Equality, Diversity and Inclusion in GTA Teaching
Intended Learning Outcomes:
(Independent work using this website) To research prejudice and discrimination and describe how it may appear in your teaching and learning context.
(Pre-workshop assignment and workshop) To identify our own conscious and unconscious biases and how they influence our teaching approach
(workshop) To discuss strategies to surface prejudice and discrimination and mitigate its impact.
Our teaching identity is formed from our own identity, our lived experiences both inside and out of educational environments and our reflections on our experiences. There is plenty of empirical research evidencing the existence of prejudice and bias embedded in the society in which we live which we will be absorbing all the time whether we recognise it or not which can influence our perceptions of different groups in different situations.
As teachers, we have a position of power which means that we need to be even more in tune with our own implicit biases to be able to address them early and so not to perpetuate them in the classroom. We also have a responsibility to use that power to address bias between students. Our focus needs to be on the impact rather than the intent behind bias as discriminatory behaviour is often unintended but can cause lasting damage which affects a student's ability to engage with their work and to have a sense of belonging in STEM academia. As you will see from some of the resources on these pages that inclusive practice not only benefits individual but produces better outcomes from study and research overall as diverse viewpoints and contributions create a far richer environment for solutions and innovations in STEM benefitting a wider spectrum of the population.
How to use this resource
This site is a "pick and mix" of resources around ED&I meaning that you can select your own way into the topic by choosing resources which you find most interesting or relevant. The training comprises of 3 parts totalling 2 hours:
Pick from a selection of resources from this website totalling 30 mins (ILO 1 )
Complete and submit your responses to them (15 mins) (ILOs 1 and 2)
Attend the 75 minute workshop to discuss the impact of these ideas on your teaching practice and the experience of your students (ILOs 2 and 3)
Contents
The resources on this page looks at how a lack of diversity in STEM stifles innovation.
The resources on this page look at how students experience inequality and prejudice at university and how it affects their experience and their academic engagement.
Resources on this page explore how to overcome the sense of fear of either offending someone or making a situation worse by saying the wrong thing. Ideas on this page can help you to reflect on how to facilitate equal group discussion and team work.
Resources on this page interrogate the idea of the classroom as a so-called safe space for students to speak freely.
This page explores the ways in which you can intervene as a GTA with your students and colleagues when you notice bias is appearing. It also looks at what it means to take an inclusive approach to intervening with students in their learning.
This page looks at the impact of representation in resources.
This page explores how bias can appear in feedback band evaluations.
The shortcomings of the idea that everyone can achieve by working hard is explored in the resources on this page. It looks at why some voices dominate and can help you reflect on the role of the teacher in addressing this imbalance.
This page looks at how inequality affects academic colleagues in their working lives and how they support students.
This resource explores how everyone has implicit bias and includes activities to help you identify yours.
This page looks at ED&I in a wider social context. This page includes news stories of how government policy perpetuates systemic inequalities in schools and workplaces.
This page includes statistics on student numbers, attendance and retention of different groups both nationally at at the University of Sheffield.
Equality, Diversity and Inclusion is an enormous topic which is central to pedagogic practice. It is not possible to cover it in depth in a one off training session . You will continue to have access to this website after the training and we hope that you return to it periodically to develop your inclusive practice.
For your training to be effective, the themes which appear here should come up regularly in collegiate discussions around teaching and learning and be applied to each new teaching context you find yourself in.
A list of suggested ED&I reflective questions will be given to your academic leads to raise in pre-lab meetings and debriefs. If they don't use them or haven't received them, demonstrate your allyship by prompting them to do so or raising them yourself for discussion so that diversity is supported to create universally beneficial progress in STEM.