创造“勇敢的空间”

An OUWB associate professor and associate dean have published an article that addresses how educators should respond to reports of curricular content sparking intense emotional reactions — i.e.“学生”被触发.”

“On Triggering and Being Triggered: Civil Society and Building Brave Spaces in Medical Education，由Jason Wasserman博士共同撰写.D., associate professor, Department of Foundational Medical Studies, and Berkley Browne, Ph.D.，学生事务临时副院长.

这篇文章发表于 医学教学与学习.

以沃瑟曼的课为例, the authors examine what it means for students to be triggered and suggest a civic framework to support establishment of “brave spaces.”

“Students claim that medical educators’ blind spots and their resulting offenses demand change. 教育工作者反驳说，医学中没有“安全空间”. 这两种观点都代表了合理的担忧，”作者写道.

“It is important to foster equitable and including learning environments and also to engage in discourse on sensitive subjects.”

“一次非常有价值的教学练习”

The article centers on a real-life situation whereby Wasserman says he was using team-based learning environment to demonstrate “just how insidious bias can be.”

Specifically, he used a case-based learning activity on sickle cell disease designed to elucidate the role of stigma in pain management and highlight the nature of bias in clinical judgment.

Wasserman

One case intentionally underscored best practices for pain management of an acute vaso-occlusive pain crisis, 包括静脉注射阿片类药物治疗. 在下一个例子中, 一个病人的表现完全一样, 但这种叙述中充斥着大量带有偏见的信息, including noting the patient appeared to have “gang tattoos” and that a friend accompanying the patient “appeared to be high.”

The majority of students failed to deliver IV opioid therapy as the correct answer in the second case, 经常提到对吸毒的担忧, 尽管这个小插曲没有提供任何支持证据.

“一年前我们提出这个案子的时候, 一些学生看到了所有带有偏见的影射，变得非常情绪化, 他们甚至不能真正参与到活动中来, 有一个甚至离开了房间,沃瑟曼说. “They never saw the big reveal, which is it’s anti-bias training in some respects.”

沃瑟曼说，这让他进退两难. 一方面，一方面, 他想要真正的尊重, appreciate, 并使学生的种族主义经历合法化.

“I (also) think it’s a very valuable teaching exercise that does a lot of good work exposing people who otherwise typically don’t think that they’re biased,” he says. “作为一名教育工作者，我想保留这一点.”

文章指出，这个案件自然会引起一系列的意见, ranging from outright racial insensitivity to a fixation on the notion that the students were overreacting and need to “toughen up” to make it in medicine.

“But rushing to any of these judgments obviates important features of our shared educational space,作者写道.

这就是“勇敢空间”概念发挥作用的地方.

勇敢的空间

沃瑟曼和布朗的博士学位.D. is in Higher Education Leadership, have worked together on numerous publications. 最新消息, Browne says the duo developed a framework that would allow for the curricular content to remain in place.

The framework centers on the concept of creating “brave spaces” — a way to sensitively facilitate engagement with provocative material rather than attempting to offer safety from this material altogether. The article says brave spaces aim to prepare students to navigate more effectively the challenges of difficult conversations, 特别是在学习环境的背景下. (See sidebar)

Browne says brave spaces allow for difficult conversations to take place in an educational setting by first establishing ground rules to help learners deal with the discomfort that may be associated with more challenging lessons.

在教室里成功地创造勇敢的空间, Wasserman and Browne write that “we need a clear sense of how the rights and responsibilities of students and faculty are bounded by multiple intersecting social domains.” In this case, the domains are intrapersonal; interpersonal; and civic.

在文章的上下文中, the intrapersonal domain asserts that people have a right to feel their own feelings while the interpersonal assumes that we have to talk to each other to understand other peoples’ perspectives, goals, and values.

The civic domain refers to the responsibility held by educators to teach students.

在这方面, 在某些方面，我有责任不去改变, 或者至少不会从根本上破坏, 学习活动,沃瑟曼说. “If I truly believe in it and it’s truly methodologically sound…then I must not tear that down just because of students’ feelings.”

Wasserman says it’s important to note that doesn’t mean he doesn’t genuinely hear students and respect their feelings.

“It means that I have other kinds of obligations that can’t be fulfilled if I’m only seeing my job as being in service to those feelings,” he says.

Wasserman says the whole idea of using the three domains as the basis of the framework is to allow for each to exist in balance when applied to situations like the team-based learning exercise.

在文章中使用的情况下, Wasserman says he adjusted some of the language but not in a way that impacts the effectiveness of the lesson.

Browne says she hopes other educators read the article she and Wasserman wrote and identify ways they can similarly adjust curricular content.

“参与框架的机会已经存在，”Browne说. “更重要的是认识到它是什么, 给它起个名字, 并在背后投入某种有意识的能量.”