Chicago Public Schools established the Office of Equity in 2018. The office works with every CPS department, as well as the larger community, to apply an equity lens to each district and school undertaking. In order to do this, the team worked for months to develop a comprehensive Equity Framework that would serve as a guide for all of the work, from the classroom to central office.
However, in order to operationalize the CPS Equity Framework, it had to be something that all stakeholders could actually use. The Office of Equity wanted to communicate the big ideas around the work and why it was important and urgent, but they also needed a way to invite folks to engage with the framework to help advance equity across the district.
The Equity team approached Convergence for help combining engagement strategy with design in order to create materials that would help a wide variety of stakeholders both understand the elements of the CPS Equity Framework, as well as feel invited to collaborate as vital participants in the work.
Equity is not static. It is ongoing, nuanced, and looks different in every context. This understanding guided our work on this project, incorporating a mix of strategy, learning design, and media production. We were fortunate to be able to collaborate with the CPS Equity Office on this work from the very beginning, prior to the release of the framework itself. Throughout the process, we have been guided by big questions such as:
The CPS Equity Framework was a seminal, guiding document - the anchor for the work that this newly formed team set out to do across the district. Because of this, it was important to create something that communicated the importance of these ideas, without feeling overly academic and removed from the day-to-day experiences of the students, educators, administrators, staff, and families who would feel the impact of the work.
Convergence designed the Equity Framework document as a learning tool, with intentional iconography, use of space, and guided prompts that invited readers to find their own entry points for engagement with the concepts in the document. The Equity Lens took center stage as a way to communicate the overlapping concepts that guide equity efforts in CPS, as well as the Targeted Universalism that supports it all. The resulting iconography, colors, and design choices guide the reader to look at challenges through an equity lens.
The framework document did not stand alone - it was important to provide specific tools for those working to address equity challenges at the district, network, school, and community levels. Convergence worked with the Equity team to strategize and design a suite of tools to accompany the framework and allow groups of stakeholders to begin to apply the concepts to their contexts. In each instance, we asked:
Once the CPS Equity Framework and tools were released and the framework concepts began to be operationalized, the Office of Equity knew that they wanted to tell the story of the work as it was unfolding across the district. Convergence has since helped the team write, film, and produce a variety of videos that:
Convergence Design Lab listened to me think and came back with design ideas that enhanced our strategic thinking. They helped make complex concepts for equity easy to understand using design elements that never would have occurred to us.
—Dr. Maurice Swinney, Chief Equity Officer, Chicago Public Schools
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