1 Introduction

In 2019, one of America’s biggest challenges and focal areas in higher education was the lack of graduating student growth adversely affected by a decline in student retention and success. Higher education institutions, including those having STEM-Focused programs, have been fraught with student retention challenges [10], and the need for specific policies addressing increased student diversity [18]. Inclusive teaching benefiting all students are intentional teaching practices fostering students’ sense of belonging in the classroom environment [19] that can serve as a possible solution to student retention challenges. However, for higher education faculty, especially STEM faculty, uncertainties may exist among them because of their traditionally educated environmental experiences not focused on classroom teaching [10], and limited teaching networks and pedagogical support [22]. The faculty role in developing inclusive classrooms can offer a valued opportunity at higher education institutions to help address student retention and increase student diversity [18]. For faculty, having the appropriate training, including an inclusive pedagogy framework, strategies [18] and supporting tools, such as an inclusive teaching guide and checklist [10], are necessary to support inclusive classroom teaching. Hereafter, we refer to the practice term of inclusive teaching as inclusive pedagogy.

While existing literature in inclusive pedagogy has increased within the past twenty years, more research and practice in inclusive pedagogy are needed. Over the past few years, the United States Coast Guard Academy (USCGA), a top military college (https://www.uscga.edu/aboutcga/), has established several initiatives to support and promote diversity, equity, and inclusion practices across the USCGA community (https://www.uscga.edu/inclusion-and-diversity/). This research study is intended to help extend the continued development and delivery of inclusive pedagogical practices at USCGA and other military academies. In practice, while inclusive teaching has been traditionally designed to address underrepresented students in higher education, classroom diversity has presented challenges when “creating inclusive, supportive, equitable learning environments for all students” [19, para. 3]. These inclusive teaching challenges are driven by increasing classroom diversity “in terms of race, ethnicity, culture, gender and socio-economic status” [19, para. 3]. We focused our inclusive pedagogical research using the Center for the Integration of Research, Teaching and Learning (CIRTL) Inclusive Pedagogy Framework [32] to inform how best to address or improve inclusive pedagogical practices. We, collectively, approached this study from a multi-disciplinary perspective. The disciplines that were covered included: science, technology, engineering, math, education, humanities, management, and economics. Based on our review of inclusive pedagogical research published in peer-reviewed, cross-disciplinary academic journals and conference proceedings, we addressed the following three research questions.

RQ1: What type of research has been published that aligns with the CIRTL Inclusive Pedagogy Framework?

RQ2: What are the current trends of inclusive pedagogy in extant literature?

RQ3: Which articles of the sample population identified were STEM-Focused?

We believe that having an inclusive pedagogy framework when working towards inclusive teaching delivery is important. Our study is rooted on the premise of promoting ‘a sense of belonging’ [19] and ‘supporting the whole student’ [15] when teaching. That sense of belonging should be driven through intentional teaching practices [19]. Based upon the CIRTL’s stated core competencies, skills, and strategies, we applied our interpretation of CIRTL coupled with fostering this ‘sense of belonging’ and ‘supporting the whole student’ in mind throughout this study.

The purpose of this study is to identify best practices that can be used to foster faculty growth in inclusive pedagogy for classroom teaching delivery. Our study’s contributions offer inclusive pedagogy considerations that may help address student retention challenges and support student diversity initiatives at higher education institutions. Also, we view this study as an extension to the existing body of inclusive pedagogy knowledge for academia and other industry researchers by sharing a research agenda that will help strengthen inclusive pedagogy delivery.

In response to the above research questions, the remainder of this article is arranged as follows. This study’s foundation and the framework used when reviewing the literature are addressed in the next section. Afterwards, we describe the methodology used in this study, and then report the related results. Following the reported results, we discuss the study’s research questions conveying key findings, related implications, and limitations, as well as a research agenda for future inclusive pedagogical research. Finally, we close this paper by providing concluding statements.

2 Study’s foundation and framework use

In higher education institutions, having an inclusive pedagogy framework that drives specific strategies can be beneficial in addressing student retention challenges and broadening student diversity. Student retention challenges have persisted in higher education institutions [10] while higher education policies have continued to focus on increasing student body diversity [18]. However, institutional culture has often presented certain biases inhibiting such student body diversity, particularly in fields of science, technology, engineering, and math (STEM) [18]. The personal role in the classroom that faculty can play offers opportunities to individually help strengthen student retention and persistence in addressing student diversity challenges [18]. In this study, the focus of inclusive pedagogy for faculty use is reviewed through the Center for the Integration of Research, Teaching and Learning (CIRTL) Inclusive Pedagogy Framework lens.

