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(via https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Vo3lpCB8pbY)

#mcb15 bridgingthegap #progress dialogue discourse STEM #highereducation #science knowledge public understanding

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#mcb15 #bridgingthegap 

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Barriers: On Becoming a Scientist from a Non-Science Background:

My Journey into the Sciences as a Pomo Indian

I would like to preface this write up by saying that I am speaking from personal experience and observations. My data and claims, unless specifically cited, are based on my experience growing up in the Native American communities of Northern California, primarily using my mother as resource for reference.

Growing up, I noticed that I lived a life very different than my peers in my low income, underrepresented locale. This could be due to the realization that my Native American community was a minority even among other underrepresented groups. I do consider myself a part of a marginalized community because historically and contemporarily Native Americans have been treated as a second thought in many regards, which has created innumerable barriers to education, and specifically the sciences.

Historically, land that was once very rich with culture was partitioned in such a way that the natives who initially roamed the land were forced onto small reservations, whereas the government was free to exploit the rest. At least in my family tribe, this had very startling consequences as my family was promised decent living conditions by the US government, but instead my family was left to fend for itself completely. More recently, natives have been sitting on the American back burning in various situations. One in particular is illustrated by the fact that natives are continuously and consistently the most underrepresented minority in higher education. Based on articles and data I’ve read, universities like UC Berkeley have been struggling to keep up their already low native population of students having origins in North America or the Pacific Islands, whereas other minorities are seeing much better outcomes. This stems from Native Americans not being exposed early on to opportunities and a lack of outreach programs that could potentially mentor young natives to help them realize their educational goals.

Growing up, I’ve noticed the main support to be from the family front rather than a collection of many individuals striving for a cause. The family culture in Native American society is very strong, but the effects are differential, which is strongly dependent on each family, distance, and time. For example, my mother grew up in Crescent City, CA, a town that nearly borders Oregon. In addition, she was raised on the very isolate periphery of this city, which added to the already strong effects of distance. She grew up in a very traditional setting, and as a result, had a lot of family who she could turn to. In fact, any day she would expect to see any of her dozens of aunts, uncles, and cousins. They would aggregate and partake in traditional activities. This strong tie allowed my mother to find a home in nearly any one of our family. However, this tribal life style also had its draw back, too.

My mother, although provided family stability in the long term, she was unable to pursue and kind of educational goals-- in fact, she claimed she couldn’t even imagine furthering her education even past the middle school level. These pressures against schooling were derived from the source which provided her so much support: her family. Despite these sentiments against education, she was always in the top of her class, and never had any trouble obtaining the highest grades in school. Her teachers were astounded, and often encouraged her to further her education in school programs, but these lacked the necessities she was so familiar with within her family. Indeed, it was the lack of resources for Natives in these educational outreach programs that halted her aspirations. This was common within my family, and because of this, she made the decision to end this cycle by pushing her children to pursue higher education, a privilege she was never afforded.

The effects of this, however, were not complete because my siblings all had difficulties trying to balance the tribal culture and educational path. School was often second nature for them, but due to family pressures, they internalized these feelings which had devastating effects. Perhaps, if there were resources available that could balance the Native lifestyle as well as our satiation for education, Natives would be better mobilized in society and the sciences. However, this is difficult because many of my family still have barriers that are preventing them from realizing their true potentials.

Speaking from experience, my tribe has had troubles visualizing college. Out of my 350 member tribe, less than 10 of them have went through college successfully. With rates as low as my tribes, it’s seen as virtually inaccessible to go on to college. In many ways I feel it took the push and support of my entire tribe to send just me onto college. Although this may be seen like breaking through the barrier, there seems to be more ahead. I’m the first in my immediate family to go to college, and I’m also the first in my tribe who decided to pursue science, a field that is very rigorous, and at UC Berkeley known to weed out underprepared students.

So, what is the underrepresented-underrepresented minority to do? In an age when there are many initiatives to help underrepresented minorities gain a voice and fighting chance in the public arena, why are Native Americans still facing barriers concerning these same initiatives of education-- the bridge that facilitates the movement of opportunities? Perhaps this is my chance to step in. As I said before, I had my entire family and most of tribe to support me in reaching my educational goals, specifically those related to science. Although some of the science I am learning is not necessarily important for tribal culture, it does bring about new views, and with that comes new opportunities. Although this is unusual in Native communities, my bridge to science was my family; however, for many other Natives, this bridge is very hard to visualize because their family’s priorities lay elsewhere. Perhaps the key for Natives to successfully enter the sciences is within people like my mother, who eventually pass this key down to other people like myself. Now that I am in possession of this key, I realize that I can have a great effect on younger generations of Natives. People who can inspire have a great responsibility to pass on their knowledge and sense of motivation. I desire to pass my key of knowledge and motivation down to other Natives so they too can be enlightened by sciences.

#mcb15 #barriers #Becomingascientistfromanonsciencebackground #Pomo #Indian #Natives #Inspiration

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Chapter 3: Public Engagement with Science

#mcb15 #matsui

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#mcb15

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#mcb15 #public #the gap #motivation #science #why understand science

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#mcb15 #science #the public #bridgingthegap #motivation

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Future of Science and Sustainability of Change

           Science is advancing rapidly. As science continues to advance, there are several ethical concerns about the accessibility of research. Accessibility to primary resources has been hard to obtain for people outside of education. In terms of accessibility, it is common that only faculty and students in higher education are able to obtain the hard evidence present in journals. This creates a gap between those that are able to obtain knowledge about scientific advancements and those that cannot. While this disconnect has been somewhat balanced by the increase in science being displaced in popular media, there is still this ability for opinions about science to be formed by incorrect or opinion based popular media articles. The future of science consists of rapid advancement and the necessity of transparency between scientists and the world.

