Teaching, Learning, Policy & Leadership Theses and Dissertations
Permanent URI for this collectionhttp://hdl.handle.net/1903/2759
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Item Crossing the Cultural Bridge: Examining the Cross-Ethnic Interactions and Relationships Between Black Immigrant and Black American Students at a Predominantly White, Public, State Flagship Institution(2024) Ogwo, Ashley; Fries-Britt, Sharon L; Education Policy, and Leadership; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)The discourse surrounding Black immigrant and Black American student relationships in higher education has often centered tensions between the two groups related to their enrollment in private elite institutions (e.g., Bennett & Lutz, 2009; Charles et al., 2008; Massey et al., 2007). However, both inside and outside of the private elite context, there is little research that intentionally examines the cross-ethnic interactions and relationships between Black immigrant and Black American students (Awokoya, 2012; De Walt, 2011; George Mwangi et al., 2016; Jackson & Cothran, 2003). Existing literature’s primary focus on circumstances surrounding Black immigrant and Black American undergraduates that are out of their control, such as their respective over- and underrepresentation at elite colleges (Bennett & Lutz, 2009; Charles et al., 2008; Jaschik, 2017; Massey et al., 2007), has left a significant gap in the knowledge base regarding the actual communicative experiences of these student populations across ethnic lines. Few studies have ventured beyond the private elite institutional context to explore these relational dynamics, resulting in limited scholarly understanding of the benefits and challenges of Black immigrant and Black American interactions and relationship-building from the perspectives of students themselves. This study aims to address these knowledge gaps by examining the cross-ethnic relationship dynamics between Black immigrant and Black American undergraduates in the institutional context they more frequently attend: a predominantly white, moderately selective, public, state flagship institution (U.S. Department of Education National Postsecondary Student Aid Study, 2016, as cited in Espinosa et al., 2019).Utilizing communication theory of identity and case study methodology, this study empirically unpacks the cross-ethnic interactions and relationships between Black immigrant and Black American undergraduates at a predominantly white, public, state flagship institution in the Mid-Atlantic U.S. This study was guided by the following two research questions: 1) What do Black immigrant and Black American students at a predominantly white, public, state flagship institution perceive to be the role of their ethnic identities in their cross-ethnic interactions with one another? And 2) What do Black immigrant and Black American students at a predominantly white, public, state flagship institution perceive to be the benefits and challenges of Black cross-ethnic interactions and relationship-building? My study uncovered six themes that were prevalent across participants’ case narratives, including three challenges and three benefits to cross-ethnic interactions and relationship-building between Black immigrant and Black American students: 1) Challenge #1: “I Don’t Really Have Time”: How Students’ Schedules Limit Their Cross-Ethnic Engagement; 2) Benefit #1: “For the Sake of Community”: Developing Strong Cross-Ethnic Bonds to Support One Another at the PWI; 3) Challenge #2: “Instilled from Childhood”: The “Cycle” of Passing Down Cross-Ethnic Stereotypes and Preconceived Notions; 4) Benefit #2: “Breaking Generational Curses”: Combatting Instilled Interethnic Stereotypes through Cross-Ethnic Communication and Relationship-Building; 5) Challenge #3: “Trying to Reach and Understand the Other Side”: How Lack of Cultural Knowledge Limits Cross-Ethnic Interactions and Relationships; and 6) Benefit #3: “There’s So Much to Learn and Love”: Building Cross-Cultural Understanding through Cross-Ethnic Interactions and Relationships. The study’s findings provide critical insight into existing relational dynamics between Black immigrant and Black American undergraduates, detailing how these students perceive, describe, and make meaning of the relationship between their ethnic identities and their cross-cultural communication experiences with one another as well as the utility of their cross-ethnic interactions.Item INTERNATIONAL VIRTUAL EXCHANGES AND GLOBAL CLASSROOMS: EDUCATING GLOBAL CITIZENS FOR PEACE(2024) Weaver, Gregory; Lin, Jing; Education Policy, and Leadership; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)The outbreak of a global pandemic in the form of the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) and the ever-increasing xenophobia on immigration policies have called for a need to reexamine how universities can internationalize beyond traditional classroom instruction methods. Virtual exchanges have been shown to provide students with a more equal opportunity to develop their global competencies and cultural skills than study abroad. The purpose of this study was to explore the impact of virtual classroom exchanges in higher education for global citizenship development and peace education at a public institution in the United States. It examined university administrators, faculty, and student experiences, perceptions, and voices on global citizenship and peacebuilding within virtual exchange/global classrooms. The study utilized a qualitative case study approach. The qualitative approach consisted of interviews, classroom observations, and document analysis allowing for students and faculty to share their experiences of learning and teaching in the virtual