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This Students as Partners Program project was a great experience and learning opportunity for me. I had the pleasure of having Nathalie as a student in this course (NEUR

3204: Neuropharmacology) in a previous semester, and I appreciated having the opportunity to work with her to develop new content to improve the course.

We believe that it is important to broaden the scope with which we discuss the use of substances in different societies and cultures. Our goal for this project was to develop learning materials that would allow students to better understand how issues of substance affect BIPOC communities – both in Ottawa, as well as other parts of the world – and to highlight some of the many contributions to the field of substance use and addiction from BIPOC scientists.

For me personally, I was inspired to work in the field of substance use and addiction by a Black neuroscientist named Dr. Carl Hart. During many conversations with Nathalie and other BIPOC students in my class it became evident how important it is for BIPOC students to see better representation in the field of science, and that I wasn’t doing enough to explicitly highlight some of the ground-breaking research from BIPOC communities and scientists as it relates to our field.

Part of the inspiration for this project was to highlight these contributions and explore more of the traditional and historical uses of substances to BIPOC communities. Nathalie and I were both committed to ensuring that all students feel connected to the materials presented in class, regardless of their background and cultures.

I believe that through this SaPP project we have created a suite of learning materials that will not only improve the interest in and relevance of this course, but will also help reinforce some of the learning objectives, and ultimately have a lasting impact on BIPOC students in our program. I am extremely excited to implement these new materials into my course.

The Beginning: A Thank You Email Goes a Long Way

After completing the early summer course NEUR 3204: Neuropharmacology, taught by Dr. Patterson, I decided to send a thank you email to show my appreciation for taking the time to instruct this course, as our school would be approaching nearly one year of online learning due to the COVID-19 pandemic. A few days later, I received a reply from Dr. Patterson with an invitation to apply for a SaPP project and to consider him as a faculty partner. After several Zoom calls brainstorming our ideas, Dr. Patterson and I agreed to submit our application for the program.

Knowing this research opportunity would be met with challenges during this difficult period in the pandemic, we were still determined to develop our ambitious ideas to implement Equity, Diversity and Inclusion (EDI) elements into this course.

Working on Brightspace: BIPOC GeNiUSeS*, Building Quizzes and Assessments

During the early stages of the fall term, Dr. Patterson and I shared our ideas on how to create specialized course material by combining his expertise (and my beginner-level understanding) of neuropharmacology and its intersection with BIPOC communities. With Dr. Patterson as a scientist and instructor who aims to learn from and include students of all minority identities, and my identity as a young Black woman, we were determined to utilize our strong backgrounds in science and BIPOC issues to develop course material that would support the learning of future NEUR 3204 students.

Coupled with our curiosity to discover new concepts and enhance our prior knowledge of neuropharmacology, Dr. Patterson and I decided to explore this field from a perspective that includes racialized individuals, which is often ignored or misrepresented in neuroscience and related sciences. For our project we aimed to highlight scientific publications from BIPOC researchers and positive examples of substance usage in racialized communities.

Through Brightspace, we developed BIPOC GeNiUSeS, a page dedicated to highlighting the works of BIPOC researchers, substance usage in BIPOC communities and specialized resources for students of minority backgrounds. This explorative page includes resources to supplement content taught in class for students to imagine neuroscience in the context of racialized communities in Canada and throughout the world. Examples of elements that are found on the BIPOC GeNiUSeS page include:

• BlackinNeuro, a grass-roots organization designed to amplify and empower practicing and aspiring Black neuroscientists while partnering with non-Black allies in reaching this goal.
• A publication on cannabis usage in Ancient Chinese medicine (Brand and Zhao, 2017).
• A documentary on the cultural and historical background of the kava plant used in Pacific Islander cultures (filmed from 2015-19).

Additionally, Dr. Patterson and I developed two bonus assessments to encourage students to further engage with the course content. The first is a bonus quiz testing students on a documentary about the history and cultural relevance of the red willow plant (tobacco) for Indigenous communities based in Minnesota (Reclaiming Sacred Tobacco in Minnesota’s Indigenous Communities, 2017). A final bonus assessment was included to challenge students’ EDI and research skills. In this assessment, students have the opportunity to re-create a similar project that I conducted throughout this program, investigating scientific articles and art expressions concerning BIPOC communities and substance usage.

Final Words

In concluding this reflection, I am grateful to have collaborated with Dr. Patterson in supporting my goal in impacting racialized students in neuroscience. As well, I am thankful to ĐÓ°ÉÔ­´´ University’s Teaching and Learning Services for providing the Students as Partners Program and related research opportunities in supporting student and staff research on course design.

As a science student, this project has challenged my research abilities and supported my professional development skills. I am hopeful these course materials will impact future students in their understanding of substance usage, addiction and the significance of including racialized scientists and their communities in conversations concerning neuropharmacology.

*GeNiUSeS is spelt this way using elements from the Periodic Table of Elements.

Administered by the Discovery Centre and fully funded by TLS, the Students as Partners Program offers instructors and learning support staff the opportunity to provide a paid work experience to undergraduate students interested in teaching innovation and curriculum design.

The program will run from June 20 – August 31. The application deadline is June 19, however we will be accepting applications until all the spots have been filled. Find out more about the program and the application process here.

If you have any questions, please send them to Aleksandra Minic, Discovery Centre Coordinator, at: aleksandra.minic@carleton.ca.