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Growing Towards a Sustainable Science Practice for the 21St Century Cheryl L Intersections Volume 1999 | Number 7 Article 4 1999 Rooting Science in Empathy: Growing Towards a Sustainable Science Practice for the 21st Century Cheryl L. Ney Follow this and additional works at: http://digitalcommons.augustana.edu/intersections Augustana Digital Commons Citation Ney, Cheryl L. (1999) "Rooting Science in Empathy: Growing Towards a Sustainable Science Practice for the 21st Century," Intersections: Vol. 1999: No. 7, Article 4. Available at: http://digitalcommons.augustana.edu/intersections/vol1999/iss7/4 This Article is brought to you for free and open access by Augustana Digital Commons. It has been accepted for inclusion in Intersections by an authorized administrator of Augustana Digital Commons. For more information, please contact [email protected]. "Rooting Science in Empathy: Growing Towards a Sustainable Science Practice for the 21st Century" Or "How a Feminist, Trained as a DNA Biochemist, Finds Freedom at an Institution Whose Heritage is German Lutheran" By Cheryl L. Ney "Tobe rooted is perhaps the most importantand As I look back on my exploration of the least recognizedneed of the human soul." scholarshipof teaching, I have come to realize that Simone Weil, TheNeed for Roots, 1952. I spent the first six or seven years searching to define the foundations of teaching. I began my I wouldlike to use my experiencesin the Chemistry teaching career by trying to extrapolate from my Departmentat Capital Universityover thepast ten own experience as a studentto the students in my yearsto suggestwhat teaching andlearning in the firstgeneral chemistry course - who were a mere sciences at Lutheran institutions has been and an 13 years apart, so I thought. Through a be about. In doing so, I hope to address the collaborativejournalling project I conducted with following questions: 1) What doesempathy have nursingstudents in chemistry, a project I devised to to do withscience?; 2) Whatis "science practice"?; lowertheir anxiety aboutthe study of chemistry, I 3) What is"sustainable science practice"? and 4) cameto realize thattheir experiences were diverse What does"sustainable a science practice" have to and different from mine. As an example, they do with the teaching and learning of science in were having an opportunity to discuss their fears Lutheranhigher education? andanxieties aboutthe study of chemistry totheir professor as a way of improving their learning -­ Exploring the Grounding for Teaching Science something my staid Arizona State University I cameto Capital University in Columbus, Ohioin professorswould never havedone (after all, many 1987, as an assistant professor, just after of my classmatesand I were not the "cream-of-the obtaininga Ph.D. at the University of Chicago in -crop", the "targetgroup" back in those days!). 1 Biochemistry . Sincethat time, withthe support of the Dean of the College of Arts and Sciences, With the realization that I couldn't solely use my Daina McGary, who is well-versed in thework of experiences to understand the students in the Ernest Boyer2, I have focused my scholarship on courses I was teaching, I turned to the research teaching, specificallyon teaching andlearning by literature on teaching and learning, in general and womenin science. A commitment to teaching on in thesciences, speci:fically3. Since I was primarily the part of our institutions allows faculty in the teachingchemistry to female nursing majors, I also sciencesthe freedom to choose teaching as a focus focusedon theliterature describing the experiences of scholarship. of women and girls with science education.4 Imagine my surprise, when I, a narrowly trained DNA biochemist, learnedthat there was a research Cheryl Ney is Professor in The Department of base for teaching. In turning to the research Chemistry and Director of Capital University's literature on teaching and learning, I had moved Summer Science Institute. away from using "teachers teach as they are taught"ismy foundationfor teaching. This change Intersections/Summer 1999 3 in direction also demonstrated to me that I could cameupon theidea that pedagogy in science ought use myhighly developed skills in scientificresearch to be grounded in the epistemology of science. in doing research on teaching and learning in the Thatis, how we teach science ought to ariseout classroom. Every good scientist knows that you of whatwe believe about how we knowwhat we start a research project by reading the current knowin science.6 research literature! As an example of this practice, I can remember Understandingthe value of empathy in science using a Journal of Chemical Education article, Exploringepistemological issues in science ledme entitled, "What Goes on in Student's Heads in to the work of Cathleen