Making Excellence Inclusive, CTL

1
The RARE Paradigm
Accountability
Respect
Self-Focus Personal Awareness Path Accountable
Self-Expression
Look again Basic Human Value Acceptance of
Nonviolence Love
Responsibility
Emotional Self-Management
Awareness Listening
Conflict Resolution
Boundary-Setting
Respectful Negotiation
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Core Qualities of the RARE Paradigm

• True empowerment is power to rather than power
  over. Empowerment means the ability to create
  the life one wants and to continue to grow and
  develop personally. The following qualities and
  skills contribute to true Empowerment.
• Respect for Self and Others Respect for self
  and others, in the RARE Paradigm means that we
  know the value we all have just for being human
  and have skills for bringing Respect into
  interactions. Respect can be thought of as
  having 4 levels attention, basic value,
  non-harm, and nurture.
• Accountability Accountability in the RARE
  Paradigm means the ability to account for
  oneself. Accountability includes 3 main skills
  Self-Focus, Self-Awareness and Accountable
  Self-Expression. Focusing on others disempowers
  us and often leads to trying to control others,
  which is Dominance. Self-Focus keeps us on track
  to creating the life we want and to continuing to
  grow and develop personally. To make Empowered
  choices, we need to be aware of our own internal
  experience--including our sensory perceptions,
  thoughts, emotions, wants/longings, and
  intentions. Empowerment also requires skills for
  Accountable Self-Expression.
• Responsibility Responsibility in the RARE
  Paradigm means the ability to respond
  effectively. True Empowerment means developing
  our skills so that we are able to respond to
  situations with the appropriate, most effective
  action to further our values and goals. Because
  Dominance-based cultures tend to do a poor job
  teaching Empowerment skills, most people need to
  work on refining at least these skills for
  enhanced Responsibility emotional
  self-management boundary-setting communicating
  for mutual understanding conflict resolution
  and respectful negotiation.

3
Personal Awareness Path for Accountability
I saw . . . I heard . . .
Pay attention to effects and
make adjustments
When I heard you say that, I thought . . .
To communicate, negotiate, set boundaries, etc.
in service of Intentions
When I was thinking that, I felt . . .
My true intentions are . . .
What I want in this situation is . . .
4
Accountable Self-Expression

• Within the RARE Paradigm is an expectation that
  whatever power you hold, you hold yourself
  accountable and are willing to be held
  accountable for its use.
• Privilege is defined as power or access to
  resources and services which is accorded you
  through no merit and without accountability for
  its use. Accountable self-expression is an
  antidote to privilege-based power, which is
  unaccountable. Accountable in the RARE Paradigm
  means ability to account for yourself.
• Accountable Self-Expression
• I statements. Talking about your own
  experience, not the other person. Talk
  especially about what you think, feel, want and
  intend. What do you want for the other person,
  for yourself, for the connection and what do you
  intend to contribute toward those ends.
• Example
• When I heard you say that you dont understand
  why anyone thinks we need affirmative action
  anymore, I found myself thinking, Here we go
  again! because I have had this discussion so
  many times. I began to feel discouraged and even
  a little angry at you. So a small part of me
  wanted to avoid the discussion and move on. But
  my true intention is to have the discussion be
  openand also accountable to principles of
  critical thinking. So Im going to ask us all to
  express our opinions but be prepared to discuss
  what evidence or rules of logic we have used to
  form these opinions. This allows us to keep the
  discussion about the issues rather than about
  each other. So, instead of trying to avoid this
  discussion, I would ask you to tell me what
  evidence you look at that leads you to believe we
  dont need affirmative action and then allow
  others to tell you their opinions and the basis
  for those opinions.
• Beware the sneaky you statement disguised to
  look like an I statement.
• For example, I think that you are full of it,
  is really a you-statement. When I hear your
  perspective, I find that I disagree with it
  strongly is an I-statementyou are owning it as
  a thought you are having rather than declaring
  something to be true about the other person.

5
Emotional Self-Management for Personal
Responsibility

• Mistriggered threat response
• We all have hard-wired programming that evolved
  for effective responses to physical threats
• The human brain is symbolic and associative, so
  the threat response is easily mistriggered when
  we perceive relational, status or psychological
  threats as well as physical threats
• The hard-wired threat response leads to fight,
  flight or freeze behaviors OR when cant win
  leads to shutdown (emotional and physical
  numbing)
• None of the hard-wired threat response behaviors
  are effective for responding to the other kinds
  of threats
• Personal Responsibility to manage mistriggered
  threat response
• It is our own responsibility to manage when we
  get mistriggered it isnt effective to expect or
  hope no one will mistrigger us it isnt
  effective to try to change the other person.
• It is only effective to manage the mistriggered
  threat response and think through our empowerment
  options (such as setting boundaries).
• Note that if you are in an actual physical threat
  situation, you need to take actions for safety
  that usually include boundary-setting skills not
  self-management skills.
• Emotional self-management
• Recognize threat response constriction cues as
  early as possibleearlier allows more effective
  management. What body cues tell you that you are
  starting to get tense? (Ask those close to
  you--they usually know your very early cues!)
• Deconstrict through belly breathing.
• Engage in Accountable Self-Expression.

