Author: Dominique Van Gilst

1. For my response to this question, I chose to focus on “Shaping and Ethical Workplace Culture” because of the way the authors present information in a way that will make it usable for the readers of the article. I believe that the intended audience of this article is anyone in the workplace. In this article, the authors process what they have learned and make it actionable to the reader by typing main ideas in green, including bullet points that help explain their claims in an understandable way, including graphs and charts, and adding examples. All of these things that are incorporated into the article allow the reader to easily find the purpose of this article, and make the information easy to understand so that the suggestions being made can be taken by the readers. For example, on the side of page 9, there is a block of green titled, “Hallmarks of an Ethical Workplace” with a bulleted list of things that make a workplace ethical. This allows the reader to get an idea of what an ethical workplace is supposed to be. This block of ideas is actionable because it says things like, “Employees feel empowered and energized to reach for ethical and technical excellence in serving customers, clients and each other” (p. 9). When an employee or leader looks at this bullet point, they can reach out to employees and/or take a look at what they are doing as a leader, and think about what they can do to make their employees feel empowered at work. 
2. Some of the options that I have begun to consider for my unit 3 assignment include: 
   1. having parents/guardians be my target audience, explain to them what it means to be inclusive, and give them examples of the benefits of inclusive classrooms → the readers would probably engage with a presentation/essay the best, and would most likely expect a longer text with lots of detail and explanation, as well as examples. 
   2. Having young students be my target audience, and find a way to explain inclusion and differences to them in a way that they can understand → the readers would likely engage with their teachers or parents through a story, powerpoint, song, etc. because it may help them understand the information better. The readers of this topic, since the target audience is young, may expect a short, colorful, and interactive source or presentation. 
   3. Having teachers be my target audience, and give them suggestions/advice about how to successfully teach an inclusive classroom → the readers would likely engage with a presentation, essay, etc. The target audience may expect a longer essay with a lot of examples and evidence that proves the point being stated.

1. The linked resource that I explored is a card set called Inclusion Conversation Cards. Each card includes engaging statistics and questions that will definitely get you thinking. This set of cards is important because it allows for a comfortable way to speak and learn about inclusion and gender equality. This resource is also great for motivation because it gets people thinking about what they need to change at work, home, school, etc. This tool adds to Wynn’s article because it is a suggestion of something that can be used to teach employees how to be more inclusive at work. Wynn believes that this resource could definitely assist in creating a more accepting and inclusive workspace. However, this tool should not be the only one used to do this; creating a safe environment for everyone must be a continuous process. 
2. I think that anyone could benefit from reading this article because it provides a lot of tools and resources that can help people to be more aware of inequality at work, school, home, etc. However, I think that the main target audience is probably any organization and its employees because of the way that the article is written, and the language used. The segment that I think works well with that target audience is:

“Beyond hiring, organizations should establish clear, specific criteria for evaluating employees year-round. Research shows that ambiguous or vague evaluations can open the door to bias, such as evaluating employees based on gendered personality expectations (e.g. women should behave communally, men should behave assertively), so it’s important for organizations to use a transparent and consistent process for evaluating employees”

It is easy to tell from this passage that the article is geared towards organizations and employees because it talks about hiring, bias, and evaluating employees. Even though I chose to include this specific passage, the whole article talks about ways to improve the workplace so that everyone is treated equally.

1. The overall message of the article, “Inclusive education: Perspectives on implementation and practice from international experts” is that every child deserves the right to a good education. This article defines inclusive education in many different ways, but one is  as “a process and practice of designing schools to support and benefit all learners” (p. 1). Inclusion means allowing each and every student to learn and grow a general education classroom. However, it also means providing support for students who need it in that classroom. Later in the article, there is a study done to find out if inclusive education is worth it. In the end, the authors, who are experts in the field of education, find that inclusivity is certainly worth studying, and in order for inclusive classrooms to be successful, we must know the barriers.

This article will be extremely helpful because it talks a lot about the ways in which inclusive education can be defined. For example, in the paragraph above, I quoted one of the definitions. However, this article uses more sources in order to have more definitions. The more the article talks about inclusion, the better the reader can understand it.  I believe that the study included in the article will be helpful too because it gives proof of inclusion working, and tells the reader what is needed to make it successful.

2. “I do have a rather robust response to being watched, having been one of the first girls at a boys school, and then the first female on the factory floor in three organizations. But after moving to local government, I noticed several of the points raised. However, one seems left out. A lot of the women would get in early to be able to sit by the walls, not the aisles, in an open office. This let them feel slightly less exposed in situ, but of course also put the men at the end where it was easy to ‘aisle watch’! This early start, coupled with the pressure to dress well–let’s face it, dress down Friday is for men!–made them more likely to do unpaid overtime at the end of the day. Because the men were still going, work was still being discussed.” —Kristin W. 

I chose this response because the author, Kristin W., builds on what was said in the original article, while also writing about her take on open office plans. I believe that according to Rewriting,  Kristin is extending, or putting her spin on the original article based on her own experiences. Kristin adds something that was not talked about in the original article, which is intriguing because it unfortunately makes a lot of sense. Kristin opens a new line of inquiry with her response because she says that many women would get to work early just so that they could sit closer to the wall during the day so that they would not be noticed as much. This is not surprising to me, but it should be eye opening for offices, and people working there. Women should not have to feel that they must get to work early so that they will not be “watched” by their male co-workers. I think that Kristin makes a very valid, interesting point. This response was different from a lot of the women who responded to the original article, so I thought that it would be a good response to choose.