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Universal Design of Instruction and Social Justice Education: Enhancing Equity in Outdoor Adventure Education

Robert P. Warner, Cindy Dillenschneider

Abstract


Given continued underrepresentation of nondominant populations in outdoor adventure education, there is a clear need to create more welcoming environments, increase equity in programs, and empower all participants to become agents of change. Many of the current practices used to create equitable outdoor adventure education experiences are specific to organizations or programs and not universally applicable to other settings or the full spectrum of underrepresented populations. The field may benefit from incorporating effective strategies from other educational contexts to improve equity. This paper discusses universal design of instruction and social justice education as potentially viable strategies for enhancing equity. The authors explain each strategy and apply them to outdoor adventure education programming. Together these strategies provide a framework for evaluating current practices and designing new approaches to enhance equity.

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Keywords


equity; outdoor adventure education; social justice education; universal design of instruction

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References


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DOI: https://doi.org/10.18666/JOREL-2019-V11-I4-9543

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