(2024). Factors That Influence Elementary School Teachers Who Refer Students to Special Education. ProQuest LLC, Psy.D. Dissertation, Walden University. There is an overrepresentation of African American students in special education classes; placing African Americans disproportionately in special education classes lowers their self-esteem and compromises their academic performance. This study aimed to increase understanding of the meaning-making processes elementary school general education teachers use to refer African American students for special education services. I used critical race theory (CRT) to support the study, which suggests that structural racism in schools harms African American students' self-esteem and academic achievement. Two research questions directed the study: What are the decision-making processes of elementary school teachers who refer African American students for special education services? How do the beliefs of teachers impact their decision to refer African American students for special education services? With a qualitative approach, I interviewed 14 K-6 public school general education teachers who had… [Direct]
(2021). Perspectives against Racism: Educational and Socialization Efforts at the Departmental Level. Advances in Physiology Education, v45 n4 p720-729 Dec. The current heightened social awareness and anxiety triggered by escalating violence against Black Americans in the United States demands a safe space for reflection, education, and civil discourse within the academic setting. Too often there is an unmet need paired with a collective urgent desire to better understand the chronic existing structural, social, educational, and health inequities affecting disadvantaged populations, particularly Black Americans. In this perspective, the authors provide insight into a shared learning approach that provided a forum to discuss Perspectives Against Racism (PAR). Unlike existing top-down approaches, faculty, trainees, and staff were engaged in leading a series of focused discussions to examine unconscious bias, promote awareness of implicit biases, and reflect on individual and collective roles and responsibilities in working toward becoming antiracist. An existing 1-h graduate elective seminar course was dedicated to creating a space for… [Direct]
(2024). Building Brighter Futures: Dismantling the Preschool-to-Prison Pipeline. ProQuest LLC, D.S.W. Dissertation, California Baptist University. The Building a Brighter Future: Community Symposium Against the Preschool-to-Prison Pipeline addresses systemic inequities in early childhood education and the juvenile justice system. The symposium aims to combat the preschool-to-prison pipeline–a phenomenon disproportionately affecting children from economically disadvantaged backgrounds, racial and ethnic minorities, individuals with disabilities, and those in foster care. The symposium employs the Dismantling Racism, Equality, and Achieving Milestones in Schools framework to address the root causes of this pipeline, fostering collaboration among educators, community leaders, law enforcement, parents, and policymakers. The symposium's structured methodology emphasizes continuous quality improvement, assessing its impact through quantitative and qualitative research methods. This initiative seeks to inspire collective action, enhance community awareness, and promote an inclusive and equitable environment for all children,… [Direct]
(2024). Still Climbing the Hill: Intersectional Reflections on Brown and Beyond. Educational Researcher, v53 n2 p73-84. National Youth Poet Laureate Amanda Gorman's poem "The Hill We Climb"–among the most powerful moments of the 2021 presidential inauguration–inspired the central inquiry of the 18th Annual "Brown" Lecture in Education Research: Why are we still climbing the hill of educational equity 67 years after the U.S. Supreme Court's landmark decision in "Brown v. Board of Education?" The purpose of this article is to challenge dominant narratives surrounding "Brown" and introduce perspectives that might help account for a general lack of progress–perspectives that typically are overlooked or erased in wider "Brown" discourses. Inspired by her poem, Patton Davis offers a scholarly analysis and contributes a robust understanding of "Brown" and its historical and contemporary meanings in the sociopolitical contexts of racism and white supremacy. Patton Davis considers pressing questions: How can study of the circumstances that have… [Direct]
(2022). Pre-Service English Teachers' Reflections on Culturally Responsive Teaching in Teacher Education. English Teaching, v77 n4 p159-176 Win. As Korea has recently become a multicultural society, English teachers acknowledge the need to address anti-racism in the classroom. However, how to raise students' racial awareness and ways to incorporate racial issues into English language instruction have not been sufficiently studied in the Korean teacher education context. The aims of this study were to provide pre-service English teachers with a guide to implementing antiracist pedagogy in their language teaching and assessing its impact on their racial literacy development and to examine how pre-service English teachers' racial literacy can be developed through multiple self-reflective practices and microteaching experiences in their teacher education programs. This paper first introduces an anti-racist curriculum for pre-service English teachers intended to raise their multicultural awareness, and then provides multiple educational resources and teaching strategies to help them become culturally responsive language teachers…. [PDF]