2.1 Inclusive pedagogy

While the term “inclusive pedagogy” is relatively new, the concept of using evidence-based teaching practices to support the education of all students is not. In the current work, we analyzed the prevalence and context of the word “inclusion” as related to educational practices in a variety of disciplines to determine which practices were discussed in different discipline-specific educational literature. As a multi-disciplinary faculty team, we were curious about lessons learned in inclusive pedagogy in various subdisciplines, and how these lessons could be applied to other disciplines.

With higher education in mind, Salazar, Norton and Truitt [26] addressed the phenomenon of ‘inclusive excellence’ and its linkages to the needs for inclusive pedagogy and inclusive pedagogical practices. Their argument stemmed from the increasing diversity in higher education institutions [14, 26] and its proven associated benefits [2, 6, 26] to those needs of inclusive pedagogy and inclusive pedagogical practices that help drive inclusive excellence [26]. As noted above, inclusive pedagogy and education are used in many ways, however, the Center for the Integration of Research, Teaching and Learning (CIRTL) devised a pedagogical framework (https://cirtlincludes.net/inclusive-pedagogy-framework/) to help researchers and teachers think about these ideas systematically, as noted below.

2.1.1 CIRTL inclusive pedagogy framework

Our research includes journal articles and conference proceedings discussing inclusive pedagogy and how those fit within the Center for the Integration of Research, Teaching and Learning Inclusive Pedagogy Framework hereafter addressed as CIRTL. The mission of CIRTL is to “develop a national STEM faculty committed to implementing and advancing effective teaching practices for diverse student audiences as part of their professional careers” [32, para. 1]. CIRTL was constructed as a synthesis of prior literature [26] that addressed a checklist of the Universal Instructional Design (UID checklist) based on the work of Chickering and Gamson [7]. They discussed seven principles to improve college teaching and learning: “(1) encourages contacts between students and faculty; (2) develops reciprocity and cooperation among students; (3) uses active learning techniques; (4) gives prompt feedback; (5) emphasizes time on task; (6) communicates high expectations; and (7) respects diverse talents and ways of learning [7, p. 1–2]”. This framework for inclusive excellence was developed containing five dimensions: “(1) intrapersonal awareness, (2) interpersonal awareness, (3) curricular transformation, (4) inclusive pedagogy and (5) inclusive learning environments [26, p. 208]”. Later this framework was further developed into a checklist of actions indicative of practices in each of these dimensions. The combination of the above-mentioned efforts was funded by the National Science Foundation under Grant No. ICER-1649199 resulting in the CIRTL Inclusive Pedagogy Framework [32].

In 2017, a formal introduction to CIRTL began as an investigatory effort by the USCGA Equity Task Force initiative. The Equity Task Force was formed to assess equity and inclusion efforts at the USCGA, and was comprised of several teams whereas one team, the “Inclusive Pedagogical Practices (IPP)” team was created to identify practices that might be adopted in our classrooms to close gaps in equity. The IPP team’s preliminary work led to CIRTL, which was used as a means in driving research into various discipline’s inclusive pedagogical practices that involved discipline areas outside of STEM, as USCGA’s proposed framework for inclusive pedagogy.

CIRTL contains three core competencies: Inclusive Communication, Inclusive Pedagogy Practices, and Designing Inclusive Curriculum. Each of these core competencies is characterized by a set of skills of which each skill has corresponding strategies with specific supporting practices. We noted that CIRTL provided references in support of each stated strategy.

In this study, we sought to recognize prior literature that embodied the essence of CIRTL, identify gaps in discipline areas, and help facilitate the sharing of related sources among disciplines. While these practices are not specific to STEM, we performed this study in hopes of finding synergies beneficial across the disciplines of science, technology, engineering, and math. The framework as designed is summarized (Table 1).

Table 1 Summary of the CIRTL inclusive pedagogy framework (as adapted from https://cirtlincludes.net/inclusive-pedagogy-framework/)
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3 Method

This paper uses a systematic literature review (hereafter referred to as SLR), and more specifically a thematic synthesis to summarize research to date using the CIRTL inclusive pedagogy lens. The SLR process is defined as a five-step protocol that is prescribed as a “standardized method” that renders a “replicable, transparent, objective, unbiased and rigorous” approach [4, p. 162]. The SLR process that we followed is depicted (Fig. 1).

Fig. 1
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An Overview of the SLR Process (adapted from [4, p. 163])

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3.1 Our SLR process detail approach

Our SLR process detail approach where we performed Steps 1–3, included supporting techniques for our research efforts to address RQ1 (Table 2).

Table 2 Our SLR Process Detail Approach (based on Steps 1–3 in Fig. 1 [4, p. 163])
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3.2 Code design, development, and implementation

CIRTL was used to generate coding for assessment of the articles identified. Our coding schematic in Table 3 reflects three levels: primary (Core Competency), secondary (related Skills), and tertiary (related Strategies). The three core competencies were labeled Inclusive Communication (IC), Inclusive Pedagogy Practices (IP), and Designing Inclusive Curriculum (DC). Each skill was assigned a number (SK01-SK08) and each strategy was assigned a number (SP01-SP21). If it was determined during our review that an article could not be thematically referenced to a core competency, skill, or strategy, the article was coded as Not Applicable (NA).

