Statement of Diversity
My philosophical and empirical research on explanations for the underrepresentation of various groups across disciplines (including philosophy) has influenced the ways that I teach my own courses. As an instructor, I promote the message that success in philosophy requires skills and strategies that can be developed through practice. At the beginning of my courses, I ask students to consider the course goals laid out on the syllabus. I explain that I hope to improve their skills as defined by those goals, but that students may also have their own personal academic goals for the course. Each student is asked to write down two goals (at least one course goal and at least one personal goal) that they will focus on for the term and put those goals in an envelope. Periodically throughout the course I bring out the envelopes and ask students to reflect on their progress so far and how they might improve their progress on their chosen goals in the future. I even ask students to reflect on how they will continue to work on the skills developed in the course on the last day of class because each of the skills transfer outside of the course context.
Another way to communicate to students that philosophy does not require innate brilliance is to scaffold assignments so that the skills required to successfully complete them will be slowly added over time. I scaffold the philosophy paper by assigning different preconditions for the term paper every few weeks over the entire term: a few sentences proposing a topic, an annotated bibliography of sources, a thesis statement, an outline, and a draft of the paper.
I also teach other philosophers about best inclusive practices based on my own research and research from other disciplines. I have been invited to present on these topics at the University of North Carolina’s Workshop on the Recruitment and Retention of Female Undergraduates in Philosophy (April 2014) and at the Minorities and Philosophy chapter at Princeton University’s Conference on Implicit Bias/Stereotype Threat and Pedagogy (October 2016). For example, at Princeton I led a discussion with the conference attendees about how to align course goals, assessment of student participation, and inclusivity concerns. I argued that the traditional method of marking participation for quantity and quality of in-class comments is often not well aligned with course goals and may conflict with goals of inclusivity. Instead, I argued that if instructors’ course goals are to cultivate engagement and thoughtfulness about course content, a better assessment of learning would give credit for students’ written and out-of-class participation too.
I have also presented work on inclusive pedagogy and underrepresentation in philosophy at a variety of conferences: Hypatia/Committee on the Status of Women Conference at Villanova University (May 2015), APA Committee for the Status of Women Panel at the Central American Philosophical Association meeting (February 2014), Implicit Bias, Philosophy and Psychology at the University of Sheffield, England (April 2013), Diversity in Philosophy at the University of Dayton (May 2013), Society for Philosophy and Psychology at Brown University (June 2013).
I have also been invited to co-lead (with Liam Kofi Bright) the inclusive pedagogy session of the graduate student instructor training courses for both the University of Pittsburgh Department of Philosophy (Fall 2014, Fall 2015, Fall 2016) and the University of Pittsburgh Department of History and Philosophy of Science (Spring 2015). In these sessions we cover how to improve minorities’ and women’s sense of belonging in the classroom, why and how to diversify course syllabi, why and how to anonymize grading, and among other topics.
I have also served as a local organizer (with Nora Boyd) for the American Association of Philosophy Teacher one-day workshop at Pitt, which focused on inclusive pedagogy. Nora and I organized all financial and hosting aspects of the workshop as well as conferencing with the facilitators about pedagogical methods demonstrated through their sessions. In addition, I was elected as the teaching co-representative (along with Nora Boyd and then Willy Penn) by and for the HPS graduate students from 2016-2018. As one of the teaching representatives, I gave fellow graduate students advice about their own teaching, organized practical feedback sessions on syllabi and assignments (like creative projects), and represented the graduate students’ teaching interests to the faculty.
Another way to communicate to students that philosophy does not require innate brilliance is to scaffold assignments so that the skills required to successfully complete them will be slowly added over time. I scaffold the philosophy paper by assigning different preconditions for the term paper every few weeks over the entire term: a few sentences proposing a topic, an annotated bibliography of sources, a thesis statement, an outline, and a draft of the paper.
I also teach other philosophers about best inclusive practices based on my own research and research from other disciplines. I have been invited to present on these topics at the University of North Carolina’s Workshop on the Recruitment and Retention of Female Undergraduates in Philosophy (April 2014) and at the Minorities and Philosophy chapter at Princeton University’s Conference on Implicit Bias/Stereotype Threat and Pedagogy (October 2016). For example, at Princeton I led a discussion with the conference attendees about how to align course goals, assessment of student participation, and inclusivity concerns. I argued that the traditional method of marking participation for quantity and quality of in-class comments is often not well aligned with course goals and may conflict with goals of inclusivity. Instead, I argued that if instructors’ course goals are to cultivate engagement and thoughtfulness about course content, a better assessment of learning would give credit for students’ written and out-of-class participation too.
I have also presented work on inclusive pedagogy and underrepresentation in philosophy at a variety of conferences: Hypatia/Committee on the Status of Women Conference at Villanova University (May 2015), APA Committee for the Status of Women Panel at the Central American Philosophical Association meeting (February 2014), Implicit Bias, Philosophy and Psychology at the University of Sheffield, England (April 2013), Diversity in Philosophy at the University of Dayton (May 2013), Society for Philosophy and Psychology at Brown University (June 2013).
I have also been invited to co-lead (with Liam Kofi Bright) the inclusive pedagogy session of the graduate student instructor training courses for both the University of Pittsburgh Department of Philosophy (Fall 2014, Fall 2015, Fall 2016) and the University of Pittsburgh Department of History and Philosophy of Science (Spring 2015). In these sessions we cover how to improve minorities’ and women’s sense of belonging in the classroom, why and how to diversify course syllabi, why and how to anonymize grading, and among other topics.
I have also served as a local organizer (with Nora Boyd) for the American Association of Philosophy Teacher one-day workshop at Pitt, which focused on inclusive pedagogy. Nora and I organized all financial and hosting aspects of the workshop as well as conferencing with the facilitators about pedagogical methods demonstrated through their sessions. In addition, I was elected as the teaching co-representative (along with Nora Boyd and then Willy Penn) by and for the HPS graduate students from 2016-2018. As one of the teaching representatives, I gave fellow graduate students advice about their own teaching, organized practical feedback sessions on syllabi and assignments (like creative projects), and represented the graduate students’ teaching interests to the faculty.
Inclusive Pedagogy Resources
In addition to sharing my work and resources in inclusive pedagogy with the Pittsburgh community, I have created a number of resources for the wider philosophical community on inclusive pedagogy. I helped create the Best Practices for the Inclusive Philosophy Classroom website for the Minorities and Philosophy (MAP) organization. Specifically, I reviewed empirical research on the underrepresentation of students in philosophy and other disciplines to provide an annotated bibliography on the "Empirical Research" page, which you can find here: http://phildiversity.weebly.com. I have also created a short reference sheet for tips and resources for promoting inclusivity in philosophy, which can be found here. Finally, I have created a document based on the teaching practicum sessions on inclusive pedagogy that Liam Kofi Bright and I have developed.
