Recommendations for Integrating Anti-Racist and Inclusive Pedagogy Strategies into Doctoral Teaching Training in Public Health

Integrating Student Voices into Teaching Training

In the wake of George Floyd’s murder in 2020, Black students renewed demands for schools to make demonstrable progress in addressing institutional racism (Ezarik, 2021; Thomason, 2020). For example, graduate students in the Black Community at Emory University’s Rollins School of Public Health sent an open letter (Rollins School of Public Health, 2022) with actionable items to school leadership. The letter contained several pedagogy-related demands, such as incorporating and updating course materials that “promote Black ideals and voices within the classroom.”

Beginning in fall 2020, we integrated this letter into the Teaching in Public Health course to center students’ voices, allow doctoral students and instructors to examine biases, demonstrate how instructors can respond to student feedback, and prompt reflexivity on one’s own teaching and positionality. In this course, we discuss an article by Abuelezam (2020) that underscores the importance of trauma-informed pedagogy, prioritizing social determinants, and addressing the political nature of health sciences. Then, students review the letter before reflecting on the questions: Given this information, how do you see your teaching contributing to antiracist work? What are the challenges? Students generate concrete steps to use in their teaching, such as valuing lived experience as part of the learning process, developing varied assessments for students to demonstrate their learning, being available for questions and discussions outside the classroom, and intentionally including course materials from diverse authors, perspectives, and sources.

Each year, as the literature on antiracist and inclusive pedagogy continues to grow, we expand the course reading list to include some of the most recent work in this space, such as Aqil et al.’s (2021) article on engaging in anti-oppressive teaching. Part of our classroom discussion focuses on the articles themselves, and we also discuss the process of how pedagogy and academic culture is hopefully changing to address important anti-oppression movements and our own accountability in that process. Students are responsive to these discussions and frequently share insights from their own experiences as students as the launching point for developing and solidifying their own inclusive teaching activities.

Modeling Inclusive Classroom Activities

A hallmark of inclusive and antiracist pedagogies involves designing classroom activities that value the participation and perspectives of all students. Modeling such activities in a pedagogy course allows doctoral students to see how they can use these approaches in their own teaching.

In keeping with backward design (Bowen, 2017) and active learning principles (Brame, 2016), classroom activities should align with the class learning objectives and allow students to practice and apply the skills they are learning. For example, Liberating Structures activities (Lipmanowicz & McCandless, n.d.) and Antiracist Discussion Pedagogy (Chew et al., 2020) are designed to create inclusive learning spaces for engagement and critical conversations among all students. Based on these approaches, we engage doctoral students in discussion about teaching and learning, while simultaneously modeling activities they can use in future teaching. For example, we use an Impromptu Networking activity (Lipmanowicz & McCandless, n.d.) in which students rotate partners to discuss questions related to their values and beliefs about teaching. Other strategies we use include reflective writing, small and large group discussion, and application of skills through designing learning objectives and a lesson plan.

Opportunities to Apply Antiracist and Inclusive Pedagogy in the Classroom

Mentored teaching experiences allow doctoral students the opportunity to meaningfully engage in course preparation and delivery, including implementing inclusive teaching strategies in the classroom, under the guidance of an experienced instructor (Walker et al., 2022). For example, doctoral students can participate in selecting readings, examples, case studies, and other materials that centers the voices of historically underrepresented communities.

Additionally, an important aspect of research and teaching is acknowledging one’s positionality (Holmes, 2020)—how our identities and experiences relate to the students in our classes, the history of the school, and the power dynamics inherent in those relationships. Activities where instructors model their positionality statements and prompt students to think about their own positionality and practice reflexivity related to their coursework and public health practice are incorporated into several of the Master of Public Health courses that doctoral students commonly serve in for their mentored teaching experiences (e.g., courses in qualitative methods, quantitative methods, and community assessment). We engage doctoral students in the implementation of such activities, including discussions of whose perspectives are included in research and ways to challenge inequitable narratives and approaches. One example is in the Qualitative Methods for Research and Evaluation course, where students, during the process of individually designing and conducting a mini-study, are asked to reflect on such questions as: What personal experiences or beliefs might influence my research topic or questions? How does my power and authority influence my approach to research? How might my cultural background shape the way I approach my research? What biases or assumptions do I bring to the research process, and how might this impact my data collection and analysis? Doctoral students serving as teaching assistants can help guide students in thinking through the nuances of these questions for their specific projects.

Imperative for Continued Collaborative Learning

Current training methods often aim to include multicultural or cultural humility approaches (Blanchet Garneau et al., 2023). While appropriate, these approaches do not fully deconstruct issues of race and racism or engage students in the work of understanding underlying power relations and systemic oppression. Antiracist pedagogy is a learned, intentional, and strategic effort in which educators incorporate antiracism into their teaching (Blanchet Garneau et al., 2023). Instructors can also find antiracist and anti-oppressive pedagogies to be challenging as it involves trying strategies that might not work the first time, experiencing failure in the classroom, and possibly causing more harm to students from underrepresented groups who already experience bias (Diffey & Mignone, 2017; Wagner, 2005).

In sharing our experiences and recommendations, we acknowledge that we are continually learning and reflecting on new approaches to antiracist and inclusive pedagogies, including our own positionalities and privileges. The first author identifies as a white, cis-gender woman who is a teacher from a family of teachers. She actively works to build inclusive learning communities in her teaching, directing of the Master of Public Health program, and research on the scholarship of teaching and learning and mental health workforce capacity development. The second author identifies as an American-born Asian Indian, cis-gender woman who is currently a PhD student conducting research on addressing health disparities in the provision of cancer care. The third author identifies as a white, cis-gender woman and has a background in women, gender, and sexuality studies. She focuses her work on building inclusive teaching and mentoring programs in the US and research training programs in low-and middle-income countries. Each author practices ongoing self-reflection as part of developing critical consciousness, which involves examining how our positionality, biases, and assumptions (e.g., about students, teaching practices, structures of academia) may underlie our teaching and working—individually and with colleagues—to implement inclusive and antiracist teaching practices (Halman et al., 2017). We also actively work with diversity, equity, and inclusion initiatives in the department and school.

We have found that both faculty and doctoral students benefit through shared learning, reflection, discovery, and accountability. One area of growth for our course is deeper exploration of the intersections of multiple identities—including disability, neurodivergence, and first-generation scholars. A second is to extend beyond trauma-informed pedagogy by weaving in healing-centered engagement, which uses a strengths-based approach to advance collective well-being and action. In teaching, healing-centered engagement involves recognizing the centrality of students’ identities and culture in supporting well-being and the role of the environment—both inside and outside the classroom—in shaping learning (Ginwright, 2018). We recognize this work is an ongoing part of a larger cultural change needed in schools and programs of public health, and requires space for missteps, repair, and opportunities for growth.

Doctoral pedagogy training provides a critical foundation to the practice and art of teaching. For future directions in research and pedagogy instruction, we strongly encourage public health programs to assess and refine how antiracist and inclusive pedagogies are integrated into doctoral teaching training and implement further steps to better prepare future faculty to become antiracist educators. This ongoing process will better equip future faculty to actively engage in antiracist education and foster inclusive learning environments that promote health equity for all students.