Cultivating New Futures for Girls in STEM

These compelling narratives illustrate how Black women educators cultivate inclusive, justice-centered STEM learning environments for K–12 students.

Explore the powerful pedagogies and lived experiences of four Black women educators who challenge structural barriers to reimagine STEM education as a space of radical love, cultural sustainability, and justice.

Grounded in a National Science Foundation–funded study, this volume documents how educators—through their stories, struggles, and triumphs—develop what the editors call Black STEMinist Pedagogies. These pedagogies center collective and communal responsibility, ancestral knowledge, and the healing power of teaching, offering a blueprint for how to recruit, support, and retain Black women teachers in STEM fields. Each chapter, authored by a diverse team of researchers, amplifies the voices of Black women teachers and affirms their role as knowledge producers and agents of transformation.

By weaving together life histories, scholarly analysis, and classroom narratives, this book offers both inspiration and practical guidance for creating a future where girls of color thrive at the center of STEM learning.

Book Features:

• Original Framework: Introduces the concept of Black STEMinist Pedagogies, an approach that combines Black Feminist Thought with culturally sustaining pedagogies in STEM.
• Rigorous Ethnographic Research: Draws from an NSF-funded mixed-methods study with first-person narratives that humanize data and provide nuanced insights into classroom practice and teacher identity.
• Teacher Training and Retention: Provides a critical resource for teacher preparation programs, education researchers, and policymakers seeking actionable strategies for equity in STEM.
• An Interdisciplinary Author Team: Written by a diverse team of Black, Brown, Indigenous, queer, and white scholars who bring layered perspectives, intersectional analysis, and reflexive methodology.
• User-Friendly Format: Features a narrative-driven style accessible to educators, students, and community members alike.

Aaminah Norris is a professor and faculty director of the Office of Research and Engagement at Sacramento State, and founder and CEO of UnHidden Voices, a Black woman–owned educational consultancy. José Ramón Lizárraga is a scholar, educator, and innovator in digital learning, instructional design, and equity-driven education technology.

“Cultivating New Futures for Girls in STEM wrestles with complex exemplars of what multitude of factors contribute to how teachers see their work and how they see themselves as professionals…. This volume invites important and complex discussions that are deeply needed both in education broadly speaking, specifically in STEM education, and most pervasively in our society at large.”
—From the Foreword by Carol D. Lee, Edwina S. Tarry Professor of Education and Social Policy, Northwestern University

“By giving voice to the life histories of Black women STEM teachers, this book sheds light on the transformative potential of culturally responsive teaching.”
—Elisabetta Crocetti, full professor in social psychology, University of Bologna, Italy

“The lucidly told stories of these four STEMists, rooted in life histories and flowering in radical love, provide clear visions and practices of teaching to transform educational and societal systems that too often disrupt rather than promote democratic values and ideals.”
—Jabari Mahiri, professor and Brinton Family Chair in Urban Teaching, Berkeley School of Education

“Cultivating New Futures for Girls in STEM is a vital and timely book that foregrounds the intellectual and pedagogical labor of Black women STEM teachers. Their stories, carefully woven together by Norris and Lizárraga, illustrate how Black STEMinist Pedagogies resist anti-Blackness and reimagine schooling through love, accountability, and cultural sustainability. This volume will resonate with scholars, practitioners, and all who care about creating just futures in STEM education.”
—Sepehr Vakil, associate professor, School of Education and Social Policy, Northwestern University

Contents

Series Foreword  vii

Foreword Carol D. Lee  xi

Acknowledgments  xix

1.  Introduction: She Builds a Bridge  1
Aaminah Norris and José Ramón Lizárraga

2.  A Champion for Students and Self: Creating Change as a Science Educator  17
Nalya A. F. Rodriguez

3.  Becoming the STEM Teacher She Needed  33
Abigail R. Cohen

4.  Her Calling Is to Be a STEM Teacher  55
Maha Elsinbawi

5.  Replenishing the Fractures: On Teaching as a Site of Nourishment and Healing  73
Eghosa Obaizamomwan-Hamilton

6.  In Conclusion: Building New Bridges to Just Futures  95
Aaminah Norris and José Ramón Lizárraga

Endnotes  105

References  107

Index  115

About the Editors and Contributors  119