course materials revised by our 21 faculty, from 13 different disciplines, who participated in REAL from 2023-2025
Works Cited & Additional Resources: Sources compiled from current research in teaching and learning.While the REAL Guide is inherently inter-disciplinary, you can also access resources specific to your (or an adjacent discipline), to explore what equity and accessibility can mean in your own discipline and to reach out to REAL Representatives on campus.
Though the guide is offered for independent use, we encourage you to seek out support and collaboration. Get involved in a campus Community of Practice, such as the REAL Community of Practice, or the Equitable Grading Lab, or create your own! Join REAL workshops on Flex Day, or institutes over the summer! Reach out to the Instructional Designer for your division for a consultation! This work is hard, and the faculty who participated in REAL workshops (whose revisions you see here) benefited from extensive collaboration with colleagues, including support from our Instructional Design team.
We would like to thank the long list of people--faculty fellows, planning committee members, and student reviewers--who contributed to the resources you find here. They are listed here in alphabetical order (with the exception of our student reviewers, who reviewed materials anonymously): Salem Admassu, Natalie Alizaga, Robbie Baden, Julieth Diaz Benitez, Stephan Bera, Michelle Brown, Tarana Chapple, Hoang Nini Che, Catherine Ciesla, Sarah Fama, Lena Feinman, David Galvez, Carla Grandy, Paul Hankamp, Heeju Jang, Jennifer Howze-Owens, Susan Khan, Judith Hunt, Jon Kitamura, Danni Redding Lapuz, Beth La Rochelle, Robin Lee, Jeniece Lusk, Donna McCabe, Teresa Morris, Michelle Mullane, Monique Nakagawa, Tamara Perkins, Marisol Quevedo, Erica Reynolds, Kristi Ridgway, Sujata Verma, Elinor Westfold, Todd Windisch, Laura Woltag, Alex Wong, Erica Yoon, Angela Zepeda.
