(2024). How We Overcome: A Phenomenological Study Exploring the Pursuit of the Undergraduate Degree among Black and Latinx Populations. ProQuest LLC, Ed.D. Dissertation, Northcentral University. Sadly, an enduring legacy of the United States is inequities between groups of people based on their skin color. These inequities are ingrained within the educational system, such as a lack of opportunities and interventions and significant gaps in support and resources that target underserved populations. The problem that this study addressed was the issue of lower graduation rates among Black and Latinx students in comparison to their white counterparts in higher education. The purpose of this qualitative phenomenological study was to highlight the practices and dispositions that effectively promote higher education degree completion among striving Black and Latinx students, as well as the barriers that hinder their degree completion. Data was gathered through semi-structured interviews with Black and Latinx students and a focus group from the same sample population. The theory used in this study is the Critical Race Theory (CRT). This study contributed to the field of… [Direct]
(2024). The Impact of Transfer Bridge on Community College Students: A Mixed Methods Analysis. ProQuest LLC, Ed.D. Dissertation, San Diego State University. This research explored the concepts of Sense of Belonging and Campus Cultural Capital among first-generation transfer students who were accepted to attend the EOP Transfer Bridge Program in 2018 and 2019. The methodology employed for this study was a transformative and mixed methods design that utilized the lens of Student Validation and Critical Race Theory. Sense of Belonging and Campus Cultural Capital were measured through the use of pre and post tests. The quantitative data was supplemented by semi-structured interviews. The findings indicated that Transfer Bridge was successful in enhancing the student's connectivity with the university and were able to identify the services available to them for their continued academic success. Recommendations are to ensure the program continues to have the necessary programmatic structures in place to continue to validate student success but to also use the student voices to guide the direction of the program as they are central to the… [Direct]
(2021). "All Kids Matter"? Catholic Institutional Advocacy for Federal COVID Relief Funding for Non-Public Schools. Education Policy Analysis Archives, v28 n131 Oct. This article explores the policy interests expressed by the largest private educational system in the United States, American Catholic schools, during the first four months of the COVID-19 crisis. Critical discourse analysis is applied to public texts produced by the Catholic Church between March 1 and July 1, 2020, in order to understand the discursive strategies through which this institution constructs meaning in the policy arena. This analysis illustrates how Catholic leaders use language to make racialized and low-income students "discursively invisible." The author documents a significant change in policy discourse, from neoconservative logics to neoliberal ones, which corresponds directly to political signaling from the Trump Administration. Drawing on critical race theory, the author suggests implications for policymakers and stakeholders…. [PDF]
(2021). Beyond Good Intentions: A Critical Discourse Analysis of Teaching Tolerance's 'Teaching the New Jim Crow: A Teacher's Guide'. Journal of Curriculum Studies, v53 n1 p83-102. This paper uses critical discourse analysis to examine the alignment between the stated goals and the discursive implications in a scripted curriculum published by Teaching Tolerance, a progressive education organization in the US. Social justice education and critical race theories ground the analysis of "Teaching 'The New Jim Crow': A Teacher's Guide"; this set of 10 lessons and related resources claims to structure learning for open racial dialogues, democratic participation, and both standards-alignment and social justice education, yet my analysis of the lesson plans' language and structure reveals procedural instructional practices that uncritically transmit progressive messages while constructing an implied White audience. Implications focus on pathways for teachers and teacher educators to pursue social justice and critical pedagogy while rejecting superficiality and indoctrination…. [Direct]
(2021). Counteracting Dysconscious Racism and Ableism through Fieldwork: Applying DisCrit Classroom Ecology in Early Childhood Personnel Preparation. Topics in Early Childhood Special Education, v41 n1 p45-56 May. Early childhood personnel preparation programs must prepare future early educators who can counteract racism and ableism to provide all children with an equitable and just education. We applied Dis/ability Critical Race Theory (DisCrit) Classroom Ecology to early childhood and specifically to preschool settings. We argue that early childhood personnel preparation programs can utilize this framework to prepare preservice early educators to facilitate more equitable experiences for Children of Color with disabilities and their families. We discuss the importance of preparing future early educators to counteract racism and ableism through their fieldwork experiences. We also provide a brief overview of DisCrit in relation to early childhood personnel preparation and present DisCrit Classroom Ecology to apply the framework components to preschool fieldwork…. [Direct]