(2023). English as an International Language Education: Critical Intercultural Literacy Perspectives. English Language Education. Volume 33. English Language Education This volume provides an overview of current issues in English as an International Language (EIL) education and critical intercultural literacy pedagogy. The different chapters are inspired by 'critical interculturality' as a decolonial project that seeks to interrogate the structures, conditions, and mechanisms of colonial power relations that still pervade our increasingly globalising postcolonial societies; they tend to perpetuate forms of discrimination such as sexism, racism, classism, heterosexism and linguicism. Divided into five sections, this collection critically examines English Language Teaching textbooks' integration of intercultural dimensions, the promotion of intercultural literacy in teacher education programs, the management of cultural diversity in multicultural professional/business and educational situations, and the 'decolonisation' of the curriculum in various global educational and professional situations. The book presents a range of linguistic approaches as a… [Direct]
(2023). Critical Race Theory: An Exploration of African American Medical Students' Perception of Their Racialized Experiences While Attending Medical School. ProQuest LLC, Ed.D. Dissertation, The University of Memphis. Supported by Critical Race Theory, this study explores the perceptions of African-American medical students regarding their racialized experiences while attending medical school. The history of African Americans seeking medical education in the United States is entrenched in a legacy of racial segregation, social and cultural constructs, and legal doctrine perpetuated through society's sustained racial bias. Critical Race Theory has often examined the relationship between race and education systems. Critical Race Theory in medicine consistently acknowledges race as a social construct. Racism is not obsolete, and this is not a post-racial world. A critical race methodology research approach along with counter stories will be utilized in this study through semi-structured interviews to fully understand participants' lived experiences as African American medical students and generate data concerning racialized experiences while attending medical schools. [The dissertation citations… [Direct]
(2023). Reclaiming the System: Group Counseling Landscape in Schools. Professional School Counseling, v27 n1a. Postpandemic culture has provided educators the opportunity to rebuild and reclaim the education system from its very foundation. Pioneering researchers in school counseling have begun reexamining what antiracist school counseling programs look like and providing school counselors practical recommendations for addressing racism and dismantling racist policies and procedures in their schools. This article disseminates findings from a quantitative research study that examined how school counselors are currently utilizing the lens of power, privilege, and intersectionality in their implementation of small groups in their schools. The results indicated that about half (52%) of participants are implementing small-group counseling through this lens while the other half are not. Further results showed that, demographically, school counselors who identified as Black or African American are more likely to do this critical work. We discuss implications for practitioners as they explore their… [Direct]
(2019). Experiences of Cross-Racial Trust in Mentoring Relationships between Black Doctoral Counseling Students and White Counselor Educators and Supervisors. Professional Counselor, v9 n3 p211-225. The literature is replete with research and references to racism experienced by Black faculty and students in counselor education. Although explorations of the mistrust in relationships between races is extant, empirical investigations into trusting cross-racial relationships in counselor education have been scarce. To address this void, the researchers conducted a phenomenological qualitative study with 10 Black doctoral counseling students concerning their experiences of cross-racial trust with White counselor educators and clinical supervisors who were mentors. Researchers identified three superordinate themes during data analysis: reasons for trust, reasons for mistrust, and benefits of cross-racial mentoring. The researchers also identified several themes and subthemes that delineated the interpersonal and intrapersonal factors that helped generate cross-racial trust, despite participants' ubiquitous experiences of racism. The participants' experiences are discussed, and… [PDF]
(2021). Mirrors to the Soul: Elementary Preservice Teachers' Critical Reflections of Situating Race, Racism, and Antiracism within the Literacy Curriculum. ProQuest LLC, Ph.D. Dissertation, University of Arkansas at Little Rock. Research that engages preservice teachers in critical reflective practices may reveal the level at which they understand and confront their own biases when addressing race within the institutions and societies they interact. This study was conducted to understand the depth in which elementary preservice teachers critically reflect on their own racialized experiences and beliefs and how they situate race within the literacy curriculum through the lens of critical race theory. Semi-structured interviews were conducted with 21 preservice teachers. Findings indicated that preservice teachers believe antiracist themes should be integrated into literacy. However, due to lack of exposure, limited coursework, and curriculum mandates, they were not fully prepared to address race, racism, and antiracism within literacy instruction. Future research should focus on revising teacher education programs to include a more concrete focus on race and racism, specifically ways to navigate those topics… [Direct]
