Teaching interdependent agency I: Feminist STS approaches to STEM pedagogy

Abstract

The first of 3, this panel discussion of STEM graduate training brings together insights from feminist theory with social studies of science to address deep bias in scientific research to suggest methods and frameworks that produce more accountable, accurate and responsible scientific research. This panel is interested in talking about how feminist STS (fSTS) scholars are using, or exploring the use of, the critique of objectivity to address biases in science. How are we engaging with STEM graduate education to teach a more nuanced “situatedness” (Haraway 1988) in culture and history to produce more responsible and accountable science?

Research in STEM education suggests that integrating socio-cultural context and communal values into STEM education can increase recruitment and retention of women, under-represented minorities (URMs), and first-generation students in STEM. Building on the contributions of Jenny Reardon, Karen Barad, and Banu Subramaniam’s to feminist approaches to STEM pedagogy, this panel invites papers addressing how feminist STS can move STEM graduates toward greater engagement with social justice, as well as deep collaboration with social sciences and humanities. What sort of curricular changes could lead to a transformation of STEM research and the diversity of researchers conducting it? How can STS scholars use pedagogy to empower STEM researchers to be agents of social transformation even in the face of anti-science discourse, and anti-women, racist, anti-trans and anti-LGBTQ cultural politics?

Chairs

• Kalindi Vora, University of California Davis

• Anita Say Chan, University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign

• Maya Cruz, University of California - Davis

Individual Presentations

• Accept Only: Framing the Compulsory, Citations as Syllabus in Trans- Feminist and Queer Data Studies - T.L. Cowan, University of Toronto

• Building Feminist Science Pedagogies: Reflections on Teaching the Power of Metaphors in STEM Research on Mars - Maya Cruz, University of California - Davis

• Curriculum as Futurism: Towards a Liberatory Computing Education - Sanaa Khan, UC San Diego

• Refusing Settler Coloniality in Queer Design - Jasmine Rault, Faculty of Information, University of Toronto

• Thriving and Struggling Towards Decolonial Futures: The Technoscience Research Unit’s Lab Guide - Kristen Bos, University of Toronto; Lindsay LeBlanc, University of Toronto

Session Organizers

• Kalindi Vora, University of California Davis

• Anita Say Chan, University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign

• Maya Cruz, University of California - Davis