Table 3 Coding schematic for CIRTL core competencies, skills, and strategies
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3.3 Summarization of evidence

In the following two subsections, we identify the actions performed in Step 4 of our SLR process detail approach, which had two parts addressing A) RQ2 and B) RQ3, respectively.

3.3.1 Trending of CIRTL inclusive pedagogy literature

Of the evidence collected and analyzed, current trends that helped capture how we present notable CIRTL inclusive pedagogy literature review results were identified (Table 4).

Table 4 A. Our SLR process detail approach Step 4 Part A
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Table 5 B. Our SLR process detail approach Step 4 Part B
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3.3.2 Identification of STEM-focused versus non_STEM-focused articles

We recognize that CIRTL is STEM-designed, and of the selected sample of 304 articles, we provide a summary count of those articles by discipline. Table 5 also shares an understanding of STEM-disciplined (i.e., science, technology, engineering, and math) articles. However, we also identify STEM-Focused articles, which we define as articles that focus their primary literature content (or study’s objective) on STEM or as a program, not as the collective disciplines of science, technology, engineering, and math.

As shown in Fig. 2, to identify STEM-Focused articles, we performed a text search on the keyword ‘STEM’ using NVivo12. NVivo12 is a qualitative and mixed methods analysis software, allowing for rapid and systematic search within the sample of 304 articles. Our text search query as depicted in Fig. 2 rendered 84 of the sample of 304 articles. Each article was manually reviewed to verify if it was STEM-Focused of which a total of 60 articles were identified.

Fig. 2
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A screenshot of the NVivo12 text search query performed

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4 Results

Demonstrating the performance of the prescribed actions as well as summarization of the evidence gathered regarding the sample of 304 articles, we completed Step 5 of our SLR process review (Table 6).

Table 6 Our SLR process detail approach step 5
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Based on our methodology, we identified 304 articles from the prescribed search criteria and aligned them to CIRTL. The full listing of 304 articles in alphabetical order by author(s) is available in Supplemental File 2. As shown in Table 7, our articles were identified from 77 sources comprised of 70 journals and seven conference proceedings. Within the scope of this study, we reported identifying 68 (88.3%) of the 77 sources (both journals and conference proceedings) within the following disciplines: 29 in science, 19 in education, 10 in engineering and 10 in humanities. We reported the education separately from other disciplines, but we noted that education-discipline specific journals were accounted for within disciplines of science, technology, engineering, and management. Engineering included five (71.4%) of the seven articles from conference proceedings. We further classified our sources by subdiscipline and found most journals in our study were education focused.

Table 7 Summary count of journals and conference proceedings by discipline
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4.1 Summary mapping and trends

A summary of 304 coded articles, reflecting their alignment to CIRTL by core competency, skills, and strategies is shown in Table 8Footnote 1. For further detail by discipline, see Supplemental File 5. While some were deemed to be strategy-specific (i.e., SP01, SP02), we reported some exclusive to specific skills (i.e., SK01, SK02) or core competency (i.e., IC, IP, DC). Certain aligned articles overlapped multiple strategies, skills, and core competencies. Therefore, the totals by strategy, skill referenced “Non-specific Strategies Defined”Footnote 2, and core competency referenced “Non-specific Strategies or Skills Defined”Footnote 3 represent unique occurrences.

Table 8 Total summary of all articles mapped to the CIRTL inclusive pedagogy framework and categorized by core competency, skills, and strategies
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4.2 Core competency trends

We identified inclusive pedagogy literature dating back to 1976 that aligned to CIRTL, and subsequently, the CIRTL aligned prior literature reflects growth across core competencies. For the IC competency, we noted that during the 2010s the largest growth of publications existed (Supplemental File 3, Figure 1). From 2010 through 2019, 69.1% of the total 68 for IC were published. The largest growth of publications for the IP competency existed during the 2010s (Supplemental File 3, Figure 2). From 2010 through 2019, 62.1% of the total 95 for IP were published. Supplemental File 3 (Figure 3) shows from 2010 through 2019, 58.1% of the total 31 for DC were published. For SK08, 62.5% of the total eight were published. For its specific strategies, 50% of the total 18 were published for SP20, and 59.1% of the total 22 were reported for SP21.

4.3 Historical summary and multi-disciplinary trends

Our sample of 304 articles references the earliest publication in 1976. We found two articles in the 1970s, two in the 1980’s, 23 in the 1990s, 58 published in the 2000s, 194 in the 2010s as shown in Table 9. Between 2010 and 2019 the number more than tripled compared to the previous decade. In 2020 alone, 25 articles were published when compared to two published in the 1970’s. After the first twenty years, the number published significantly increased through the following thirty years. In the 1990s, 2000s, and 2010s, publications increased 1,050%, 152%, and 234%. For further detail by discipline, see Supplemental File 4.

