This school year, Learning Undefeated is leading a cohort of eight East Coast-based educators on a STEM equity journey as part of a new partnership funded by the Defense STEM Education Consortium (DSEC). The 2023/24 program, “Cultivating STEM Equity Ambassadors to Address the Barriers to Equity in STEM Education,” uses virtual and in-person sessions to identify ways individual STEM educators can impact persistent underrepresentation in areas such as race and gender in STEM fields.
Learning Undefeated’s educator cohort is part of a national group of 32 teachers, who participate in monthly virtual learning opportunities plus two in-person STEM bootcamp sessions. The yearlong program uses interactive, experiential, critical arts-based, culturally relevant framework to engage teachers in defining and operationalizing equity in all aspects of their STEM work.
Across the curriculum, educator participants will deeply explore topics that promote equity through culturally relevant STEM pedagogy. Specific learnings include equity audits, curriculum design, and planning programs that engage students, teachers, family and community. In addition to content knowledge, participants will engage with a passionate peer community, focused on equity in STEM education, and develop an equity action plan for their own workplaces. Upon completion, participants will earn a DoD STEM microcredential in STEM equity.
More than 30 educators applied to the year one program, for a variety of reasons including personal and classroom experiences that have informed their desire to create a more equitable learning environment for their students. “As a result of this experience, I have been able to learn more about the challenges/barriers that students may face when entering the STEM field, and incorporate ideas into my classroom/school as well as build stronger relationships with students by being able to have tough conversations of the realities of the world,” said Danielle Affinito, 7th grade science teacher from Farquhar Middle School in Olney, MD.
This program is jointly presented by Arizona State University Mary Lou Fulton Teachers College (ASU MLFTC), Intercultural Development Research Association, Learning Undefeated, and the Teaching Institute for Excellence in STEM (TIES), and funded through the DoD STEM DSEC Innovation Bloc, which strategically addresses programming gaps, expands reach, and strengthens DSEC alignment to evolving DoD priorities including building skills in support of critical technology areas to enhance technical capabilities for the future.
