Fall Updates from the Justice, Equity, Diversity, and Inclusion Committee

Khan Lab School
October 14, 2021 / 5 mins read

Students & Faculty Collaborate to Advance Community Values

The following is an update from our Khan Lab High School (KLHS) student leaders.

The Justice, Equity, Diversity, and Inclusion (JEDI) Committee was formed at the beginning of our virtual school year in 2020. Its creation and progress were supported by students along with our faculty advisors, Brandon Lee and Michael Hurley.

The committee was originally called theEIJ Team, the acronym being short for Equity, Inclusion, and Justice. These are all things that we are working on improving in KLS. While this name is fine, we realized that we also focus a lot on diversity (and you have to admit, "JEDI"is a pretty cool name).

We also decided to add some more organizational structure by choosing six committee leads: Ainsel, AJ, Arjun, Nunu, Pooja, and Sita. Together, they make up the “JEDI Council” within the JEDI Committee,and will each have separate roles and meet separately to plan out JEDI meetings. This year, we're planning on continuing some projects from last year including:

  • The LGBTQ+ micro learns, which are mini-lessons some of our committee members worked on last year to educate students about LGBTQ+ topics;
  • The Justice, Equity, Diversity, and Inclusion climate survey, a survey sent out to the KLHS student body to understand students' comfort level at school and how to improve it;
  • And finally, affinity groups, which are safe places for students who identify similarly (gender, race, and more identities) to meet and talk.

The members of the JEDI Council will also be preparing for the NAIS Student Diversity Leadership Conference (SDLC), which will take place virtually in late November. High school students from all over the nation, as well as international schools, meet together in groups similar to the affinity groups described above and talk about ways to improve equity and inclusion in their schools. The council is looking forward to attending SDLC this year!

With our current schedule, the JEDI Committee will be meeting from 4:00 - 5:00 p.m. after school on Thursdays. Currently, only KLHS students can be a part of the council, but it's our hope we can expand the committee and serve the rest of the KLS community.

If a student has an idea to share with or contact the JEDI Committee, they can email jedi-council@khanlabschool.org.