Great program!  As this is a program developed for educators, it was great to hear the anecdotal evidence that students' impressions and vision of what the physics world resembled changed.  Was that something you directly measured (pre and post), and in comparison to other schools that utilized more traditional physics curricula?

To answer a few of your questions, (1) The stories of women in physics and the navigation of such gendered spaces in STEM have been well-documented (work from Mia Ong, Nuria Jaumot-Pascual, Ebony McGee, Chanda Prescod-Weinstein, etc.).  Continue to use their work and stories to help inform the practice.  Also, as physics is theoretical and project-based, students benefit from identifying physics problems from their own contexts.  Encourage students to identify potential physics' issues that play a role in their everyday lives.

(2) Certainly use culturally responsive pedagogy and abolitionist teaching methodology (e.g. Gholdy Muhammad, Bettina Love, etc.) to train administrators and offer professional development for teachers (also include literature and documentaries around indigenous practices in STEM education and STEM fields - there are a few that are palatable for students and teachers).  Also, with administrators, STEP UP can provide guidance on how administrators can build in systems of accountability for their teachers.

(3) Engage the professional societies around how they are encouraging cross-talk among teachers and industry professionals or professors in higher academia.  Societies like NSBE, SACNAS, Women in Physics & African American Women in Physics, etc. can inform you about how they are engaging in equity and inclusion processes across various professional and learning environments.

I think that to be culturally responsive, a project needs to start with problems that come from the community that it is targeting. Working with authentic problems that are meaningful to the community projects are working is the very first step. Design based research is a good starting point for culturally responsive work. 

Thanks, Nuria, for visiting and posting your suggestions for us. I agree with you that unless the community does not recognize the problem as their problem, the change does not occur. As a junior scholar in this field, what I struggle with is what to do when the problem is so embedded in the community that people see it as part of their life. In other words, it is not a "problem" in their eyes. 

I'm thinking that maybe the project can find ways to make it their problem somehow? 

Yes, for that matter, both lessons start with problematizing, showing students data about the status of the physics degree holders in around the world and talk about who we consider physicists and what they do. In that way, students began to wonder and, we observed, they owned the conversation. 

Thanks Mary, Totally agree that it is important to expand the figured worlds with visual representations of women. But we have found that it is crucial to go beyond that, where the students recognize that their values, goals, and what they want to do also can fit in the figured-world of physics. So that is what we aim to nurture with Career in Physics lesson. We also want to highlight that many structural and cultural barriers should be recognized, acknowledged and challenged by the students, which is the main goal of the Women in Physics lesson. 

And now the two challenges that we have faced are (1) two lessons are good quick remedy but the classroom culture needs to change and (2) reaching out to more physics teachers. 

One of the ways we strive to disrupt the "Figured Worlds" narratives is with the Everyday Actions Guide. Some of the suggestions for teachers include directing students with question to female students and using group roles so that all students gets hands-on with lab materials. Like Mary mentioned, we do find some teachers' first steps in making change starts with consciously choosing the language in their class materials to be more inclusive and include non-male genders.

Thanks Nuria for your questions and interest in the project. We have done surveys measuring students' physics identity during the pilot study and the experimental study and both showed that students' physics identity had significantly increased as they participated in the lessons. We also have done video recording of the classes during the lesson implementations in a pilot study examining how students' discourse changed and what that indicates about their figured worlds. Last fall we implemented a national survey to examine the impact and reach of STEP UP lessons across the state. We hope to publish the results in the upcoming fall. 

Teachers implemented them in both regular and AP classes. We are submitting a paper in The Physics Teacher explaining some of the theoretical ideas behind the design to allow others adapt/adopt the lessons and materials for other contexts. 

Great question Overtoun, we have seen the lessons done in all levels of physics. I've done them in a 9th grade Conceptual Physics (physics first) class and AP Physics C. I found that the Student Personal Profile activity had to be scaffolded a bit differently for the different levels but they each got something out of it. 

We have had interest in expanding the approach to other courses but haven't done anything official. Our online community at STEPUPphysics.org is filled with adaptations and extensions. If you ask there someone may be able to share what they have tried in their classrooms. 

Unfortunately our video is too short to include all the details about the full curriculum. If you take a look at the Careers in Physics lesson materials here, you'll see that the Career Survey Match questions include choices about benefiting humankind. My students that are interested in careers related to health and medicine have really enjoyed learning about the different career options related to physics. Students that are more interested in environmental science also find there is a lot of physics in green technology. It is definitely an inflection point in the class when students realize that not only are there more women in physics than they may have expected there are also a lot more careers that involve physics they are interested in. 

Since the global climate crisis looms before us as disastrous for civilization, make a strong connection to it. Physicists are central to addressing the climate crisis; get more women involved by increasing the awareness of the crucial role of physicists and the helpfulness to humanity.

We appreciate your support - thanks!

Thank you for watching and commenting!

I should probably be more specific, and in my next question reveal my ignorance of the research on this: What do we learn from interviews with young women and men after their terminal HS physics course about their future plans and the role physics (or continued physics education) may plays in it (or not), and what their differential experience in physics (versus other courses) might contribute to their thinking?

Great questions and Wonderings! I think cultural and societal factors are some of the most critical forces that push women (and minoritized racial and ethnic groups) out of physics. So instead of asking why girls are not interested in these things (a deficit view), we may want to ask what structural and cultural factors created this disinterest or underrepresentation.
Or How their figured world of physics is created that they do not see themselves in it?
with STEP UP lessons and materials, we strive to disrupt and expand students' figured worlds, and we do that through counternarratives (which Dr Hazari talked a little bit about in the video)

If you are interested, we recently submitted a paper to The Physics Teacher journal that we further explained the design of the STEP UP materials and lessons. please look forward to that. 

Thanks Martin.  Your thought "we need to change science itself" hits the nail on the head for me.  Yet, hundreds of years of the construction of what it means to do physics and be a physicist is difficult to change.  The fingerprints of historic inequity are in the standards, content, process, values, etc., which are propagated forward in a constantly reproduced and reinforced system.  So we create disruptions so that more voices might question that system and provide new perspectives. 

Thanks Bahare for watching our video, appreciate your encouraging words

Thanks Bahare - we lock arms in solidarity together!

Thanks Candice for visiting and your positive words:) 

Thanks Jane for your recommendations. Glad to say that we do have close collaboration with both groups and hope to continue and expand our connections.