Table 9 Trending of all articles by discipline for the period 1976–2020
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4.3.1 Science

Table 9 shows 101 science related articles published from the 1970’s to 2020’s. The publications increased every decade with 13 in 2020. Table 8 shows that out of the 304 articles applicable to CIRTL, 199 included the core competency of Inclusive Communication (IC), with 71 of those discussing the skill of Intrapersonal awareness (SK01). The strategy most mentioned in Intrapersonal Awareness was “Expand knowledge of the OTHER through readings about diverse cultures and identity groups and immersing oneself in diversity” (SP04). The same pattern existed in science journals. Of 70 articles in Inclusive Communication, 37 discussed Intrapersonal Awareness, and 18 in SP04. Fostering an Inclusive Learning Environment (SK03), another skill in IC, was present in 52 of the articles, 30 in science journals. Another relevant skill, Interpersonal Awareness (SK02), was discussed in 45 articles, 19 in science journals. The most discussed strategy, “Create opportunities for interpersonal dialogue where multiple perspectives are honored” (SP05), appeared in 12 articles, four in science journals.

The core competency of Inclusive Pedagogy Practices (IP) was discussed in 164 of the articles, 52 in science journals. The most common skill developed in IP was “Using teaching methods that consider diverse learning, abilities, previous experiences and background knowledge” (SK07) with 60 articles, 21 in science journals. The most repeated strategy, “Effective use of learning technologies and tools.” (SP16), appeared in 24 articles, nine of which were in science journals. The core competency of “Designing Inclusive Curriculum” was mentioned in 74 articles, 28 in science journals. Curricular Transformation skill was addressed in 43 articles, 19 in science journals. “Reflect critically on whom the curriculum includes or excludes (SP21)” appeared in 22 articles, 13 in science journals, while “Incorporate multiculturalism throughout course content” (SP20) was a strategy included in 18 articles, nine (50%) in science journals. We found 21 journals in science education and reported eight focusing on CIRTL.

4.3.2 Technology

In technology, the inclusive pedagogy aligned to the CIRTL represented 55 (18.1%) of 304 items. As with engineering and humanities, no CIRTL aligned inclusive pedagogy related articles were reported in the 1970s and 1980s. We reported two (3.64%) of 55 articles published in the 1990s. In the 2000s and 2010s, a significant increase resulted in 21 (38.2%) of 55 and 26 (47.3%) of 55 articles published. The remaining five (9.1%) were in 2020. For technology, 55 education articles were published in seven journals and no conference proceedings. The ReCALL journal published 40 (72.7%) of the 55 total articles. Of the total 40 ReCALL articles, 19 (47.5%) and 16 (40.0%) articles were published in 2000s and 2010s.

The technology inclusive pedagogy results included articles across all three core competencies. For the IC core competency, 25 (45.5%) of the 55 articles were aligned. Of the 25 total IC core competency related articles, seven (28.0%), nine (36.0%), six (24.0%), and one (4.0%) were aligned or cross-aligned to the specific skills, SK01, SK02, SK03, and SK04. Nine (36.0%) of the total 25 articles were generally aligned to the IC core competency. When focused on the specific skills related strategies, we reported that SK01 and SK02 included four (57.1%) of seven and five (55.6%) of nine crossed multiple skills related strategies. For SK03, three (50.0%) of six related specifically to its associated strategy, SP10, and the remaining three (50.0%) of six articles were generally aligned. Only one (4.0%) of the 25 total articles was generally aligned to SK04.

For the IP core competency, 47 (85.5%) of the 55 articles were aligned including 16 (34.0%) of the total 47 articles being generally aligned. No articles were aligned to SK05 and its related strategies. For SK06, only three (60.0%) of the five articles were aligned to the associated strategy, SP14, whereas as the remaining two (40.0%) generally aligned. Of the total 47 articles aligned to the IP core competency, 29 (61.7%) aligned to the specific skill of SK07. While only one (3.4%) of the 29 total articles was generally aligned to SK07, the remaining 28 (96.6%) articles were aligned or cross aligned to the specific strategies of SP16, SP17, SP18, and SP19 resulting in 13 (46.4%), six (21.4%), five (17.9%), and six (21.4%). For the remaining core competency, DC, there were four (7.3%) of the total 55 articles aligned. For SK08, three (75.0%) of the four articles were aligned to its related strategies. The remaining one (25.0%) of four was generally aligned to the DC core competency.

4.3.3 Engineering

Of the 304 articles that were aligned to CIRTL, 27 of the articles were categorized in engineering. These were published between 1994 and 2019. All 27 came from 10 sources, including five journals and five conference proceedings of five engineering societies.

