Document Type

Honors Thesis

Major

Biology

Advisor(s)

Liliana Herakova

Committee Members

Susan Bredlau, Julia McGuire

Graduation Year

May 2024

Publication Date

Spring 5-2024

Abstract

Pre-medical education’s traditional orientation of teaching gender as a binary results in future medical providers who are not prepared to adequately care for trans* and gender-nonconforming patients (Snelgrove et al., 2012). To address this issue, I conducted an autoethnographic study of my educational experiences in the pre-medical program here at the University of Maine. I also investigated current pedagogical approaches in the field of pre-med and medical education, as well as scientific and social understandings of sex and gender, to create a tool to reflect on the gender inclusivity of course curricula and classroom environments. The tool draws on and responds to existing literature on the topics of gender discrimination in healthcare, the importance of gender- diverse education, different perspectives on gender, and pre-existing social justice tools. The self-reflective tool I designed can be used by educators and learners alike to consider gender inclusivity within both course materials and classroom interactions. The tool can help improve undergraduate education, especially in the pre-medical field, to include a comprehensive understanding of gender and educate competent healthcare providers who are capable of providing quality care to all, as called for by the Center for Gender-Based Biology at UCLA, Boston University School of Medicine, and researchers with the journal of Perspectives on Medical Education (Male or Female? It’s Not Always so Simple, 2015; Streed Jr. et al. 2022; Zumwalt et al., 2021).

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