Loving, a teacher 5 7 Lab" , to changehow I interacted withstudents in educator. · She has developed a usefulframework lab. I resisted asking students theoretical for understanding two important aspects of the questions about their experiment, while they were epistemology of science (The Scientific Theory conducting the experiment. The article reported Profile), which she describes in two continua thatstudents have difficultyenough managingand chartedon an xy graph (something every scientist thinking about the lab procedure, without also can understand). One additional feature of her having to think about atoms and molecules - work is thatshe identifiesthe thinking of important those questions can come after the experiment is philosopher;; of science about these two aspects of over! I use thisexample to show that this research scientific k 1owledge by plotting their beliefs as literatureis very useful for one's own practice of points on the graph. Glancing at the Scientific teaching. Theory Profile, one observes a scatter plot. This leads one to the important understanding that On the basis of my work in the teaching and philosophers of science don't agree about the learningof science, in April of 1994, I was chosen natureof scientific knowledge! to be a facultydevelopment leader in the National Science Foundation funded Women and Science The aspect of epistemology in science I want to project in the University of Wisconsin System. focus on addresses the question, "Who are This was serious business - which got me scientific knowers?". Using Loving's Scientific thinkingeven more seriously about the foundations Theory Profile, this question is explored on the x of teaching - although I really hadn't axis andtherefore as a continuum. On one end of conceptualized my work yet as getting at the scale is the purely rational knower - the one "foundations". It was during this time that I who throughthe correct and dispassionate use of participated in a discussion (at a facultymeeting, "the scientific method", is led to an unbiased, I believe) led by a colleaguefrom the Humanities objective understanding of nature. Two popular - a philosopher, I believe - Tom somebody - cultural portrayals of the best examples of this who was talking about his work- which had rationalitycan be foundin two Star Trek series - somethingto do withgrounding somethingor other Mr. Spock andData- one a Vulcan, theother an in Lutheran theology,that I connectedthe notion of android - they aren't even human! On the groundingto my work. Eureka! I was searching to opposite end of the scale is the natural knower understand the grounding for teaching. As it (surprise - it's not characterized as irrational!). happens, I was also actively pursing an Thisis theknower whose knowledge is hopelessly understanding of feminist critiqul:/s of science, biased by their perspective (including emotions) which required an understanding of the and therefore uniquely their own. Perhapsthose epistemologyor grounding in science. Armedwith who believe in a flatearth, fall into thiscategory. the notion of grounding and an interest in It is important to understand that these are two foundational issues in teaching and in science, I extreme ends of a contiuum and somewhere Intersections/Summer 1999 4 between these twoextremes, lies modem western McClintock, heightening her powers of scientific knowers. discernment, until finally, the objects of her study have becomesubjects in their own right; theyclaim I have chosen to focus on this aspect of the fromher a kindof attentionthat most us experience epistemologyof science since manyof thefeminist only in relation to other persons."12 critiques of science specifically address this aspect.8 At thetum of thecentury and well intothe An understanding of how Barbara McClintock 1960s, scientific knowers would be characterized carried out scientific research demonstrates two well towards therational end of the scaleof "who veryimportant ideas. Firstis the idea that one can can know" in science. And what gender would do serious scientific research withouthaving to be theseknowers be? Herein lies a critique of science dispassionate and second, rooting scientific developedby EvelynFox-Keller. Anearly work of investigation in empathy can lead to important hers,9 examines the history of modern western understandingsabout nature (afterall, McClintock science andshows that science was foundedto be did receivethe Nobel Prize!). a "truly masculine philosophy" - in which, "thinking objectively is thinking like a man". Of what use is this foundational understanding of Women,emotional creatures, were consideredto be one aspect of the epistemology of science to the incapable of rational thought. But is this so? We science educator? I can think of at least two now have an emerging
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