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“I’m a black woman and I’m being called a white supremacist. That had never happened in my entire teaching career. And not only that, I’d never seen teachers calling each other names like that.”

In 2021, Tabia Lee was hired to direct De Anza College’s Office of Equity, Social Justice, and Multicultural Education and to reduce the wokeness of the institution.

“I just went beyond the smaller bubble to the larger community, and said, ‘Who wants to work on actual inclusion and doing some things we’ve never done here before?’” says Ms. Lee.

But after two years, Ms. Lee was terminated for her heterodox perspectives and inquiry-based approach to diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI).

“I’ve lost everything, basically. And that’s tough,” she says. “But what I’ve gained is so many people coming and saying, ‘Thank you for having the courage. Thank you for raising the issue.’ They’ve said, ‘You inspired me to ask about my equity policy. You inspired me to go into my child’s school and ask to see that curriculum, and to make a public records act request if needed, if people aren’t being forthcoming with the information I’m seeking. You inspired me to push back when I wasn’t going to, and I hadn’t in the past.’ And to me, that’s worth everything, because that’s what it’s going to take to take our nation back.”

We discuss Ms. Lee’s heterodox approach to DEI, inquiry-based learning, the difference between classical and critical social justice, and what it means to genuinely practice inclusion.

“We’re making that small impact with our students, right? But the broader system is just being destroyed and dismantled right before our eyes. And we’re complicit in that because we’re not saying anything,” says Ms. Lee.