Exploring and addressing pre-service teachers' awareness of inequitable practices in science courses.

The preparation of future middle school science teacher requires the development of multiple types of knowledge required for teaching (PCK, KCT, KCS, etc.), and yet, discussion about access and equity is often addressed in a separate space, outside of the context of science education. This work explores students' awareness of inequitable practices in STEM education as well as their roles of action as future science educators within science education courses. The data is collected through multiple semesters in two different upper division courses explores students written engagement in the topic. The first course introduced an explicit conversation regarding access to science, underrepresented populations in STEM, and equitable practices. The second course engaged students in discussing science education research papers addressing intersectionality of race, gender, ethnicity, and language proficiency. We use the framework of colorblindness to assess students' writing pieces and identify how students are willing to engage in social justice discussion in a writing format during a science course. This qualitative study shows the need and opportunities to implementing explicit conversations of inequities within a science context.