Analyze

• The process of designing curriculum is quite useful as it details how different activities correspond to learning goals in science, mathematics, and technology. Fig. 3 describes the steps: selecting content through content specialists in the POAC team, making a curriculum outline, individual meetings with content specialists, and making the lesson plans. I really like the activities they designed, such as comparing different mask materials and how they protected against differently-sized viruses. They were also given time to research career pathways and present on epidemiology careers, a step that invites students to imagine career pathways. 

• I realize the scope and audience of this paper is different, but I am so curious about how the Imhotep Academy created a setting that encouraged underrepresented students to participate and speak up, given that they cite evidence of how difficult that can be. How did they choose participants? 

• Having read Freire’s Pedagogy of the Oppressed recently, I am thinking about his approach to curriculum design that is based on a feedback loop between would-be learners and would-be educators. The roles of learners and educators aren’t fixed. Content development is not done beforehand just by content specialists but in an iterative process with multiple feedback loops. Since very few research teams have the time or the resources to deploy Freire’s rigorous approach, I am not surprised that most curriculum development does not follow the route. And educators are working with former experiences anyway. So I am curious about how the authors’ previous experiences shaped their approach to curriculum design?

• A context for this paper is the controversy on the proposed revisions to the California math curriculum that conservative media outlets argue “waters down” calculus–a cherry topping on the college admissions cake–to privilege data science in middle-school grades. Education researchers contend that apart from physics and engineering majors, not many colleges actually require calculus for admissions (many private institutions do), and that the relevance of advanced calculus for college preparation is overrated. 

• National Commission on Excellence in Education ‘s 1983 report Nation At Risk: the need for a new STEM workforce specializing in computer science and technology 

• National Council on Mathematics 2000 guidelines for preparing American students for college in Common Core Mathematics 

• Stuck in the Shallow End: Virtual segregation; Inequality in learning computer science in American schools focusing on Black students 

"Throughout the volume, we introduce several novel concepts to the EJ debate, and engage with rich debates within the field. Consequently, in this volume, an emerging lexicon provides a rich arena to further understand and address the complexity and holistic basis of environmental justice. Valle uses the term convivial labor in juxtaposition to capitalism, where labor is not a tool of capital- ism but a form of celebration and cultural connectivity. Vasconcellos Oliveira suggests that conditional freedom includes the precautionary principle in decisions to limit effects upon others where working towards a stable climate has obliga- tions and responsibilities that cascade across actions. Further, she postulates the need for sustainable consumption – seemingly an oxymoron – but situated within the context of limiting future injustices through accentuating intergenerational capabilities. Pandit and Purakayastha employ Shiva’s earth democracy to illuminate the contributions of indigenous Indian cultures to furthering vegetal living of con- nectivity and conviviality." (325)