by Dr Josh Gaon
In January 2021, building on our relationships with local schools, Undergraduate Primary Care Education launched an exciting and innovative new module for year 2 Imperial Medical and Biomedical science students called I-Explore: Social Accountability in Action. This module was developed by our Community Collaboration Lead, Bethany Golding, together with Josh Gaon, Neha Ahuja, Arti Maini and Imperial StudentShapers Huriye Korkmazhan, Nadia Zaman & Ray Wang, with input from with local schools and community partners.
Imperial students explore the concepts of social accountability, power and privilege through a real-world project developing and delivering after-school STEMM-based sessions for local secondary school pupils in partnership with schoolteachers. STEMM topics have included a focus on the COVID-19 pandemic context, including topical issues relating to vaccine hesitancy and equitable distribution of the vaccine.
Imperial students have worked closely with the participating schools in Hammersmith and Fulham (Fulham Cross Academy, Phoenix Academy and Hammersmith Academy) to ensure the sessions are engaging, inclusive and relatable for the pupils. Through this real-life project work, our Imperial students are gaining invaluable experience of working in partnership with schools and with young people from a wide range of backgrounds and abilities as well as applying critical enquiry, creative thinking and using problem solving skills.
To support this experience, we provided central sessions where Imperial students learnt core inclusive teaching skills and were supported to explore concepts of social accountability, including consideration of power and privilege, and reflect on how these principles relate to their future professional career and their role in society. These sessions were built using inclusive material developed in collaboration with the three participating schools, and with Hammersmith and Fulham Youth Council, Mosaic Trust and Young Hammersmith and Fulham Foundation. We have been grateful to receive valuable input throughout from Matthew Chisambi, a TeachFirst Ambassador and the Innovation Lead at Imperial College Health Partners.
A key challenge this year has been the need to run the entire module, including delivery of after-school sessions, virtually. As many will know, running an interactive session virtually can be tricky even for the most experienced of teachers. Our Imperial students rose to this challenge, creating engaging and inclusive material that brought their sessions to life.
The feedback from schools has been fantastic so far.
Feedback from a teacher at Hammersmith Academy:
“I just wanted to pass on my gratitude on behalf of our pupils for the sessions yesterday, and my praise for the Imperial College students who led them so well. They were both fantastic sessions and flowed very well, stimulating sophisticated, thought-provoking conversation. The information shared was relevant and accessible to our students and the guidance they gave in regards to higher education was most definitely inspiring. I have no doubt that our pupils left the calls, considering their potential and excited for the future.”
The culmination of the project will be a presentation event in March where the students will be showcasing their work as well as reflections and lessons learnt from their teaching experience.
The pandemic has presented us with many unforeseeable challenges. We have been encouraged and heartened by the ability of our students, faculty team, schools and pupils to navigate rapidly changing circumstances, and by the feedback we have received.
We hope that I-Explore: Social Accountability in Action provides an exciting example of how our faculty and students can work in partnership-with local schools and communities to inspire our future generation, and we very much look forward to building on this work.