Decolonising and Diversifying Biosciences Education

Dr. Nick Freestone

School of Life Sciences, Pharmacy and Chemistry, Kingston University, London

Nick Freestone is an Associate Professor in Physiology and Pharmacology and Course Leader for a suite of undergraduate degrees in Pharmaceutical Science at Kingston University in south west London.  He is co-Chair of the Royal Society of Biology’s “Bridging Awarding Gaps in the Biosciences” Network and a member of the British Pharmacological Society’s Inclusive Pharmacology Education Steering Group. He was also, until recently, an Education Theme Lead for The Physiological Society. In 2014 he was the UK’s Higher Education Bioscience Teacher of the Year as awarded by Oxford University Press and the Higher Education Academy and is now Chair of the panel of judges for this award for the Royal Society of Biology. In 2021 he was awarded a National Teaching Fellowship for his work in addressing awarding gaps both in his local teaching environment and also nationally.

 

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Prachi Stafford

BSc, MREs, PhD, FHEA. Senior Lecturer in Biological Sciences

Title:   Addressing the degree awarding gap through decolonisation of the curriculum

Description:   A degree awarding gap has persisted in Higher Education since it was first documented in 2005. This gap is prevalent even when adjusted for prior attainment. Although awareness has increased within universities, at the current rate, it will take over 65 years to close the gap for Black students. Interestingly, the largest decrease in awarding gap was recorded during the COVID-19 pandemic and is thought to be the combined outcome of changes in both teaching delivery and assessment practices. However, whether this decrease will be retained with a return to face-to-face teaching remains to be seen. At Sheffield Hallam University and in line with other institutions, we have a statistically significant discrepancy in the rate of good degree awarded to Black, Asian and other minority ethnic groups compared to white students (-15% in Biosciences & Sports). At the institutional level, over 74% of our undergraduate home student population identify as being from under-represented groups and experiencing barriers to learning (Office for Student, 2019). To address this, within the Bioscience and Chemistry department, we are currently adopting approaches to decolonise the curriculum to better reflect the student population, to reduce the awarding and enable all students to achieve their full potentials. This talk will take an evidence-based approach in identifying some of the challenges faced and how these can be addressed by decolonising the curriculum. We will also explore how these approaches can be delivered within the curriculum.

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Carol Ibe

Founder & President of JR Biotek Foundation , (previously a postdoctoral scientist at the John Innes Centre, Norwich, UK)

Title:   Democratising plant science research to accelerate food and nutrition security in low resourced countries

Carol Ibe is founder and president of the JR Biotek Foundation, an organization dedicated to upskilling and empowering Africa’s next generation of agricultural scientists. Carol completed her PhD in Plant Sciences from the University of Cambridge (as a Gates scholar) and a postdoctoral research training at the John Innes Centre in Norwich, UK. Her PhD and postdoctoral research focused on two major global staple cereal crops (rice and wheat) and how their interactions with beneficial and harmful fungi may be optimized for practical agricultural applications. Although she enjoyed working on these interesting projects, Carol has become increasingly restless about the looming hunger and malnutrition problems affecting millions of people in sub-Saharan Africa. She now devotes most of her time and efforts towards developing innovative solutions aimed at advancing research on scientifically neglected and undervalued African indigenous (local) crops. Carol strongly believes that the democratization of plant science research will enhance the accessibility of plant bio-technologies to enable scientists in low resourced scientific communities in Africa and elsewhere to accelerate food production in a sustainable and environmentally friendly manner. Carol’s outstanding research, leadership and absolute commitment to improving lives and systems has led to several awards including the 2019 Bill Gates Sr. Prize and the University of Cambridge’s Society for the Application of Research Awards (CSAR).

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Jason Arday

Professor of Sociology of Education, University of Glasgow

Title: Racial Inequality and Social Justice in Higher Education

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Sarah-Marie da Silva

Undergraduate, University of Hull

Title: Confronting Ableism in Biosciences: its history and how we can take positive steps towards disability inclusion 

Description : Ableism is society’s prejudice toward disabled people that is embedded in our society. Ableist thinking has a significant impact on the culture and structures of education. In this talk, biosciences education is used as a case study on how ableism’s history has a negative impact on disabled students today and suggest how educators can be more inclusive.  

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Nicola Hemmings

University of Sheffield, School of Biosciences

Dr Nicola Hemmings is a Royal Society Dorothy Hodgkin Research Fellow at the University of Sheffield School of Biosciences. Her research interests are broadly in the fields of evolutionary and reproductive biology. Alongside her research, Nicola has a strong interest in dismantling barriers to access and participation in science and higher education more widely, and is one of the Co-Directors of the University of Sheffield Centre for Equity & Inclusion.