(2022). A Domains of Power Analysis of the Narratives of Women of Color on Community College STEM Education Pathways. Journal of Women and Gender in Higher Education, v15 n4 p375-395. Informed by Black feminist thought and intersectional feminism, this study examined the lived experiences of 12 Women of Color on community college STEM education pathways. Participants were current and former community college STEM students, whose narrative interviews were analyzed using Patricia Hill Collins's domains of power framework. Findings suggest that rather than participants' experiences being isolated cases, they form a part of a larger pattern of realities that reveal multiple forms of power operating in STEM and beyond. Participants' experiences of racism and heterosexism intersected with other identities and backgrounds such as being a transfer student, an undocumented student, and a parent. These overlapping and multilayered manifestations of power were found to impact individuals' abilities to successfully navigate STEM in higher education. While the women of this study critically analyzed their experiences of power and resisted oppression, all stakeholders in the… [Direct]
(2024). Talking Back as an Act of Resistance and Healing for Black Women Survivors of Prostitution. ProQuest LLC, Ed.D. Dissertation, The University of Memphis. The sexual abuse and prostitution of Black women is a system of oppression that has its foundation in slavery and is still embedded in the culture of the U.S. This ongoing practice of domination, racism, sexism, and class exploitation is at work daily in the lives of Black women. Some of the harsh conditions of today that limit choice and influence Black women into prostitution include poverty, lack of opportunity/education, and prior sexual, emotional, and physical abuse, which leads to a disproportionate number of women of color and girls of color who are trapped by racism and structural oppression into prostitution. Drawing on Black Feminist Theorists (BFT) Collins (2000) and hooks (1989) and Communities of Practice by Wenger (1998) and Wenger et al. (2002), the purpose of this study is to share the narratives of Black women survivors of prostitution and their communities of practice to consider the role of spiritual practices in shaping their experiences. The participants were… [Direct]
(2023). Bruised, Not Broken: Scholarly Personal Narratives of Black Women in the Academy. International Journal of Qualitative Studies in Education (QSE), v36 n10 p2229-2251. With growing research on our experiences, this paper explores the academic lives of four doctorate-holding Black women. Using Scholarly Personal Narrative as a methodology, monologues and reflections from a conference on race in higher education were analyzed and thematically situated to understand the vantages of navigating gendered racism in the academy. Black women experience advancing the academy in painful ways that impact their well-being and professional trajectory. Amidst a growth in social justice-focused academic programs, contemporary politics have undercut the experiences of Black women whose stories are often academicized and co-opted by others. Through the unique lens afforded by intersectionality, this paper addresses the need to listen to and value Black women's stories. Additionally, discussions herein underscore how providing a venue for Black women to foster commu nity benefits our and others' success which has implications for practice, research, and policy…. [Direct]
(2022). Remnants of Educational Leadership and Desegregation Etched in the Memories of Black Educational Leaders: An Oral History. ProQuest LLC, Ed.D. Dissertation, University of South Florida. In this study the experiences of Black (a.k.a. African Americans/ Negroes) educational leaders were explored focusing on the period during the transition to a more desegregated public- school setting in the state of Florida. Using retrospective storytelling and reflections of 'leading' during desegregation, the lived experiences of those in educational leadership roles were captured in the form of oral histories and analyzed using critical race theory. The effects of desegregation is recounted from their vantage point, from the dissolution of the 'all Black' schools to the impact it had on the communities. The research question was: "What are the stories told by Black people in educational leadership roles about leading during the school desegregation era?" The sub-questions were: "How did school desegregation efforts affect their experiences as Black educational administrators?" "How do counter-narratives about educational leadership manifest in their… [Direct]
(2024). Bridging Compliance Gaps: Training on Special Education Mandates in Carceral Spaces. ProQuest LLC, D.Ed. Dissertation, American University. This dissertation of practice delves into the critical examination of special education provision in adult correctional facilities, focusing on the systemic and compliance-related challenges that predominantly impact incarcerated Black males ages 18 to 21. Through the lenses of Critical Race Theory (CRT) and Disability Critical Race Theory (DisCrit), it investigates the compounded effects of systemic racism and ableism, highlighting the stark disparities in educational outcomes and the perpetuation of the prison-to-prison pipeline. The research employs a multifaceted methodology, including an analysis of legal frameworks and an intervention workshop aimed at enhancing the understanding and implementation of special education mandates among carceral staff. The findings reveal a deficit in the delivery of federally mandated educational supports within the carceral system, exacerbated by systemic inefficiencies. These deficiencies significantly contribute to increased recidivism rates… [Direct]