Carlos Andrés Gómez

Programs

Toward a Culturally-Affirming & Inclusive Campus

Join Carlos Andrés Gómez, educator and equity and inclusion strategist, for this interactive session that will explore and identify actionable strategies for making both classrooms and campuses more culturally-responsive, affirming, and inclusive, particularly for historically-marginalized students. What concrete approaches can be implemented to make a classroom and campus more fair, while promoting a greater sense of belonging for everyone? How can each of us develop systems to identify where our gaps in knowledge and understanding persist? And how can that self-reflection be a galvanizing opportunity toward greater equity and inclusion? With history, intersectionality, and personal experience as anchors for this skills-based training, participants will leave this workshop better-equipped to create and nurture a community that embraces students and colleagues from all walks of life.

Takeaways:

• Participants will comprehend concepts related to diversity, social identity, equity, and inclusion.
• Participants will build cultural competency and awareness about unconscious bias, structural and systemic inequity, and intersectionality.
• Participants will examine the effect of cultural norms on policies, established practices, and ways of thinking, particularly as it relates to social identity and equity.
• Participants will analyze common pitfalls and obstacles that undermine equity and inclusion.
• Participants will identify concrete strategies to be more culturally-responsive, affirming, and inclusive.

Reimagining Gender: Beyond Socialized Roles, Beyond the Binary

This interactive session will examine the ways in which we have been taught to think about gender. More specifically: what values and assumptions have we been socialized to believe about gender? And how do those ideas impact how we think about ourselves, navigate the world, and interact with each other? How are new paradigms subverting outdated clichés like the rigid gender binary and prescribed gender roles? How do our other identities (i.e. race, sexuality, socioeconomic status, nationality, religion, dis/ability, etc.) impact how we understand and experience gender? Using history, intersectionality, and personal experience as frames for discussion, participants will collectively explore these and other concepts.

Takeaways:

• Participants will comprehend concepts related to gender, equity, and inclusion.
• Participants will build competency and awareness about unconscious gender bias, sexism, and transphobia.
• Participants will examine the effect of friends, family, culture, technology, and media on behavior and ways of thinking, as it relates to gender.
• Participants will identify concrete strategies to counteract unconscious gender bias, sexism, and transphobia.

Tools for Self-Care: Mental Wellness & Emotional Resilience

In a time of intense isolation, grief, and stress, the need for strategies to promote mental wellness and build emotional resilience are more urgent than ever. With pressure building to find ever innovative and responsive ways to address our students’ building mental health crisis, this session will be focused on ways to keep students motivated and supported. Join Carlos Andrés Gómez (poet, author, educator) for this timely and interactive program focused on finding ways to navigate some of the most pressing challenges of our new normal. From routine building to evidence-based psychological strategies and more, participants will leave with practical tools and a resource list for how best to support mental and emotional wellness. (Highly recommended for all college student leaders, educators, staff, and administrators.)

Takeaways:

• Attendees will build competency and awareness about mental and emotional health, relevant concepts, and evidence-based strategies for mental wellness and emotional resilience.
• Attendees will examine the effect of various strains on their mental and emotional wellbeing, as well as strategies for alleviating those stresses.
• Attendees will identify concrete strategies to promote mental wellness and emotional resilience.

Our Intersecting Selves: Diversity, Equity, Inclusion, & Accessibility

This interactive session explores how our intersecting social identities impact access in the world. We will interrogate historical legacies of structural inequity and privilege. Moreover, we will investigate the ways in which some social identities enable the wielding of unearned structural power, while others, simultaneously, make us susceptible to systemic and interpersonal discrimination. Using history, intersectionality, and personal experience as frames for discussion, participants will collectively explore these and other concepts.

Takeaways:

• Participants will comprehend concepts related to diversity, social identity, equity, inclusion, and accessibility.
• Participants will build cultural competency and awareness about unconscious bias, structural and systemic inequity, and intersectionality.
• Participants will examine the effect of friends, family, culture, technology, and media on behavior and ways of thinking, particularly as it relates to social identity and equity.
• Participants will identify concrete strategies to counteract unconscious bias and structural inequity.

