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Literacy is a civil right that every child should have access to. Despite decades of research on how children best learn to read, literacy rates continue to be diminished in the United States, leading children to lives of poverty, unemployment and even crime. Via policy and research, the focus in literacy has shifted to teacher learning as a means to improve student achievement in reading. However, teachers’ voices are largely omitted from discussions regarding how this learning should take place and how they are empowered to apply new knowledge in their classrooms. Through an examination of teachers’ experiences with state mandated reading professional development, it is possible to glean understandings of what professional development practices are most helpful to teachers, particularly in rural areas. The proposed study seeks to answer two essential questions: 1) What factors contribute to rural elementary teachers’ experiences with LETRS professional development? and 2) In what ways do these factors act as facilitators and barriers to teachers' professional development? This study will follow a case study design, collecting data through focus groups. The findings of this study will highlight the experiences of teachers in rural areas, who are often omitted from educational research. More specifically, it will provide valuable guidance around the considerations of context when designing and delivering professional development.
Family engagement is a crucial component of student success, impacting academic performance, attendance rates, and behavior. However, many families, particularly those from historically marginalized communities, remain disengaged from their child's school due to barriers such as a lack of trust, negative experiences, and language or cultural obstacles. A foundational reason for this disengagement is the unpreparedness of teachers to intentionally engage families. Teacher education programs often do not have an explicit focus on family engagement, resulting in teachers who may feel unprepared and who do not understand the cultural context of their students' families; thus, hindering effective communication. This dissertation explored the preparedness of beginning teachers to engage families in elementary schools, and how they perceive this preparedness, particularly in urban settings. By examining how beginning teachers perceive their readiness, it provided insights into the strengths and weaknesses of teacher education programs in this regard. The research sought to answer two central questions: 1) How are beginning teachers prepared to engage parents and families in elementary schools, and 2) How do they perceive their teacher education program's preparedness for this task? The study employed a mixed methods approach, involving curriculum analysis, online surveys , and semi-structured interviews. The findings of this study informed recommendations for teacher education programs, looking to equip future teachers with the skills and knowledge needed for effective family engagement.
Black women are underrepresented in secondary math education, but their presence is critical for young black girls who dream of STEM careers. Some researchers believe that the number of Black women pursuing secondary math licensure can be increased through improved recruitment strategies, while others focus on causes of leakage in the education pipeline. This study sought to discover types of capital that Black women, who are preservice Mathematics teachers (PSMTs), relied on to persist towards the completion of their teacher preparation programs.
Framed using Critical Race Feminism and Black Feminism, this study employed Counternarrative Inquiry to discover the capital that the five PSMTs credited for their ability to stay the course. The findings indicate that, while PSMTs might use the same capital, they use it in a variety of ways and for different purposes.
A key implication of the findings from this study is that, if undergraduate math educators can mitigate or eliminate the conditions within the math classroom that triggers the use of many of the capitals in this study, Black women who are PSMTs may be able to divert their energies to developing robust mathematical identities.
Increasing tensions in American society surrounding social equity issues and minority statuses like race and sexual orientation have prompted competing social narratives. Historically marginalized groups face disparate socioeconomic, housing, and educational opportunities. The existing body of research and governmental data contend that there are strong relationships between minority status(es) and housing instability. However, most of the presently available research does not examine these relationships within the school district’s economic context and local homelessness response efforts. This dissertation investigated the association of housing instability with minority status(es), school district, and homelessness response efforts. A descriptive quantitative case study was conducted of Black and White adolescents, between the ages of twelve and eighteen, identifying as heteronormative or LGBTQ+. Data used came from the Oakland Unified School District and the Los Angeles Unified School District. This study employed Critical Race Structuralism and Quantitative Critical Theory to guide the study’s analysis. Cross-sectional data from the 2017 Youth Risk Behavior Surveillance System (YRBSS) survey was used for secondary data analysis. The present study analyzed intersections between race, sexual orientation, school district, and housing instability.Opportunities for further data collection and exploration were identified and implications for policy and programming were discussed.
Keywords: race, sexual orientation, housing instability
Racially minoritized students (RMS) face substantial disparities in college persistence and completion rates (Museus & Saelua, 2017). In particular, Black student enrollment at public two-year or community colleges has declined significantly, dipping below 13% in 2020, while for-profit institutions have maintained enrollment of Black students at roughly 28% over a 10-year period (AACC, 2023). Because community colleges have a reputation for being low-cost, high-quality institutions with more than 60 % of its graduates free of student loan debt (AACC, 2019), proper attention must be given and action taken to identify and address the needs of RMS in the community college settings to increase persistence and graduation rates. Sociological research on community colleges highlights the stratified tension between the increased provision of access as open-door institutions against low rates of successful completion (Schudde & Goldrick-Rab, 2014). While culturally relevant education practices have been most successfully implemented in the K-12 space (Ladson-Billings, 1995), an amplified call goes out to responsible community college leaders for the creation of culturally relevant campus environments. Using the culturally relevant leadership practices framework (Jones et al., 2016), this cross-case study explores the roles and practices of presidents and executive leaders within the context of their community colleges to determine how they create spaces for Black student achievement.
