PGE/DEM - Seeing Gender: Tools for Change

Kansas State University, Manhattan KS

Investigators

Abstract

Kansas State University is developing an interactive CD-ROM/DVD set for use with pre-service and in-service high school teachers, teacher education faculty and college faculty in SMET fields. The set will: (1) introduce the user to the research base on gender and gender socialization, (2) sensitize these educators to the inadvertent gender bias that operates in SMET classrooms and programs, (3) provide classroom strategies and interventions designed to reduce bias, and (4) present school-wide or department-wide efforts to increase the presence of women in SMET classes and programs. Components of the CD-ROM/DVD include: (1) classroom segments or dramatizations of bias, research, or interventions; (2) interviews with female high school and college students about their experiences in SMET classrooms; (3) interviews with high school teachers and college faculty members about the process by which they became sensitized to gender issues and began working towards change; (4) interviews with researchers familiar with the research on gender bias conducted in both psychology and education; (5) abstracts of relevant journal articles; and (6) essays that invite further reflection. The CD-ROM/DVD will be field-tested with the target population and disseminated through existing professional organizations. In addition, guidelines will be prepared for introduction of the CD-ROM/DVD in classroom settings for pre-service teachers as well as in professional development seminars for in-service teachers and college faculty. The project is innovative in its use of an interactive CD-ROM/DVD to provide instruction, in its integration of presentations of gender bias in education with a solid research base, and in its use of student and teacher/college faculty members' voices to explore their own experiences in SMET classrooms and the processes by which change is implemented. Because it can be used both individually and as part of a classroom or seminar, the CD-ROM/DVD has the capacity to reach thousands of pre-service and in-service teachers, teacher educators, and college faculty who work in SMET disciplines. This potential for reaching a broad audience makes this project a cost-effective and efficient method of strengthening the social infrastructure in SMET education in ways that ultimately increase the number of women working in SMET fields.