Of the millions of people working in STEM fields in the U.S., only 9% are Black, according to the Pew Research Center. Those numbers are "unchanged" since 2016.How can efforts around “inclusivity” in these fields go farther? Environmental scientist Dr. Nyeema Harris has written about the importance of Blackology.“Blackologists are not simply scholars that are Black but, rather, are scholars who deliberately leverage and intersect Blackness into advancing knowledge production," she writes.Dr. Harris joins us to discuss how this approach is applied to environmental science and so many other disciplines.Plus, public health professor Dr. Ijeoma Opara discusses her work to reduce racial health disparities, and to "strengthen the pipeline of Black youth to the field of public health research."GUESTS:

• Dr. Ijeoma Opara: Assistant Professor, Yale School of Public Health; Assistant Clinical Professor, Yale School of Nursing
• Dr. Nyeema Harris: Knobloch Family Associate Professor of Wildlife and Land Conservation, Yale School of the Environment

Cat Pastor contributed to this episode which originally aired February 24.

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