6
Belly Breathing

• Perceiving threat triggers the sympathetic
  nervous system which gets the body ready for
  action. Belly Breathing, when done effectively,
  triggers the parasympathetic nervous system which
  serves to relax the body and deconstrict it.
• It is called Belly Breathing because, when done
  correctly, your belly should come out on the
  inhale, rather than your chest.
• Follow these steps for Belly Breathing
• Use the diaphragm muscle--not the chest
  muscles--which is located at the point where the
  two sides of the rib cage meet.
• Silently count to 6 as you inhale a full deep
  breath with the diaphragm muscle.
• Silently count to 6 as you hold the breath.
• Silently count to 6 and take the full 6 counts to
  exhale the breath.
• Begin again, taking 6 counts to inhale, 6 on the
  hold, and 6 to exhale.
• Repeat this cycle for about ten rounds.
• After you have practiced for awhile, pay close
  attention to what you feel in your body while
  doing this. Especially notice what you feel
  right at the cusp of the hold stageafter the
  in-2-3-4-5-6-hold-2 right there. Most people
  can feel the beginnings of the deconstriction in
  their bodies. Notice how the deconstriction
  happens even more completely at the end of the
  exhale. This is the parasympathetic nervous
  system kicking in.
• Practice Belly Breathing throughout your daythe
  more time you spend in this relaxed alert state,
  the better able you will be to handle many kinds
  of situations more effectively.

7
Boundary-Setting for Personal Responsibility

• Using the lowest level of boundary-setting that
  is effective is in keeping with the RARE
  Paradigm. If harm to another is caused in the
  process, we would then call upon ourselves to
  think through the situation and develop skills
  that would decrease the risk of harm to another
  in future situations. Doing harm, even to
  someone who harms us, would be understood as
  evidence of an area needing further empowerment
  training because harming others also harms us
  psychologically and violates a basic component of
  the model--Respect.
• Levels of boundary-setting
• verbal assertiveness
• behavioral assertiveness (e.g., not giving
  attention, turning away, leaving)
• using own granted power, with accountability to
  use it only for the purpose for which it was
  granted
• accessing community power
• confrontation interventions such as with
  substance addiction
• other granted power resources police and
  criminal justice system civil law systems
• community activism
• physical self-defense
• giving ground
• physical resistance
• --------------------------------------------------
  --------------------------------------------------
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• using just enough force to get away
• using disabling force
• using deadly force

8
Boundary-Setting in the Classroom

• The professor has granted power which can and
  appropriately should be leveraged to keep the
  classroom a psychologically or emotionally
  respectful and safe place.
• Establishing expectations for Personal Respect,
  Personal Accountability and Personal
  Responsibility in interactions among class
  members at the beginning of the course helps
• Holding yourself to the same standards is
  essential
• Confronting violations and setting boundaries in
  the moment
• Use Accountable Self-Expression to state the
  boundary
• Describe what you heard the student say or saw
  the student do, then describe how you interpreted
  it, how you feel, what you want, what your own
  intentions are (especially regarding the
  boundary)
• Example Jake, when I heard you make that
  statement that women are manipulators just now,
  to me that crosses the line into disrespect. I
  see it as my job and I very much want to keep
  this class within respectful bounds. I also want
  to support expression of various viewpoints. So
  what Im going to do Jake, is ask you to restate
  your opinion--but not as a statement about women
  but as a statement about yourself in relation to
  women. For example, what experiences have you
  had with specific women or what information are
  you thnking of which you interpret to mean that
  women are manipulators?
• Tap into natural consequences to establish the
  boundary
• Ask student to notice or to inquire about effect
  he/she had on other students
• Example Jake, Im going to ask you to take a
  minute and consider what expression you saw on
  Janets face when you just made that statement.
  Or, Janet, I noticed your face change when Jake
  made that statementwould you be willing to tell
  us about your reaction?
• For especially disrespectful or chronic
  comments/behavior, might need to use stronger
  consequences to uphold the boundary
• if behavior/comments show poor performance on a
  stated course objective, can use grades
• if behavior/comments show poor compliance with
  student code of conduct can use Office of Student
  Rights and Responsibilities process, up to and
  including removal from course to suspension
• if personal safety is compromised, can use
  processes through Workplace Violence Prevention
  Committee