Curriculum Resource Rooms
*this article has been updated to reflect the correct time of the curriculum resource room
On July 29th from 1:00 PM EST to 2:30 PM EST, Rev. Dr. Beth Jackson-Jordan and Rev. Dr. Imani Jones will have a conversation about race in CPE curriculum, specifically about de-centering whiteness in our curriculums. They have graciously offered all of us to join—to listen in and then to engage them and each other as we consider how we can construct our curriculums to best serve the diversity of students in our programs as well as those who have yet to enroll in our programs. And even more importantly, we will consider how can our curriculum prepare those students for engaging in a world in which we hope to connect with others across differences?
As many of you know, the ACPE—which is to say, all of us—has been looking at how we relate to each other, to our students, and how we prepare our students to relate to those they serve. Specifically, we have been looking at groups and people who are often limited or harmed by the unconscious biases we carry and the assumptions that we make. Humility, curiosity, self-awareness, and an openness to dialogue have been emphasized in this work so far. We would like to take another step forward and look at how these learnings can (and have already!) impact our curriculums.
As Chair of the ACPE Curriculum Committee, I have had the privilege of helping our committee coordinate with the Anti-Bias Task Force in furthering this work and bringing it to all of us in new forms. You will begin seeing Resource Rooms focused on some of the areas that the Anti-Bias Work Group has focused on—race, religion/values, gender identity, and sexual orientation. The July 29th Resource Room will be the first of many, and they will be more successful if you join!
I know what you are asking—what is a resource room?! A resource room is a 90-minute gathering in which ACPE educators explore curricular topics with a focus on how to engage that topic in the curriculum (process focus) rather than focusing on the what of the curriculum (content focus). So a resource room on research literacy would focus on the structure, process, and focus of journal clubs, what kinds of prompts are included in a verbatim to invite students to reflect on their research knowledge as it relates to that care encounter, etc.
The most important part of the resource room is that we save plenty of time for engagement among those of us who attend as we explore how we might apply the insights from the presenter to our own unique contexts and curricular needs. And the bigger goal, of course, is to create another avenue for us to gather together as a learning community and to help all of our work to better align with our values. We have heard that many educators feel disconnected, especially those who are solo educators in their center, and this is one effort to bring about a more meaningful connection for all of us around what we love.
Matt Rhodes is an ACPE Certified Educator at Penn Medicine Princeton Health and serves as chair of the ACPE Curriculum Committee. He can be reached at matthew.rhodes@pennmedicine.upenn.edu.