Four Keys for First-Years (& Beyond)

In a time of constant distraction, stress, and competing responsibilities, how does a student adequately prepare for a great first year (or second and beyond) of college? This program, which can take the form of a hybrid show and workshop or simply as an interactive seminar, offers concrete strategies and tools for students (and those responsible to students’ needs) to advocate for their mental and emotional health, approach their studies, advocate for rest and sleep, and manage their time. This session will center methods to keep students motivated and supported. Join Carlos Andrés Gómez (poet, author, educator) for this engaging program focused on finding concrete ways to navigate some of the most pressing challenges that students face. From generating a schedule that honors a healthy life balance to evidence-based strategies that support wellness and resilience and more, participants will leave with practical tools to immediately implement in their lives. (Highly recommended for all college student leaders, educators, staff, and administrators.)

Takeaways:

• Attendees will build competency and awareness about mental and emotional health, effective time management, proactive paradigms for academic success, and evidence-based strategies for mental wellness and emotional resilience.
• Attendees will examine the effect of various strains on their academic productivity and overall wellbeing, as well as strategies for alleviating those stresses.
• Attendees will identify concrete strategies for healthy time management, academic success, and how to promote mental wellness and emotional resilience.

The Power of Latinidad in a Fractured World

People of Latine/x/a/o heritage—whose cultures and histories inherently complicate rigid notions of identity—reside along many of the critical fault lines that will define the landscape of our future. We emphatically refute the notion of a monolith, impossible to reduce or summarize through a singular dimension. Which is to say, an exploration of Latinidad demands a discussion of our other social identities and how those intersecting selves complicate antiquated beliefs about binaries and anything less than far-reaching and ever-evolving continuums of identity. In this interactive workshop, Carlos Andrés Gómez (award-winning author, speaker, & equity & inclusion strategist) will illuminate how embracing and understanding his Latine heritage has taught him life-changing lessons about intersectionality, equity, and what it means to truly celebrate human authenticity.

Takeaways:

• Attendees will build competency and awareness about social identity, intersectionality, and equity.
• Attendees will examine the effect of friends, family, culture, technology, and media on perceptions of social identity.
• Attendees will identify concrete strategies to consider their and others’ social identities in more complex and thoughtful ways.

Reimagining Modern Manhood (keynote)

Through storytelling, audience engagement, and poetry, Carlos Andrés Gómez shares his journey of growing up as a sensitive boy forced to navigate toxic machismo and restrictive gender stereotypes. A riveting combination of personal narrative and sociological excavation, Gómez guides the audience through his life story, from that tender-hearted and out-of-place little boy constantly moving and changing schools to where he is now: a father of two and husband, determined to reimagine how we all think about masculinity and gender—beyond preconceived social roles, beyond the binary.

Takeaways:

• Participants will comprehend concepts related to gender, equity, and inclusion.
• Participants will build competency and awareness about unconscious gender bias, sexism, and transphobia.
• Participants will examine the effect of friends, family, culture, technology, and media on behavior and ways of thinking, as it relates to gender.
• Participants will identify concrete strategies to counteract unconscious gender bias, sexism, and transphobia.

Writing Through: Storytelling toward Social Justice

This writing workshop will challenge participants to use personal experience as a means of grappling with social inequity and exclusion: whether it be as a means of identifying and bearing witness to examples of discrimination (interpersonal or systemic) or providing an opportunity to examine instances of being complicit with or responsible for prejudice and discrimination. This session will be generative and allow participants the opportunity to voluntarily share their work, with facilitated support and guidance throughout.

Takeaways:

• Participants will comprehend concepts and strategies related to writing memoir and personal storytelling, as well as equity and inclusion.
• Participants will analyze the influence of socialized roles and cultural norms on creating unconscious bias and structural and systemic inequity.
• Participants will examine their role in being complicit with behaviors and ways of thinking that promote inequity or exclusion.

Tailored Workshop for your School

(Adaptable for your needs)

We have a wide range of additional program offerings. Please tell us, as specifically as possible, what you would like us to address and what outcomes you are hoping for. From there, and with your guidance and input, we can craft a workshop that honors your particular vision during our visit to your school.