Liberatory Design in Action: How One Educator is Transforming Systems from Within
For Ambereen Khan-Baker, a Senior Policy/Program Specialist at the National Education Association (NEA), Liberatory Design isn't just a framework—it's a lens through which she views and transforms the world around her. After attending her first National Equity Project training six years ago, she discovered a powerful approach that would reshape her work and inform her doctoral research on Muslim educators in public schools.
"I can't go back to who I was or what I was doing before this," Khan-Baker reflects. "I’m abandoning these other practices and really thinking through this lens."
Khan-Baker's journey with NEP's frameworks began with a Coaching for Equity Institute in Oakland. As a Muslim educator who experienced systemic racism firsthand, she recognized the frameworks' potential to create meaningful change in education systems. The training proved transformative, leading her to incorporate NEP's approaches into various aspects of her work at the NEA.
From Training to Practice
Working alongside her colleagues, Khan-Baker applied Liberatory Design principles to co-create and facilitate a national teaching fellows program focused on professional practice and policy. The initiative empowers educators to organize around challenges they see in their own contexts and develop professional learning plans that build belonging and affiliate capacity.
"We used Liberatory Design to create the program. Then, we had the educators learn it, and we also coached them through applying it in their work," she explains. The framework's emphasis on human-centered design and equity-driven processes proved particularly valuable in developing an effective program.
A Framework for Research and Life
In her doctoral research at American University, Khan-Baker is also applying the same design principles to investigate the experiences of Muslim public school educators—an understudied population in educational research.
"There's not much research done on Muslim public school educators," she notes. Using NEP’s framework and approach, Khan-Baker is examining relationships, challenges, hardships, and successes experienced by Muslim educators in her dissertation, "“We're An Ummah:” Disrupting Anti-Muslim Racism And Nurturing Muslim Educators Through Circles Of Collective Empowerment, Storytelling, And Healing." Through empathy interviews with 13 Muslim educators, she’s uncovering how school systems and cultural climate impact these teachers' experiences, while identifying opportunities for systemic change.
Beyond her work and research, Khan-Baker has also integrated NEP’s frameworks into her worldview. "I see this problem with my kids, and [I think], ‘Oh, let me apply Liberatory Design’," she shares. "It just became this internal shift."
Liberatory Design has become more than a framework in Khan-Baker’s hands. It's a daily practice of seeing systems clearly and working intentionally toward positive change. As she continues her research and advocacy, she’s doing her part to create more equitable and human-centered educational spaces—one critical conversation and one thoughtful design at a time.