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Dr. Shane Austin

Lecturer in Biochemistry, The University of the West Indies, Cave Hill Campus

Shane Austin is currently a Lecturer in biochemistry at The University of the West Indies, Cave Hill Campus in Barbados. Shane joined The UWI as an assistant lecturer in 2017 and has taught biology, biochemistry and scientific writing courses at both the undergraduate and graduate levels. Shane currently supervises undergraduate and postgraduate research in several areas, particularly the metabolism of organisms in extreme conditions, uterine fibroids in Caribbean women and active learning to improve biochemistry education. Shane is passionate about active learning and has piloted several initiatives in his classrooms in this area. In 2018 he joined the Promoting Active Learning through Mentorship (PALM) network. His work as part of the PALM network increased his involvement in the active learning and education communities. Shane has presented several professional development workshops on active learning strategies and published on the topic. Shane is a member of several societies, including the Society of Experimental Biology, the Malacology Society of London and the American Chemical Society. Recently, Shane has been working with the SEB to improve diversity in the society’s awards through his work with the outreach, education and diversity working group and the SEB Awards Nomination taskforce. Shane is excited to share his experiences and knowledge with colleagues in higher education. 

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Prof. Helen Kwanashie

Professor of Pharmacology and a Guidance-Counsellor, The National Open University of Nigeria (NOUN), Abuja, Nigeria

Helen Ochuko Kwanashie obtained her PhD Pharmacology from Ahmadu Bello University (ABU), Zaria, Nigeria; undertook postdoctoral training at the University of Dundee in the UK, and attained Full Professorship of Pharmacology in 2004. She had also earned two Education qualifications from ABU, namely: Postgraduate Diploma in Education (PGDE) and Higher Diploma in Guidance and Counselling Education (HDGCE). A career academic, Kwanashie has been teaching and researching in the university setting for four decades (from 1982 and mostly at ABU); but is now at the National Open University of Nigeria (NOUN) since 2021. Her expertise had been in Perinatal Biochemical Pharmacology, Toxicology and Pharmacology Education; and more recently, in Open and Distance eLearning (ODeL). Kwanashie is a Past-President/Member of the West African Society for Pharmacology (WASP), Member of the Convention of Biomedical Research Ghana (CoBREG), Fellow of the British Pharmacological Society (BPS) and a Councilor on the 2018-2022 Executive Committee of the International Union of Basic and Clinical Pharmacology (IUPHAR).

In the last three years, Kwanashie has switched her research model from mammalian systems (principally mice and rats), to the highly versatile fruit fly, Drosophila melanogaster; for which purpose, she established Kwanash Droso Lab (KDL). Her current research, teaching and advocacy interests deal with interphasing Drosophila and ODL for bioscience research/education, gender concerns within ODL institutions, as well as mitigating distance-learning student attrition via online counselling. In today’s panel discussion, she hopes to share some of her experiences as a bioscience professor as well as more generic perspectives on bioscience education among Africans and others, to whom she’s professionally connected.

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Dr. Natasha Mavengere

Senior Lecturer in the Biotechnology Department, Harare Institute of Technology, Harare, Zimbabwe

Dr. Natasha R Mavengere received her Ph.D. degree in Biotechnology with an emphasis on microbial genetics from the University of the Western Cape in South Africaa the M.Sc degree in Microbial biotechnology and ecology from the same university. Her research interests lie in the broad areas of microbial biotechnology, natural product discovery from microorganisms and microbial genetics.

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Dr. Maryam Rafiqi

Plant Scientist, UM6P, Benguerir, Morocco

Dr. Maryam Rafiqi holds a PhD title in molecular plant pathology from the University of Kaiserslautern, Germany. She has been trained as a postdoctoral fellow at the Australian National University in Canberra, as a junior group leader at Giessen University in Germany, and as a lecturer in the Jodrell Laboratory at RBG Kew, London. Recently, She held the position of associate professor of plant pathology at the Mohammed VI Polytechnic University (UM6P) in Morocco from 2019 to the end of 2022. Maryam established a molecular plant pathology lab in Morocco and mentored scientists from 6 African countries. In September 2022, Maryam volunteered to organise a coffee morning addressing the challenges facing women in science in Marrakech (Morocco), as part of the Global Women in Crop Science.  

Maryam is a single mum to a 7-year-old, She is a member of several international boards. Maryam received awards from ANU’s Network for Early Career Academics at ANU (NECTAR) in 2012 and from the European Research Council's program PRIMA in 2022.

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