Abstract:

Objectives:
We sought to transform graduate courses to incorporate anti-oppressive principles (AOPs) and to assess barriers and facilitators to implementation of anti-oppressive pedagogy at an accredited school of public health in the U.S.

Methods:
In Summer of 2021, we recruited 10 public health faculty members to an 18-month long program intervention divided into two parts:
(1) a teaching and learning period focused on redesigning courses to incorporate AOPs and
(2) a peer-led coaching period where participants collaborated and supported each other in making changes to their individual courses.

Results: The ten faculty participants included seven social and behavioral scientists, two epidemiologists, and one health communications specialist. Participants’ academic departments included the Departments of Mental Health, Epidemiology, Health Policy and Management, International Health, and Health Behavior and Society. Having a peer coaching group generated innovative ideas of how participants could incorporate AOPs into syllabi and course content and participants felt the sense of community offered increased confidence to implement AOPs in courses. Some participants expressed challenges with how to implement AOPs outside of the classroom and shared a desire to learn tools for engaging in cultural change at the institutional policy level. All participants agreed that such a course should be required of all faculty members but acknowledged that finding time to commit to such a program was challenging.

Conclusions: Findings suggest that incorporating anti-oppression into public health pedagogy requires a great time commitment that can be facilitated through institutional policy (e.g. providing professional/faculty development opportunities), department support (e.g., additional time provided for teaching preparation) alongside peer support groups (e.g., cohort training sessions).

Keywords:

Anti-oppression, teaching, pedagogy, innovation, implementation.