U.S. school achievement has been the subject of much discussion. In the case of science, technology, engineering, arts, and mathematics (STEAM), the national underperformance across the country, as well as the underrepresentation of minorities are key issues (Anderson et al., 2023; Handelsman & Smith, 2016; National Research Council, 2015; The White House, 2017). Particularly, there is a small, but growing body of research on the low numbers of Black women in STEAM, and the Black girls' STEAM pipeline. Extracurricular STEAM programs have shown some success in increasing minority STEAM participation. As such, this dissertation seeks to investigate the following research questions: RQ1: How do online extracurricular STEAM programs created for Black girls serve as a potential counterspace to increase STEAM identity? RQ2: Are there identifiable features that exist in online extracurricular STEAM programs that are important for creating a counterspace for adolescent Black girls? Through a qualitative case study, this dissertation explored Black girls’ participation in online STEAM programs. The findings of the study reveal that the extracurricular STEAM programs helped to foster STEAM identities in young Black girls. The programs also helped students build a sense of community and created a safe space for Black girls. The study provides implications and recommendations for educators and policymakers who are interested in increasing minority STEAM participation.
ABSTRACT
Culturally Responsive Teaching is a holistic pedagogical approach that appeals to the “whole child,” “whole school,” and “whole community” (Gay, 2001; Teschers, 2020); it is a multicultural practice that improves teaching and learning, promotes quality education, taps into the potential and uniqueness of students, and impacts learners intellectually, emotionally, kinesthetically, and physically (Gay, 2010; Widodo, 2019). This qualitative phenomenological case study examines the concepts and pedagogical practices of culturally responsive teaching through the shared experiences of educators and implementers of culturally responsive pedagogy to find out how effective those concepts and practices are in improving the academic outcomes of marginalized students (K-12) in urban classrooms. A purposive case sampling method (PCSM) and semi-structured interview were instrumental elements of the data collection process. A grounded theory method was used to both collect and analyze the data. Themes that emerged from the data of the interviews conducted with the participants were amalgamated to form four main themes for the study. Though this study may be limited by generalizability, it however provides answers to some lingering limitation questions of existing studies on culturally responsive practices. This study draws on and adds to the works of Geneva Gay on Culturally Responsive Pedagogy.
Keywords: holistic education, education equity, educational inequity, multicultural education, opportunity gap, culturally responsive pedagogy
Social studies education has garnered significant national attention as state governments throughout the country have waged an intentional, political attack against the teaching of Critical Race Theory (CRT) and “divisive concepts” in K-12 public schools. Even though CRT is often conflated with diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) initiatives and not actually taught at the elementary or secondary level, since January 2021, over one hundred anti-CRT (or divisive concepts) bills have been introduced in more than thirty different state legislatures throughout the country that would prohibit educators from teaching about concepts rooted in race. For Black women teachers, these legislative restrictions create a teaching context that pressures them to divert from the historical work of their predecessors and go against the grain of Black female identity. As such, this phenomenological study explored how Black female social studies teachers teach about race, racism, and oppression given today’s hostile sociopolitical climate.
This dissertation explores notions of belonging among minority Honors students through student self-identifying questionnaires and semi-structured interviews. One objective of this study is to explore how the Honors educational environment impacts minority student populations and their overall sense of belonging. Another objective of this study is to examine the influence of race, class, gender, culture, and educational experiences prior to entering the Honors College. In the context of this study, a minority classification refers to the student’s self-identification as one or more of the following groups: LatinX, Indigenous American, Black/African American, Pacific Islander, and/or Middle Eastern. The findings indicate that having a fostered identity before entering the Honors College, minority representation, community, and social/emotional safety are aspects of the Honors educational experience that contribute to the participants’ notions of belonging. The study presents implications for diversity, equity, and inclusion in Honors programs, as well as institutional and systemic changes to help promote minority student success.
This qualitative study explores the lack of African American students enrolled in AP Calculus courses in North Carolina public high schools. It considered the perception of student-counselor relationships, academic advising practices, and sense of identity of high school counselor participants. In-depth interviews were conducted with three, African American, female high school counselors with five to twenty-four years of experience in high school counseling. The data yielded five domains: characteristics of a school counselor, expected duties of a school counselor, criteria to become an AP Calculus student, student-counselor relationships, and academic advising practices and the outcomes. From the domains, twenty-seven themes were generated: empathetic, open-minded, organized, flexible, creative, knowledgeable, serving the holistic needs of students, classroom guidance activities, non-counselor duties, resource, enrollments, interventions, advocacy, completion of prerequisite courses, exceptions to the rule, teacher recommendation, AP agreement, importance, trust, connections, race, alternatives, methods, encouragement, benefits, awareness, and partnership. Recommendations include universal access to Math I for African American students in 8th grade, update all stakeholders of the role and purpose of school counselors, professional development for school counselors, and an integrated curriculum for school counselors and administrators.
