(Re)Claiming Space: Disrupting and Reimagining Equity in Informal Science Learning

• In Event: Epistemic Agency and Equity

Abstract

Equity in informal science learning, a potentially powerful space for promoting broadening participation in STEM, especially among those most marginalized in STEM, has been framed primarily through access and opportunity. Little attention has been paid to the contested nature of these spaces as sites of dis/empowered learning. Yet, such political dimensions of equity in ISL are central to promoting just opportunities for STEM engagement. This participatory, critical ethnography reports on how two ISL centers (science center and zoo) engaged in the justice-oriented pedagogical practice of “(re)claiming space,” where youth and educators collectively challenged and reimagined hierarchies of power in equitable and consequential ways. We describe variations in this practice across partner sites, including the impact of these practices.

Authors

• Angela Calabrese Barton, University of Michigan

• Won Jung Kim, Santa Clara University

• Sinead C Brien, Michigan State University

• Micaela Balzar, Impression 5 Science Center

• Spela Godec, UCL Institute of Education

• Louise Archer, University College London

• Emily Dawson, University College, London