Many articles in the engineering discipline (22 out of the 27) discussed the core competency of IC. Intrapersonal awareness was specifically discussed, including practices that develop an awareness of how beliefs, cultures, and privileges influence pedagogies and practices that expand intrapersonal knowledge of the OTHER through readings about diverse cultures and identity groups immersed in diversity [3, 17, 33]. Many articles in the IC category, such as Knight et al. [20] and Farrell et al. [12], discussed IC related techniques, including the positive impacts of practices that created opportunities for interpersonal dialogue honoring multiple perspectives and fostering an inclusive, welcoming, respectful environment.

Of the 22 articles identified as supporting IC, 14 came from journals and eight came from society conference proceedings. The first journal article was published in 1996, but most were found in journals from 2016 to 2019. For conference proceedings, this topic was first recorded as a presentation in 2010 but was frequently found from 2017 to 2019.

Eight of the engineering articles addressed the IP core competency. These discussed teaching methods that consider diverse learning, abilities, previous experiences, and background knowledge [5, 13]. The articles highlight practices using learning technologies and tools, techniques that provide support (including technology) to enhance learning opportunities and utilizing a constructivist approach to teaching [16, 24].

Of the eight articles aligned to the IP core competency, four of the articles came from journals, and four from engineering society conference proceedings. The journal articles were published in 1996, 2005, 2007, and 2019. For conference proceedings, an inclusive pedagogy presentation was first recorded in 2017, noted twice in 2018, and once in an engineering discipline presentation in 2019.

Eight of the articles addressed the DC core competency. Curricular transformation and practices that reflect whom the curriculum includes or excludes were discussed [17, 23]. Of the eight articles aligned to DC core competency, four came from journals and four from engineering society conference proceedings. The first journal article was published in 1994. Three additional articles were published in 2019. For the conference proceedings, the DC core competency topic was first presented in 2015 and in one presentation per year from 2017 to 2019.

4.3.4 Education

The inclusive pedagogy articles in education that aligned to CIRTL represented 93 (30.6%) of 304 items. We reported two of 93 (5.4%) published in the 1970s and 1980s, an increase to seven of 93 (7.5%), 12 of 93 (12.9%), and 66 of 93 (71.0%) during the 1990s, 2000s, and 2010s. The remaining six of 93 (6.5%) were reported in 2020.

The inclusive pedagogy of 93 articles related to education was published in nineteen (19) journals and one conference proceeding, 92 (98.9%) and one (1.1%). The Critical Studies in Education journal published 47 (51.1%) of the 92 total articles. During the period of 2010s, 40 (85.1%) of the 47 articles published in Critical Studies in Education represented 60.6% of the 66 total articles published.

The education inclusive pedagogy results included articles across all three core competencies where multiple articles aligned cross core competencies, skills, and strategies. For the IC core competency, 62 (66.7%) of the 93 articles were aligned. For SK01 and SK02, 13 (72.2%) of 18, and seven (63.6%) of 11 crossed multiple skilled related strategies. For both SK03 and SK04, nine (90.0%) of 10 and four (66.7%) of six were generally aligned. Overall, 22 (35.5%) of 62 were non-specific to the IC core competency related skills and strategies.

For the IP core competency, 44 (47.3%) of the 93 articles aligned. No articles were aligned to SK05 and its related strategies. For SK06, only one (2.3%) of the 44 articles was aligned, but non-specific to its related strategies. For SK07, five (71.4%) of seven total articles were aligned to its specific strategies, and the remaining two (28.6%) of seven total articles were reported as non-specific to its related strategies. Thirty-seven (84.1%) of the 44 were non-specific to the IP core competency related skills and strategies. For the DC core competency, 25 (26.9%) of the 93 articles were aligned. For SK08, nine (69.2%) of the 13 articles were aligned to its related strategies, and the remaining four (30.8%) of 13 total articles were reported as non-specific to its related strategies. The 12 remaining (40.0%) of 25 articles were generally aligned to the DC core competency.

4.3.5 Humanities, management and economics

In this study, inclusive pedagogy that aligned to CIRTL in the humanities discipline was first reported in the 1990s. Ten humanities’ related journals rendered a total of 20 (6.6%) of the 304 articles reported. Composition Studies and Language, Culture and Curriculum journals accounting for 60% of the total 20 articles, published seven (35.0%) and five (25.0%) articles, for the period of 1990 through 2020. Of the total 20 articles, two (10.0%), four (20.0%), and 14 (70.0%) were published in the 1990s, 2000s, and 2010s.

Management inclusive pedagogy results were identified almost 30 years after the first results were reported in the 1970s (Table 9). Three (1.0%) of the 304 items were reported. In the 2000s and 2010s, two (66.7%) of three and one (33.3%) of three were published. All three articles were published in the Academy of Management Learning & Education journal.

