Department of Pediatrics, University of California, San Diego, La Jolla, CA, United States.
Department of Medical Laboratory Sciences, Hunter College, New York, NY, United States.
Front Immunol. 2019 Dec 11;10:2906. doi: 10.3389/fimmu.2019.02906. eCollection 2019.
A diverse student body enriches the classroom with lived experiences, varied skillsets, community and cultural knowledge, resiliency, and altruistic interests, all critical attributes that benefit both the classroom and the STEM field at large. However, a persistent disparity in academic and educational attainment exists between under-represented minority (URM) and non-URM students in STEM fields. This achievement gap discourages talented URM students from entering STEM professions, threatening the potential, expertise, and perspective of these professions. Here we describe the factors that contribute to the achievement gap and present strategies, utilized in our Immunology classrooms, for combating each factor. We discuss project-based learning pedagogy to give students increased agency and feelings of empowerment. We also highlight concrete practices to foster students' science identities and sense of community, factors that highly promote STEM retention. The dynamic subject of Immunology provides myriad opportunities to implement a curriculum committed to equity, as we outline below.
多元化的学生群体通过生活经验、各种技能、社区和文化知识、适应力和利他主义兴趣丰富了课堂，所有这些都是对课堂和整个 STEM 领域都有益的关键属性。然而，在 STEM 领域，代表性不足的少数族裔 (URM) 和非 URM 学生之间仍然存在学业和教育成就方面的差距。这种成绩差距使有天赋的 URM 学生望而却步，不愿从事 STEM 职业，从而威胁到这些职业的潜力、专业知识和观点。在这里，我们描述了导致成就差距的因素，并介绍了我们在免疫学课堂中用来应对每个因素的策略。我们讨论了基于项目的学习教学法，让学生有更多的主动权和赋权感。我们还强调了具体的实践，以培养学生的科学身份和社区意识，这些因素极大地促进了 STEM 的保留率。免疫学这一充满活力的学科提供了无数的机会来实施一门致力于公平的课程，正如我们下面所概述的。
