Promoting Inclusivity and Diversity in Economics: Insights, Strategies, and Recommendations

Summary 

Within this case study, Dr. Paredes Fuentes reflects on her interdisciplinary teaching, sharing lessons she has learned in making her economics modules more inclusive and diverse in both ideas and pupils. She notes that traditionally, tutors teach as they are told or use practices that they think work for them. However, she emphasises the importance of reflecting on one's own pedagogy to discover what is best for students and how to keep them engaged by incorporating ideas of interdisciplinarity. Without this reflection, she acknowledges that “you are going to get a student who arrives and says, 'What is the question? What is the answer? Is this going to be in the exam or not?'” Therefore, to effectively tutor students from diverse backgrounds, it is essential to consider one’s own educational practices, which will help students feel more connected to the topics.

Drawing from her personal experience, she shares that looking outside her discipline to explore “what others are doing or at least sharing practice” was “really helpful” for her in designing her teaching, redesigning assessments, and seeing herself “not just as an economist trying to teach economics, but as an economics educator trying to educate economists for the future.”

Stefania Paredes Fuentes

Associate Professor, Department of Economics

University of Warwick

With a PhD in Economics, Dr. Stefania taught as an Associate Professor in Economics at Warwick until December 2023, after which she joined the University of Southampton as Principal Teaching Fellow in Economics. At Warwick, she taught Macroeconomics at various academic levels. Her research is primarily focused on inequality, development, and strategies to enhance diversity and student engagement within the field of economics.

Dr Stefania is currently the Diversity Champion for the Royal Economic Society (RES), where she established the RES Diversity and Inclusion Network. The network connects economists across academia, public, and private sectors, to raise awareness and promote diversity and inclusion within the discipline.

See Stefania’s full bio here.