While this study’s inclusive pedagogy results first appear in the 1970s, economics related results lag 40 years later. Five representing 1.64% of the 304 items were reported. Four of five (80.0%) were published during the period of 2015–2019, and the remaining one (20.0%) was published in 2020 (Table 9). All five articles were published in the Economics of Education Review journal.

4.4 STEM-focused versus non_STEM-focused

From our NVivo12 text search, we identified an initial total of 84 articles of our 304 articles as potentially STEM-Focused. Each article was manually reviewed to verify if the article was STEM-Focused whereas the focus of the article was directly related to STEM as an educational program instead of the article having mention(s) of the acronym, ‘STEM’ as a reference or comment in the article. Upon completion of this article manual review, 24 of the articles were excluded resulting in a total of 60 (19.74%) of the 304 articles. These were categorized by discipline as shown in Table 10 and a breakdown of STEM-Focused articles CIRTL-aligned are captured in Table 11. Both science and engineering disciplines accounted for 76.67% of the total 60 STEM-Focused articles.

Table 10 Summary count of articles by discipline (STEM-Focused versus non_STEM-Focused)
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Table 11 Total summary of all articles identified as STEM-focused and mapped to the CIRTL inclusive pedagogy framework and categorized by core competency, skills, and strategies
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5 Discussion

The CIRTL Inclusive Pedagogy Framework supported by the five dimensions promoting inclusive excellence [26] offers practices addressed by its core competencies, and related skills and strategies that faculty can deliver as change agents. Strategies, including acknowledgment of individual differences, have been recommended to strengthen faculty empowerment, meaningful fulfillment, and professional development to increase STEM participation [18]. STEM and other faculty may view the CIRTL Inclusive Pedagogy Framework as a tool for ways to address self-awareness and empathy among students. Table 12 provides a summary of this study’s key findings and implications. In consideration of this, we offer our multi-disciplinary research perspectives to past, present, and future use of CIRTL. From a CIRTL lens, we propose a research agenda to foster and strengthen inclusive pedagogy in higher education.

Table 12 Summary of key findings and implications for inclusive pedagogy
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5.1 RQ1: What published research aligns with the CIRTL inclusive pedagogy framework?

Based on prior literature review, CIRTL-aligned published work began in 1976 within the science discipline. Over the next forty years, this research spread across disciplines, including science, technology, engineering, economics, education, humanities, and management. We noted prior CIRTL-aligned literature evidenced inclusive pedagogical practice from: (1) the CIRTL core competencies, and (2) key focal research topics presented in the literature.

5.1.1 CIRTL core competencies

The Inclusive Communication core competency is paramount for excellence in teaching. In the science discipline, one common strategy in IC was to “Expand knowledge of the OTHER through readings about diverse cultures and identity groups and immersing oneself in diversity” (SP04). This exemplifies encouraging cultural and identity diversity. Gross et al. [15] discuss two cohort programs in STEM fields at Carleton College designed to support students’ sense of belonging, students’ learning, and students’ drive to succeed. Eckstrand, Potter, Bayer and Englander [11] discuss developing competencies to care for individuals who are “lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, gender nonconforming; or born with differences in sexual development.” The article states the process can be applied to other underrepresented populations. Another skill relevant to IC is Interpersonal Awareness (SK02) with the strategy discussed the most as “Create opportunities for interpersonal dialogue where multiple perspectives are honored” (SP05). Inclusion of diverse perspectives paves the way for collaborative, positive communication. Sarmiento et al. [27] discuss implementing a curriculum for medical students with collaboration of various groups discussing models of disability to understand and address challenges of patients with disabilities.

In science, the second most common core competency was Inclusive Pedagogy (IP). The strategy of “Effective use of learning technologies and tools.” (SP16) was found in 24 articles. Supalo et al. [29] discuss laboratory adaptations to increase accessibility to blind or visually impaired students. These included computer-based, audible, and tactile adaptive technology for chemistry laboratories to provide more independent, rewarding experiences. De Beer and Whitlock [9] discussed the social-scientific issues (SSI) approach to science teaching suggesting how respect of students’ backgrounds and their indigenous knowledge should be adapted to a particular situation. This was an example of discussion of “Incorporate multiculturalism throughout course content” (SP20).

The core competency of Designing Inclusive Curriculum was not common in the science articles and conference proceedings. This competency was defined by one skill (curricular transformation) compared to three skills for the two other competencies. When considering the CIRTL Inclusive Pedagogy Framework, the education discipline addressed the IC, Inclusive Communications, and IP, Inclusive Pedagogy, core competencies more than the DC, Designing Inclusive Curriculum, core competency, whereas IC and IP collectively represented 66.7% and 47.3% respectively.

