PREPARING FUTURE GEOSCIENCE FACULTY TO BE INCLUSIVE TEACHERS

In 2021, just over 1000 PhDs were awarded in the geosciences. Exit surveys administered by the American Geosciences Institute (AGI) indicate that over 65% of these recent geoscience PhDs sought employment at two-year and four-year colleges, and 45% of them found employment at four-year colleges. These data suggest that, annually, approximately 650 geoscience PhD students are considering teaching as part of their career, and approximately 450 recent geoscience graduates begin careers that include teaching.

How prepared are these geoscience graduates to use inclusive, student-centered strategies when they enter the classroom, where they will spend 50% or more of their time? If they did not experience or learn explicitly how to create an equitable learning environment, the answer is: not very. Without having experienced equitable and effective teaching as learners, new faculty are likely to teach through lecture, despite decades of evidence that show lecture to be less effective than active learning practices at promoting student learning and supporting all students. In addition, the geosciences face particular challenges in inclusion and equitable access, including an emphasis on ableism and an historical legacy of exclusion and exploitation of marginalized groups.

One potentially impactful intervention is to provide opportunities for graduate students to develop their skills in inclusive geoscience teaching while they are earning their degree. However, many geoscience graduate programs are relatively small, and geoscience-specific pedagogy courses are not viable. To address this need and create an economy of scale, the National Association of Geoscience Teachers (NAGT) is designing new professional development opportunities for graduate students that emphasize inclusive, evidence-based teaching strategies, which can stand alone or be combined into a geoscience teaching certificate. Our new offerings, piloted at the Earth Educators’ Rendezvous in 2023, will help prepare future geoscience faculty to be inclusive teachers and will have immediate effects for graduate students who are currently working as teaching assistants.