About me: I want to make the world better for Black people. So I make music about Black love and liberation. I write academic articles, books, and short stories. I use design thinking to create games, learning tools, and activities that increase our collective capacity to make a more racially just world. I help groups, collectives, and organizations create conditions for anti-racist organizational learning and continuous improvement. I co-design and implement participatory and collaborative learning projects that benefit Black communities. Listen here. Read here. Learn here. Reach out here.

Professional background: I’ve spent the 15-plus years of my professional life working with teens and adults through a range of community, school, research, and higher educational spaces and organizations to affect societal change. Over time I honed a unique competency in organizational leadership and development with emphases on adaptive change, racial equity improvement, and cooperativism. I hold a B.S. in Economics (2002) from College of Charleston in South Carolina, a M.A. (2004) in Geography & Urban Studies from Temple University in Philadelphia, and a Ph.D. in Urban Education (2009) from Temple University in Philadelphia.

Areas of consulting expertise: Anti-racist learning; Organizational improvement; Participatory Research and Evaluation

Sample publications, awards, or accomplishments:

Irby, D., Meyers, C., and Salisbury, J. (2020). Improving Schools by Strategically Connecting Equity Leadership and Organizational Improvement Perspectives: Introduction to Special Issue. Journal of Education for Students Placed at Risk (JESPAR), DOI:10.1080/10824669.2019.1704628

Irby, D., Drame, L., Clough, C., & Croom, M. (2019). Sometimes things get worse before they get better: A counter-narrative of white suburban school leadership for racial equity. Leadership and Policy in Schools, 18(2), 195-209. doi:10.1080/15700763.2019.161186.

Irby, D. & Clark, S. (2018). Talk it (Racism) Out: Race Talk and Organizational Learning. Journal of Educational Administration, 56(5), 504-518. doi: 10.1108/JEA-01-2018-0015

Irby, D. (2018). Mo’ Data, Mo’ Problems: Making Sense of Racial Discipline Disparities at a Large Diversifying Suburban High School. Educational Administration Quarterly. Online first, 1 – 30. doi:10.1177/0013161X18769051

Email: decoteauirby@deruteconsulting.com or irbyd@uic.edu

More information:

Access to publications: https://uic.academia.edu/DecoteauIrby

UIC homepage: http://education.uic.edu/personnel/faculty/decoteau-j-irby