Fanning the FLAMEs: Balancing Advocacy and Compliance in an Anti-DEI Era

FLAME (Fiercely Leading as Multicultural Educators) is a student organization associated with NAME (National Association of Multicultural Education) that fosters diversity and inclusion, particularly for students who aspire to be educators. Through collaboration between faculty, graduate researchers, and undergraduate students, this research explores the role of multicultural student groups such as FLAME in maintaining or enhancing inclusivity and equity in higher education in the wake of SB17, Texas’ newest anti-diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) legislation. Through community-engaged scholarship, the authors investigate the educational experience of systematically marginalized students and provide one possible pathway for faculty, staff, and students to ensure equitable educational support and an increased sense of belonging for students of all backgrounds. Findings suggest that the intentional use of multicultural student groups can serve to mitigate negative effects of anti-DEI legislation.