Globally, young people are asking questions about social responsibility. California addresses this in the second draft of its updated mathematics framework, still unreleased as this article goes to press. It defines these questions as authentic, suggesting that classrooms "include, at times . . . contexts students can engage with as a way to…

While issues of (in)justice in K12 STEM learning have garnered increasing attention, limited research has attended to learning as "social-spatial transformation." We draw upon a justice-oriented framework of equitably consequential learning to call attention to how learning and engagement in K12 STEM is rooted in the history and…

Inequities in opportunities to learn and become in engineering, especially for minoritized youth, are enduring and systemic. How students experience engineering education, through curriculum, pedagogy, and teacher/student interactions, all shape opportunities for identity development. In this paper we draw upon cultural studies and critical…

Although there is an extensive amount of research focusing on women in engineering, the engineering field continues to experience the most gender disparity of any workforce disparities within the United States (National Science Foundation, 2018). Engineering has been labeled "the least gender-equitable profession in the United States,"…

Making engineering and science culturally and socially relevant requires teachers to have broader content knowledge and an increased repertoire of pedagogical skills. One aspect of being an effective and culturally inclusive teacher that is seldom discussed is the ability to engage with the emotions associated with working for social justice. In…

The recent emphasis on engineering practices provides an opportunity for K-12 science and mathematics teachers to apply STEM concepts to real-world engineering design challenges (EDCs) for students (Next Generation Science Standards, 2013). We argue that engineering practices are more equitable when they are relatable to students and rooted in…

With the goal of achieving bilingualism and biculturalism, dual language education (DL) has a social justice orientation. As the program option with the best track record of closing the achievement gap between Latinx and White students, DL programs can potentially create environments in which learners can develop knowledge of science, technology,…

Cognitive enhancement--augmenting normal cognitive capacities--is not new. Literacy, numeracy, computers, and the practices of science are all cognitive enhancements. Science is now making new cognitive enhancements possible. Biomedical cognitive enhancements (BCEs) include the administration of drugs, implants of genetically engineered or…

There is an increasing interest in the humanitarian engineering curriculum, and a service-learning placement could be an important component of such a curriculum. International placements offer some important pedagogical advantages, but also have some practical and ethical limitations. Local community-based placements have the potential to be…

In this paper, we have explored how students in a cross-disciplinary course on engineering and social justice approached the idea of using social justice as a "lens" for looking at engineering. We have used an adapted phenomenographic approach [Marton, F., and Booth, S., 1997. "Learning and awareness". Mahwah: Lawrence Erlbaum], together with…