Browsing by Subject "Social justice"

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    Open Access
    Debate: Why should gender-affirming health care be included in health science curricula?
    (2020-02-14) de Vries, Elma; Kathard, Harsha; Müller, Alex
    Background Every person who seeks health care should be affirmed, respected, understood, and not judged. However, trans and gender diverse people have experienced significant marginalization and discrimination in health care settings. Health professionals are generally not adequately prepared by current curricula to provide appropriate healthcare to trans and gender diverse people. This strongly implies that health care students would benefit from curricula which facilitate learning about gender-affirming health care. Main body Trans and gender diverse people have been pathologized by the medical profession, through classifications of mental illness in the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM) and International Classification of Disease (ICD). Although this is changing in the new ICD-11, tension remains between depathologization discourses and access to gender-affirming health care. Trans and gender diverse people experience significant health disparities and an increased burden of disease, specifically in the areas of mental health, Human Immunodeficiency Virus, violence and victimisation. Many of these health disparities originate from discrimination and systemic biases that decrease access to care, as well as from health professional ignorance. This paper will outline gaps in health science curricula that have been described in different contexts, and specific educational interventions that have attempted to improve awareness, knowledge and skills related to gender-affirming health care. The education of primary care providers is critical, as in much of the world, specialist services for gender-affirming health care are not widely available. The ethics of the gatekeeping model, where service providers decide who can access care, will be discussed and contrasted with the informed-consent model that upholds autonomy by empowering patients to make their own health care decisions. Conclusion There is an ethical imperative for health professionals to reduce health care disparities of trans and gender diverse people and practice within the health care values of social justice and cultural humility. As health science educators, we have an ethical duty to include gender-affirming health in health science curricula in order to prevent harm to the trans and gender diverse patients that our students will provide care for in the future.
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    Open Access
    The role of educational technology as an enabler for women's inclusion in the STEM fields: case study: Eduardo Mondlane University
    (2025) Omar, Leila; Cox, Glenda
    Current research shows that women are underrepresented in STEM fields, despite a global increase in enrolment over the past two decades. At Eduardo Mondlane University (UEM), women make up only 15% of engineering students. This underrepresentation is linked to deep-rooted social injustices, making it a systemic issue. Scholars argue that technology can promote more inclusive education by providing greater opportunities for women in STEM. However, in the Mozambican context, research about educational technology (EdTech) as a tool for fostering women's inclusion, particularly in the STEM education field, is scarce. Therefore, this study seeks to contribute to the discussion on the underrepresentation and the inclusion of women in the STEM field of education with a particular focus on UEM's engineering undergraduate courses. In this research, a qualitative approach was used to understand whether technology in the engineering graduate course's classroom at UEM can have an enabling and inclusive effect by providing a potential mechanism for women to participate in the learning process as equal peers. The study engaged with six UEM female students through eighteen in-depth interviews (three interviews per participant). The interviews were conducted using Seidman's (2013) three-interview protocol. The results were analysed and framed using the work of Nancy Fraser, who presents a three-dimensional social justice framework (economic, cultural, political) (2005, 2009). Fraser's framework was used to analyse the results and understand to what extent EdTech can be an enabling factor to achieve social justice in the university context of engineering graduate courses. This research found that women prefer in-person classes, but they also benefit from educational technologies, appreciating the flexibility of asynchronous online activities due to their limited time, often stretched between academic pursuits and domestic responsibilities, which are culturally expected to be managed primarily by women. Moreover, for these women, in a digital environment, there is a reduced presence of conventional gender biases and expectations to fit in related to physical appearance and adoption of male behaviours, enabling women to genuinely express their character and make authentic contributions.