Considering Science Education's Civic Responsibility: Mapping Out a Dilemma for the Field

• In Event: Science Teaching and Learning: Equity and Social Justice Roundtable

Abstract

The science education of lay citizens is not a new concern. It nevertheless constitutes a perennial and thorny challenge to the field. In this conceptual paper I draw on recent literature in science education to clarify a dilemma invoked by the merger of citizenship into science schooling. In my review I find two basic approaches: expansion of the scope of “science teaching” to include non-scientific pedagogies or a maintenance of disciplinary integrity. The latter passively supports students’ citizenship while the former does so actively as it explicitly targets and includes citizenship learning within a place of science. I then discuss limitations and challenges of these approaches as well as their reform implications.

Author

• Ryan Batkie, University of Wisconsin - Madison