(2021). "We Can Do Better": University Leaders Speak to Tribal-University Relationships. American Educational Research Journal, v58 n3 p459-491 Jun. Wielding degrees of influence within educational organizations, university leaders are critical in determining how institutions enact their espoused missions and support severely marginalized campus communities. How do universities address and improve educational outcomes for the most severely underrepresented communities? This article presents emergent findings from an illustrative multiple-case study that examined the relationships between two public universities and local American Indian nations in California. As a preliminary step in understanding the present state of "tribal-university relationships," I present findings on university leaders' perceptions and knowledge regarding American Indians broadly and relationships with local Native nations specifically. Using tribal critical race theory as an analytical framework, I posit how colonization, federal recognition, and educational practices affect curricular, political, and economic relationships…. [Direct]
(2021). This Ain't What I'm Used to: Reflections of a Black Educator in Rural Black America an Autoethnography. Clearing House: A Journal of Educational Strategies, Issues and Ideas, v94 n3 p94-105. This autoethnography highlights reflections of a Black woman social studies educator, from a predominantly White, southern Appalachian area, teaching in a Southern, predominantly Black, rural area. The study reflects on practices utilized while teaching in southern Appalachia and the pedagogical transformation undergone as a result of migrating and teaching in a Southern, predominantly Black, rural area. Using Critical Race Theory, this autoethnography explores the impact of race in the development of pedagogical practices of a Black woman teacher. The author asserts Black teachers need to learn about and utilize culturally relevant pedagogical practices in their preservice programs and that teachers should engage in self-reflection as a means to navigate personal biases and confront the perpetuation of hegemonic culture in their classroom practices…. [Direct]
(2021). Who May Be Competent? Mothering Young Children of Color with Disabilities and the Politics of Care. Equity & Excellence in Education, v54 n3 p328-344. In this critical, qualitative study, we utilized Disability Critical Race Theory and revolutionary mothering to understand how Mothers of Color who have young children with disabilities made meaning of underlying constitutions of competence within schools, and how they conceptualized possibility for justice in early childhood. Findings reveal how Mothers enacted political clarity regarding ableism and racism as they mothered for respect and care. Specifically, Mothers challenged dominant notions of competence in early childhood and strategically resisted early educational practices that positioned their children as unworthy of childhood. Simultaneously, Mothers dreamed beyond the status quo, imagining early childhood systems that decentered educator expertise, and recentered multiply-marginalized children's (and their families') agency. We conclude with implications for teaching and learning in early childhood…. [Direct]
(2021). Propositions for Race-Based Research in Intellectual and Developmental Disabilities. Inclusion, v9 n3 p156-169. A nuanced understanding of disparities impacting racialized people with intellectual and developmental disabilities (IDD) requires scholars employ research methods that make visible the structural factors that influence outcomes. Following the work of Tukufu Zuberi and Eduardo Bonilla-Silva, we explore race-based methodological considerations for disparities research with Black people with IDD. Specifically, we discuss (a) structural racism in research methods, employing disability critical race theory as a framework, (b) the absence of Black voices and Black scholarship, (c) the abstraction and misuse of race as a variable, and (d) mapping race as a point of discussion in the IDD discourse. Implications for research are discussed and recommendations for contextualizing race, ensuring equity in representation and dissemination, and amplifying the voices of Black scholars are provided…. [Direct]
