I placed this inquiry project on a separate page because it is a different kind of work. It has required a series of personal changes in attitudes and worldviews and the building of relationships. Other opportunities have grown from this work. I've taken part in a Community of Practice focused on decolonizing STEM, I've been given the opportunity to co-teach HSCI 220—Indigenous Experiences of Health in Canada, and I am anticipating opportunities to contribute ideas to decolonize the new SFU medical school curriculum. 

Acknowledgement

I have been able to do this work because Indigenous people have invested their time and effort into training me.

I would like to thank the following people: 

• Dolores van der Wey (Haida) and Stephen Hall (Heiltsuk) for their facilitation and care in the decolonizing teaching workshop.

• Lindsay Heller (Nehiyaw) who created content and assessments to include Indigenous Science throughout our course HSCI 100 - Human Biology.

• Stephen Thompson (Metis) for his work on developing and analyzing the student survey.

• T’uy’t’tanat Cease Wyss and Senaqwila Wyss (Skwxwu7mesh, Sto:lo, Hawaiian, Swiss) came to our class to share their traditional plant knowledge. 

• Lyana Patrick (Stellat'en First Nation and Acadian/Scottish), my co-instructor in HSCI 220 - Indigenous Experiences of Health in Canada. 

• I also thank my settler colleagues Sheri Fabian and Laura D'Amico for co-leading and facilitating the disrupting colonialism teaching workshop series,  Mark Lechner for working with me on decolonizing our course, and Nicole Berry for her work in co-designing HSCI 220 with Lyana Patrick.  

The hot springs in my hometown of Nakusp has an old picture of Indigenous people in a bark canoe on a river shore. The smell of sulphur reminds me of home. A reservoir that used to be a river has flooded the valley full of farms and orchards. The photograph and settler context screams “Indigenous people used to live here, but they are gone now”.

This is where I grew up. On a 10-acre off-grid property with nothing on it but a teepee that my Dutch-immigrant family lived in for the first two years of my life.

Nakusp is a Sinixt word. The meaning is unknown though it's thought to relate to water features in the area. I was raised being taught that the Sinixt people were extinct. Later I learned that they were violently displaced to northern Washington. More recently, the Canadian Supreme Court ruled that the Sinixt people were not extinct after all. The Sinixt people knew this already.  

When I first contacted Lindsay, she asked me critically “Why? Why do you want to do this work? Why is it important to you?” 

It’s not an easy answer and it shouldn’t be.

My first home used Indigenous technology

I learned to walk on Sinixt dirt

I am deeply connected to the property that taught me about nature and science

Appropriated Indigenous plant knowledge was my introduction to science

My immigrant mother promised the land would always be ours

When she sold the property, I was displaced

I wear that place on my skin

I’m a settler, that loss feels microscopic in comparison to how the Sinixt people might feel

I’m doing this because I needed to, not because I should

The Decolonizing Teaching workshop was critical for the personal reflection and historical understanding that I lacked. It put me in a place where I felt like I could face those fears of screwing up or getting it wrong. Accept that I would. But how would Mark and I do this? Many of our cohort were using Indigenous examples in their english or sociology or history courses. Our science class was different. 

Our initial grant proposal had some ideas about connecting students to place and history such as Lhuḵw’lhuḵw’áyten (Burnaby mountain), and comparing different science methods. We put out an ad and were contacted by Lindsay. Her experience in pharmaceutical research and land-based pedagogy was an exceptional fit for this project. We were gifted in the opportunity to work together. 

We did not dive into “Indigenizing our content” 

We spent time getting to know Lindsay

We spent time getting to know Indigenous plant experts Cease and Senaqwila Wyss

I baked a cake

We collectively discussed what was important 

I gave up on my initial ideas and we let Lindsay take the reigns for assessments and content

Struggle

Once the assessment and content was in place, the classroom issues emerged. 

There are many challenges in bringing Indigenous content to a traditional science classroom. Indigenous Science has a different conceptual framework and is at times in direct conflict with Western Science.

How do we bring students on board?

How do I reconcile the differences in knowledge systems with the students and internally? 

