Inclusion Cultivation – a training course for Diversity and Inclusion Trainers, made its debut on 29 and 30 May 2014. This course was designed and delivered by DPA’s Diversity and Inclusion Consultant with the aim to empower local trainers in Singapore to develop training or workshop based on their personal knowledge and experience to promote diversity and inclusion at work, in education and in society.
The learning outcomes of the course were:
• Better understanding of the purpose of diversity and inclusion training
• Better knowledge of techniques in delivering diversity and inclusion training
• More confidence in promoting diversity and inclusion
• More confidence in engaging with a wide-ranging audience
Thirteen people participated in this course. They are members or staff of the following voluntary welfare organisations:
• Disabled People’s Association
• Dyslexia Association of Singapore Academy Ltd
• ExtraOrdinary Horizons
• Society for the Physically Disabled
• Singapore Association for the Deaf
Of the thirteen participants, seven are female and six are male. In terms of self-defined disability, two are visually impaired, one has bilateral deafness, one has deafness, one has hearing impairment, one is quadriplegic, one has cerebral palsy and one has severe thoracolumbar scoliosis. Their experience of delivering training or workshops ranged from none to highly skilled. Sign language interpreters were present throughout the course.
During this course, the participants explored concepts such as learning styles, learning outcomes and social structure. They were given a range of tools enabling them to challenge personal stereotypes and prejudices, manage difficult audiences and overcome fears. Furthermore, they were shown templates on how to design group activities, evaluation and marketing strategy. More importantly, they had the opportunity to demonstrate their learning by delivering a group activity created by themselves.
In their evaluation, the participants commented that they gained knowledge in a wide-range of areas such as public speaking, marketing strategy, workshop design and different types of disability issues. The participants particularly welcomed the learning pack, 54% rated it as ‘very good’ and 46 rated it as ‘good’.
“Great to have soft copy for people who prefer to use TTS or type directly into it to make notes.”
Their overall assessment for this course was positive with 38% of the participants rating the course as ‘very good’ and 46% rating it as ‘good’. Some participants felt the course could be extended by one more day as they would like more time in certain segments of the course.
One participant kindly shared with us his key learning from this course:
“I will certainly use the materials and principles shared during the course to advocate for inclusiveness and dyslexia-friendliness within my organisation. And with success, to bring that to the next level to other organisations. The road ahead may be winding and unpredictable, but with more people with similar beliefs, that is certainly not a pipe dream for Singapore.”
DPA is delighted that the Inclusion Cultivation course has been well received by the participants. It was encouraging that everyone brought their personal knowledge and experience to this course and generously shared them with the rest of the group.
Thank you to all participants for working so hard over the two days. There were a lot of concepts, tools and practical guides for everyone to work through and we were pleased that everyone coped relatively well with the pace.
The full evaluation report is available here.
DPA is keen to deliver similar courses in the future. If you are interested in finding out more, please contact Nina Munday on [email protected].
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