5.2 RQ2: What are current trends of inclusive pedagogy in extant literature?

The increasing importance of literature published in inclusive pedagogy is encouraging. The number of published articles has increased every decade since 1970s as shown in Table 9. This agrees with what other researchers have found. Waitoller and Artiles [31] found, in their 2000–2010 decadal study, that research for inclusive education increased in the mid-2000s. According to Stentiford and Koutsouris [28] inclusion has become “imbedded in the educational policy in many countries following landmark legislative developments concerning human rights, such as the UNESCO Salamanca Statement [30].” Stentiford and Koutsouris [28] provided examples of increased awareness of inclusion in higher education literature in the U.K. “following the election of New Labour in 1997” and in Australia “following the election of the Rudd Labor government in 2007”.

In technology, inclusive pedagogical trending started slowly in the current decade, but many improvement opportunities in research exist. Of the 55 articles identified, 47 (85.5%) have aligned with the IP, Inclusive Pedagogy, core competency by focusing on the specific skill, SK07, “Using teaching methods that consider diverse learning, abilities, previous experiences and background knowledge.” Within the IP core competency, we did not identify articles aligned to the skill of SK05, “Communicating Clear Course Expectations.” A small number of articles, five (9.09%) of the 55 aligned to the specific skill, SK06, “Offering multiple ways for students to demonstrate their knowledge,” did not.

In the engineering discipline, publishing inclusive pedagogy practices has increased in recent years as shown in Table 9, but there are gaps in the published research on the topic as reflected in Table 13. Utilizing the engineering subset of articles, the core competencies of Inclusive Communication, Inclusive Pedagogy Practices, and Designing an Inclusive Curriculum were addressed. However, several skills and strategies included in the CIRTL framework were not discussed by any articles reviewed. A complete list of skills and strategies that not included in the articles reflected in Table 13, shows significant gaps in literature for the CIRTL framework in engineering.

Table 13 Multi-disciplinary summary of CIRTL gaps in knowledge of all articles mapped to the CIRTL inclusive pedagogy framework and categorized by core competency, skills, and strategies for all subject areas (excludes economics and management because of low number of articles)
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5.3 RQ3: Which articles of the sample population identified were STEM-Focused?

Sixty articles were STEM-Focused (Table 12). STEM-Focused articles addressed specific needs when considering inclusive teaching, such as a better perspective of the role faculty plays towards building inclusivity [18] and the need to have greater focus on accessibility needs of disabled students [29].

5.4 Limitations

One main limitation to our work stems from our focus on a small sample of articles within the study’s focused disciplines when considering math. Because CIRTL is STEM-designed, having better representation of the math discipline would have presented a more holistic perspective of how well CIRTL served STEM users. Also, having more direct emphasis on math, and opportunities to address specific gaps related to an applied CIRTL lens to prior literature would benefit academic institutions and researchers.

A barrier to adoption of inclusive pedagogical practices is the curation of supporting literature. The lack of a common language among disciplines in describing practices impedes curation. Researchers sometimes disagree on the term “inclusion” and “inclusive pedagogy.” Stentiford and Koutsouris [28] argued that “inconsistency and fragmentation in perceptions of inclusive pedagogies is the result of inclusion itself being a philosophically contested matter.” Inclusion has been interpreted as “emphasis in shared cultures,” “flexibility of the curriculum to accommodate diversity of learners,” and “relationship between social inclusion and choice” [28, p. 2246]. We noticed that each discipline has specific terms conveying the same principles. Since we did not use these search terms, we could have missed relevant papers. Other terms used in science articles that we did not include are: “culturally responsive education” and “cultural competence” [8, 21, 25]. “Cultural competence,” for example, a search term abundantly used in medical education, aligns well with SP03 (Develop awareness of how their beliefs, cultures, and privileges influence curriculum and pedagogies) and SP04 (Expand knowledge of the OTHER through readings about diverse cultures and identity groups, and immersing oneself in diversity).

Although the CIRTL Inclusive Pedagogy Framework is a comprehensive look into inclusive pedagogy practices, it could be expanded to include areas deemed important to this conversation. We found several articles discussing teacher workshops to help design inclusive pedagogy and inclusive curriculum. We considered those as “not applicable” since they did not relate to the inclusive pedagogy of the students but, discussed teacher training. As teachers become aware and better trained, they are more likely to address these topics in their classrooms. We did not include articles about improving participation of underrepresented groups to encourage diversity and inclusion in various programs, such as STEM. Such programs lead to more inclusive education, but they were not part of the CIRTL Inclusive Pedagogy Framework. Articles on equity issues were not included, since they did not fit the CIRTL Inclusive Pedagogy Framework. Nor did we did not include articles about policy implications of diversity in the curriculum because Inclusive Pedagogy Policy was not part of the CIRTL Inclusive Pedagogy Framework. However, for inclusive pedagogy to occur, policies that lead to a more diverse and inclusive classroom should be in place and are areas where the CIRTL Inclusive Pedagogy Framework could be expanded.

