Inclusive Teaching Commitments

The HSED Program recognizes that health professions education is situated within the hierarchies that impact all society, and that its practices and policies have the potential to contest social inequity, challenge systems of domination, and foster reforms that promote freedom, social justice, and community. In order to ensure that the program realizes this potential, the following commitments are expressed so as to guide a process of eliminating oppressive educational content and maximizing our attention to inclusive teaching practices.

The HSED Program is committed to:

Continuous monitoring, review, and improvement of its course materials, teaching and learning activities, assessments, and policies with respect to removing oppressive practices and maximizing inclusivity.
Providing resources and supports to facilitate continuous quality improvement activities
Empowering faculty, staff, course coordinators, supervisors, instructors, and teaching assistants to customize an individualized approach to addressing oppression and inclusivity within their educational work.
Empowering students as active contributors in our continuous quality improvement activities, centring their voices in the process of customizing approaches to our commitments.
Being mindful of the whole student experience.
Supporting generative academic discourse and dialogue on all topics and perspectives relevant to health professional education, even when those conversation may be uncomfortable.

The HSED Program has also developed a set of terms of engagement for all central learning activities, including both Residency Weeks. Our principles of engagement are built on mutual respect, understanding, and tolerance for all perspectives. Accordingly, these sessions are considered:

A safe space to share and critically appreciate diverse ideas
Start with the premise that everyone is “good” and doing their best
Express curiosity with respect and responsibility, be open to learning
Speak from your own experience (use “I” statements)
Employ active and empathic listening and perspective taking
Engage in dialogue to seek understanding, rather than debate and defensiveness
Create space for experiences of inequities, and exercise an ethic of care
Show humility and appreciate the limits of your knowledge and experience
Respect the privacy and confidentiality of colleagues

The HSED Program is committed to soliciting feedback from students and engaging them with the commitment statement, terms of engagement, and their operation within the learning environment. There are three main instances where the HSED Program anticipates student feedback and engagement with these inclusive teaching commitments:

Students can offer revisions to the stated commitments and terms of engagement and/or suggestions for additional commitments and terms of engagement to the Program Office via email at hsed@mcmaster.ca
Students who have concerns about the operation of the stated commitments and/or terms of engagement within the context of their experience within Residency Week 2 can direct these to either the HSED Program Office, the relevant HSED Student Representatives, or the Assistant Dean of the HSED Program.
Students may feel more comfortable raising concerns outside of the Program. In these cases, students are encouraged to contact the central McMaster University Student Support & Case Management, which handles student complaints surrounding sexual violence, discrimination, and/or harassment within the McMaster community.

If you have any questions about the procedural aspects of student engagement in the HSED Program’s commitments to inclusive teaching practices, feel free to contact the HSED Program Office at hsed@mcmaster.ca