(2024). Cultivating Culturally Responsive-Sustaining Approaches to Social and Emotional Learning for Students with or At-Risk for Emotional Dis/abilities. Excelsior: Leadership in Teaching and Learning, v16 n2 p22-36. School policies are largely driven by perceptions and expectations for how students should behave academically and socially, yet these practices often lack the cultural relevance and sustainability required to support racially, ethnically, and linguistically diverse (RELD) students with or at risk for emotional and behavioral dis/orders (EBD). Similarly, many evidence-based practices for behavior do not consider internalizing behaviors (e.g., anxiety, toxic stress), exemplifying a critical need for equitable practices aimed at supporting the prosocial and emotional needs of RELD students with or at risk for EBD. Given the multifaceted social, emotional, and behavioral needs of RELD students with or at risk for EBD, social and emotional learning (SEL) practices are most effective when implemented through a culturally responsive-sustaining lens. Thus, this paper examines how the pervasive inequities within special education praxis can be mediated through culturally… [Direct]
(2020). Race and Disability in Media Coverage of the Police Homicide of Eric Garner. Journal of Social Work Education, v56 n4 p649-663. This thematic content analysis used frameworks of stigma and critical race theory to examine how mass media represented the life and police homicide of Eric Garner. Findings demonstrate how systemic racism and ableism are reflected in and created through the media's stigmatizing processes of labeling and stereotyping, as well as through voices it chooses to amplify or ignore. As such, media can be framed as a tool of structural oppression. Critical consumption of mass media is proposed as a core social justice-oriented skill for social workers, and suggestions for integrating this skill into social work curricula are made…. [Direct]
(2020). Microaggressions and Macroaggressions across Time: The Longitudinal Construction of Inequality in Schools. Urban Education, v55 n8-9 p1315-1349 Oct-Nov. This article reveals inequity as a longitudinal construction involving the cumulation of micro/macroaggressions for children who live in high-poverty communities and attend poorly funded schools. Drawing on critical race theory and empirical research that documents forms of micro/macroaggression, a longitudinal analysis is used to identify forms of micro/macroaggression encountered in elementary school, middle school, and high school. A set of mega-aggressions that were particularly severe and had devastating effects on students' academic outcomes are identified and explored as mega-aggressions. The article concludes by exploring the cumulation of micro/macroaggressions across one student's school trajectory…. [Direct]
(2020). African American Professionals in Higher Education: Experiencing and Coping with Racial Microaggressions. Race, Ethnicity and Education, v23 n4 p492-508. Using a Critical Race Theory lens, we explored how African American professionals in both HBCUs and PWIs (4-year and 2-year institutions) experienced and coped with racial microaggressions. The participants in this study included fifteen African American instructors/professors and administrators. Despite the type of institution, the emerged themes from interviews indicated that participants experienced an array of racial microaggressions. In addition, many participants addressed race-related stress experienced in the workplace by engaging in both adaptive and maladaptive coping strategies. Implications are provided to discuss the impact that racial microaggressions has on African Americans in the higher education workplace…. [Direct]
(2020). The Color of Neoliberal Reform: A Critical Race Policy Analysis of School District Takeovers in Michigan. Urban Education, v55 n3 p424-447 Mar. This critical case study analyzes Michigan's implementation of Public Act 4 (PA4), also known as the "emergency management" (EM) takeover law. PA4 grants the state control of school districts with dire budgetary problems. As most U.S. school districts are citywide, PA4 gives the state direct control over all the (previously locally controlled) schools in Detroit. We use tenets from critical race theory (CRT) and components from critical policy analysis (CPA) and offer a critical race policy analysis (CRPA) to explore racial power and privilege enacted by PA4, imposed upon Detroit…. [Direct]
(2022). Civic and Political Engagement Attitudes and Behaviors of Southeast Asian American College Students. ProQuest LLC, Ed.D. Dissertation, Temple University. Civic and political engagement is woven into the fabric of higher education and many higher education institutions have intentionally incorporated this in their mission statements. Civic engagement often refers to passive activities like community service, partnership, and reciprocity with others in society while political engagement refers to activities that influences inherent interaction with the government, most common is voting (Verba et al., 1995). Verba and Nie's (1972) defined political engagement using four elements: voting, campaign activities like membership or working for political organizations or donating, contacting public officials, and engagement in local communities that tackles local issues. The problem is that no model or robust framework exists that explains the student experiences of civic and political engagement in higher education. Furthermore, there is an absence of greater empirical studies on civic and political engagement regarding ethnic/racial students… [Direct]