So we talked about who we are and why this work matters to us. Asked about who the students were and where they came from. 

At first, I struggled with some of the content that Lindsay added to our course. Why did we have to talk about worldview and spirituality? Holism. Another word made dirty by appropriative woo circles. Slowly it made sense. It was foundational that we talked about these concepts. The “content” didn’t make sense without it. 

There was an internal shift. Imagine viewing things a whole different way. Imagine interacting with the environment as if we were related to it instead of as an object. A whole different way of thinking opened up. I also knew that I would never fully understand it. I started to see parallels between two systems. Used Western Science words to consider Indigenous concepts. For example, T’uy’t’tanat Cease talked how eating from the land made a person part of the land. One with the land. I could see students were skeptical of this concept, but we had just finished a component on the digestive system and looked at the flow of molecules through the body. So it made perfect sense, the land becomes your body when you consume from it. The building blocks in our bodies coming from local earth and air and light. Its science and poetry.

It took some time for the jangling conflict of misaligned philosophies in my head to stop. I accepted the differences. Accepted that we can’t always reconcile information from different frameworks into one perfect truth. I remembered that the history of Western science also comes out of monastic traditions and is informed by Judeo-Christian philosophy. Statistical tests drive a binary worldview in a null vs alternative hypothesis - drawing on the duality of good and evil, another Western concept. We are all just trying to explain this world and survive in it.

Students were challenged too. They struggled with describing themselves. To trust that we were asking something so personal in a Science class. Some were skeptical. Some didn’t see the point. One was outright violent in their hostility - it was not tolerated, but damage occurred. It has also motivated us to continue.  Most students were thankful. Most students learned. Most students were open to recognizing that Indigenous Science is a unique process to be respected and that has relevance and value.  Many students reported to feeling like it connected them with their own cultural and traditional roots. 

There has been a lot to process in this project. This process has changed me. There is still much more to do.

“Can’t transform students until you can’t transform yourself” 

- Lindsay Heller

Inquiry Project

In this project, we incorporated Indigenous Science content and assessments into a first year human biology course (HSCI 100 - Human Biology) and looked at changes in student perception related to Indigenous Science and Western Science. More details on the content and assessments can be found in the course portfolio section. 

I started teaching this content in Fall 2019 and have continued to do so whenever I teach this course. I now want to consider how I can bring decolonial perspectives into my other STEM courses. This will become even more relevant as the new SFU Medical School develops and our students will value those lessons as advancing Indigenous Health is part of the vision for the new medical school.

Questions We Considered

• How do students describe the similarities and differences between a Western/Eurocentric approach to science and an Indigenous approach to science or way of knowing? 

• To what extent and in what ways can students identify both good and bad Western/Eurocentric or Indigenous science? 

• What misconceptions do students have about a Western/Eurocentric approach to science and an Indigenous approach to science or way of knowing? And how do they change over the semester? 

• Do students gain affective change in how they view the relationship between their bodies/health and the local environment? 

• Do students achieve or increase an awareness of the holistic view of the human body? 

• Can students identify how knowledge systems are shaped by their environment and culture? 

Approach

Pre and post-student surveys (designed by S. Thomson), new assessment structure including a journal assignment and an assignment that compares a health topic through a Western and Indigenous Science lens (designed by L. Heller), content throughout the course that introduced Indigenous Science and worldview (created by L. Heller) 

The Project was Successful in That 

• We formed fundamental relationships with consulting experts. 

• Indigenous Science was well aligned to course content. 

• Materials and valuable new assessments were developed. 

• Observed student interest and attitude change, high engagement in topic, and students understood why they were learning material. 

Dissemination

I have not undertaken a lot of traditional dissemination approaches to this project. However, I have spoken about it at length to colleagues and it has become an exemplar for decolonizing a STEM course within our university. This is an ongoing project for me and a journey I look forward to continuing. 

Nienke van Houten, Lindsay Heller, Mark Lechner. Decolonizing the Scientific Method in Human Biology. SFU Teaching Matters Seminar Series. March 2022