           The increase in technology has created a modern scientific revolution. However, there is this lack of communication from scientists about this advancement. Recently, Dr. Canavero has announced his plans to do the first head transplant surgery. In China, scientists have reported editing the genomes of human embryos. Even the manner in which clinical trials are run illustrate the lack of ethical concern between the science community and the general public. The popular science articles that discuss the advancements in science rarely discuss the manner in which these advancements are run. They merely reflect decisions already made or done by scientists in proceeding with their research. There is usually little room for the people to argue against the science going on. In order for change in science to be sustainable, there needs to be a bigger engagement between people and scientists. While this is mediated through popular science media, it does not bring the engagement that is necessary to make accurate decisions about science. Regardless of whether the public is involved, science will continue to advance. However, this change is only sustainable with the ability to have the public access evidence to make science ethical. In terms of increasing transparency, it has already been noted that those involved with higher education institutions have the means of obtaining primary resources. Therefore, the first step in having open communication about science advancement is educating students, which are the future leaders of the world, about how to access these articles. This would be a more direct way of having a portion of the nation’s voters informed on research aside from going through the process of making all journals open access. Overall, science will advance but this will only be funded if the public is being informed about the advancements rather than finding out about them after the fact.

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#mcb15 science sustainability public understanding bioethics Designer Babies

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#mcb15 science public understanding sustainability future toomanyhashtags

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This audio file delves into the sources of biases within the sciences, and explains the many ways in which these biases manifest themselves–in research, in scientific vocabulary, in stereotypes, and in lack of diversity in regards to traditionally marginalized demographics in the STEM community.It also provides examples of men and women who have made great impacts in the world, but experienced bias due to their race or gender. It concludes with a partial list of resources available to UC Berkeley students to help overcome these biases to advance as professional scientists.

Music: “In Albany New York” by the 126ers from the YouTube Audio Library

#mcb15 #women in stem #minorities in stem #public understanding science journalism mcb15 #borders to science #science vocab #publicunderstanding

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Underserved Communities 

Video by:Juan Cano, Karen Rodriguez, Tiffany Chang, Reinere Jude Ruiz, Alicia Cuevas, Carlos Martinez, Dawa Gangshar, Lidia Pureco and Thu-An Tran.

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Science at the Interface by Pia Choi, Vin Lay, Ahyeon Hwang, Osman Shokoor, Jeffrey Zhang, Jessica Yescas

#mcb15 health healthcare healthcaredisparities doctor science popsci stem education publicunderstanding barriers minorities

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Infographic for Chapter 4: SCIENTISTS ARE PEOPLE, TOO: A CRITICAL REVIEW OF SCIENCE, Bias within Science

Compiled by Sabrina Rentschler, Miguel Barranco, Carmen Conroy, Cat Link, Claire Lee, and Colin Wang

This graphic shows the historical basis for biases in the sciences, and explains the many ways in which these biases manifest themselves--in research, in scientific vocabulary, in stereotypes, and in outreach (or lack thereof) to traditionally marginalized demographics in the STEM community, such as women. It concludes with a partial list of resources available to UC Berkeley students to help overcome these biases to advance as professional scientists.

#public understanding science journalism mcb15 #stem women #stem #publicunderstanding #publichealth

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Maybe the best way to make science accessible is to start from a young age. Students of all genders deserve an equal shot at discovering the wonders of STEM! 

For reference, links to citations presented in video:

http://www.randalolson.com/2014/06/14/percentage-of-bachelors-degrees-conferred-to-women-by-major-1970-2012/

(Women earned 58.74% of the bachelor’s degrees in Biology, and 84.8% of the degrees in Health Professions in 2011)

https://www.girlscouts.org/research/pdf/generation_stem_full_report.pdf

(“Studies show that girls lose interest in math and science during middle school, and STEM interest for girls is low, compared to boys.”

“According to the American Association of University Women, high school girls and boys perform equally well in math and science. Specifically, high school girls earn more math and science credits than do boys; and girls’ GPAs, aggregated across math and science classes, are higher than boys.”)

http://www.stemconnector.org/sites/default/files/store/STEM-Students-STEM-Jobs-Executive-Summary.pdf

(“Female students express STEM interest at 14.5% compared to 39.6% for their male counterparts.”)

#education #stem #women in stem #middle school

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Language and Culture as Barriers for the Understanding of Science. How will you impact the science gap?

#mcb15 #publicunderstanding #culture #language #barriersofscience #latinosandhealthcare #healthcare #thesciencegap

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Ethical Concerns in Science Infographic by Albert Phone, Denisse Velazquez, Diego Dubon, Jazmine Carvajal, Joseline Alvarez, Joseph Jweinat, and Kyubin Kyung

#mcb15 #ethicalconcerns #safety #publicunderstanding #science #bridgingthegap #health #research #experimentation #humanity #life #euthanasia #morality #prenatalengineering #publichealth #religion #acceptance