5.5 Implications for higher education

We found gaps in the literature when searching for articles that align with the CIRTL Inclusive Pedagogy Framework as depicted in Table 13. There were no articles on “Communicating Clear Course Expectations” (SK05). Strategies would be “addressing essential course components,” such as providing assignments to meet intended learning outcomes, using a comprehensive syllabus, and requesting frequent student feedback about the course and instructor. Another strategy part of SK05 not included was “communicating clear assessments and providing constructive feedback,” such as providing students with grading rubrics and comments in a timely manner and discussing overall weaknesses and strengths of assignments. Also, there were no articles on strategy to “Foster student choice in assignments” (SP15), such as options for presentations, papers, team assignments, role playing, etc.

Several strategy-level topics did not appear in the literature we collected. Engineering discipline specific research using teaching methods considering diverse learning, abilities, previous experiences, and background knowledge should be published and made available. Practices utilized to create a welcoming, inclusive environment and techniques to develop interpersonal skills should be part of engineering discipline specific literature.

For future research in engineering, a focused effort should be made to locate more articles within that discipline. Considering the small sample size of articles, recommended topics should be considered in extending the existing CIRTL Inclusive Pedagogy framework for engineering. Skill-level topics needing consideration are examples of practices ensuring clear course expectations and methods allowing students multiple ways to demonstrate knowledge.

The findings of this SLR have significant implications for the landscape of higher education, particularly in the realm of fostering inclusive pedagogical practices. The comprehensive analysis of existing literature using the CIRTL framework illuminates key areas where higher education institutions can focus to enhance inclusivity. Firstly, the review highlights the need for ongoing and nuanced attention to pedagogical strategies that are responsive to the diverse backgrounds and experiences of students. This includes developing curricula that are not only culturally sensitive but also actively engage with and value the contributions of all students. Such an approach is essential for breaking down barriers to participation and success, especially for those from historically marginalized groups.

Moreover, the synthesis of multi-disciplinary perspectives underlines the importance of a cross-disciplinary approach to inclusive pedagogy. The findings suggest that while there are common challenges across disciplines, the nuances of each field require tailored strategies to effectively address issues of inclusivity. For instance, STEM fields might need specific interventions to bridge gaps in representation and participation. This calls for higher education institutions to foster inter-departmental collaborations and learning communities that can share best practices and innovate inclusive teaching methods. The review also underscores the imperative for institutional policies and leadership to support these endeavors. This involves not only resource allocation but also the establishment of an institutional culture that prioritizes inclusivity as a core value, thereby creating an environment where all students feel valued and have equal opportunities to succeed.

In conclusion, this SLR serves as a catalyst for transformative change in higher education. By providing a comprehensive overview of the current state of inclusive pedagogical practices and identifying gaps in the literature, it sets the stage for future research and practice that can lead to more equitable and inclusive educational environments.

6 Conclusion

In the classroom, we offer the CIRTL Inclusive Pedagogy Framework as a teaching practice builder and change agent facilitator among faculty to embolden and strengthen their role in improving student retention and diversity in higher education. Supplemental File 6 provides a complete mapping of all 304 sample articles by discipline to the CIRTL Inclusive Pedagogy Framework. This mapping can be viewed as a reference tool of examples faculty and staff at USCGA, and other military academies can use as inclusive teaching practices.

We also recognize that the CIRTL Inclusive Pedagogy Framework may serve as a catalyst supporting a shift in continuing professional development among STEM and other faculty, regarding higher education practices. Where possible, we believe that the use of an inclusive pedagogy framework like CIRTL offers many existing benefits and growing opportunities for future innovative inclusive teaching practices to be developed and implemented in higher education.

As a result of our key findings and research agenda rendered from the SLR process, an increase in research and practitioner initiatives be pursued with the use of CIRTL in higher education. Additional research may offer innovative approaches that demonstrate the performance of CIRTL’s core competencies, skills, and strategies. Future research could further suggest studies that emphasize the effectiveness of CIRTL inclusive pedagogy practices when compared to other inclusive pedagogy frameworks.

Lastly, we wish to offer this SLR of inclusive pedagogical research as a call for researchers and practitioners to pursue equitable education in higher education using the CIRTL framework in STEM. Having greater focus on the use of the CIRTL framework in STEM could offer continuous improvement opportunities. For example, very little remains unknown on the overall benefits of the CIRTL framework in STEM. More research lending transparency in knowledge transference and benefits of the CIRTL framework in STEM’s use through teaching could help address higher educational needs, such as improvements in curricular design, delivery, and choices as well as educational policies. Future outcomes from STEM-Focused research and increased adoption of the CIRTL framework in STEM in higher education could also offer beneficial suggestions on how to further strengthen and extend the CIRTL framework when considering our SLR’s research gaps.