global classroom respectively, and administrators managing the virtual global classroom. The research found that university and departmental administrators served as curators of virtual exchange enabling global citizenship development by providing support via funding, pedagogy models, and navigating several of the international partnerships. Faculty served as facilitators of global citizenship development both within the classroom and outside of the classroom, shaping the project-based projects and challenging their students to think in a non-local mindset. The student participants in the virtual exchanges experienced development of cultural competencies for global citizenship by gaining direct, collaborative experiences working with students of other countries. Promotion of peace education within the virtual exchanges can happen. Albeit as unintentional outcome, students were able to develop much-needed peacebuilding skills that otherwise would not have been possible due to this being the sole form of internalization open to them and their community at the time of the study.Item WHITE RACIAL ALLYSHIP AMONG STAFF AT TRADITIONALLY WHITE INSTITUTIONS(2024) McGuire, Teon Donté; Fries-Britt, Sharon; Education Policy, and Leadership; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)Interrupting Whiteness at Traditionally White Institutions (TWIs) is first and foremost a White problem. Those who have been unjustly privileged due to their race (i.e., White people) have both the resources and primary responsibility to challenge and interrupt the very systems that unjustly oppress People of Color. This study sought to understand the experiences of White staff members at TWIs who intentionally challenge racism and interrupt Whiteness. This study used a multiple case study design with White staff members as the unit of analysis and data were collected through semi-structured interviews and journals from seven White staff members at working at TWIs across the U.S. White staff member practiced racial at the intrapersonal (i.e., working on themselves), interpersonal (e.g., educating students, serving as a resource Students of Color, and being an amplifier), and organizational and institutional (e.g., via hiring and participating in DEI initiatives) levels. Additionally, their actions revealed multiple forms of Whiteness such as, preference of White centric course content, tokenizing People of Color, shifting the blame from racism to those challenging racism, and unfair reward processes.Item “LIBERATING MY MIND... DECOLONIZING MY PHYSICAL BODY”: EXPLORING AFROLATINE/A/O ACTIVISTS’ CRITICAL CONSCIOUSNESS USING PLÁTICA METHODOLOGY(2024) Martinez-Benyarko, Marinel; Espino Lira, Michelle; Education Policy, and Leadership; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)My dissertation, “Liberating my mind...decolonizing my physical body”: Exploring AfroLatine/a/o activists’ critical consciousness using plática methodology, aimed to understand the experiences of 11 AfroLatine/a/o activists in the United States. Scholars have studied AfroLatine/a/os racial/ethnic identity development and activism separately, but this dissertation highlighted the critical consciousness that both these identities possess. Through a “me-search” process, a form of critical consciousness, AfroLatine/a/os assert agency and resilience to make meaning and reflect upon their Blackness and Latinidad (García-Louis & Cortes, 2020). Additionally, those who identify as activists also engage with critical consciousness in understanding social inequities and oppression (Freire, 1970a). My dissertation explored the critical consciousness that AfroLatine/a/os activists possess using plática methodology. Using a plática methodology, I cocreated knowledge, fostered healing and vulnerability, offered collaborators validation, and incorporated life experiences and community building. Pláticas also “constitute a method that recognizes and values familial and cultural knowledge, and platicando becomes the process of drawing on that knowledge and making meaning across experiences” (González Ybarra, 2018, p. 511). Through pláticas, cuentos, chismes, charlas, regaños, and consejos are shared (Fierros & Delgado Bernal, 2016; González Ybarra, 2018; M. Guajardo & Guajardo, 2007). To accomplish this work, I developed a conceptual framework titled, “Exploring AfroLatine/a/o activists critical consciousness,” that brings together (a) Latino critical race theory, (b) Daché et al.’s (2019) Black-imiento, and (c) Freire’s (1970a) conscientization to illuminate the experiences of AfroLatine/a/o activists in a way that highlights their embraced Blackness, heightened knowledge and critical action, and lived experiences. Data were collected via a survey (46 participants), a one-on-one plática (11 collaborators), and a community plática (11 collaborators). Data were analyzed first by collaborators during the community plática. Afterward, I conducted initial/open coding and focused coding strategies. The findings of this study showed that AfroLatine/a/o activists asserted agency and engaged in critical reflection through a continuous process of learning and unlearning to understand their own AfroLatine/a/o identity, country of origin history, colonization, white supremacy, anti-Blackness, and internalized racism. The second finding described the racialideologies that AfroLatine/a/o activists created, which included (a) embracing Black identity by taking pride in their physical appearance, hair, and skin color; (b) centering their resistance in language; and (c) rejecting stereotypes and generalizations of Latine/a/o as a monolithic group. Additionally, this study found that AfroLatine/a/o activists defined their activism as community, advocacy, and compassion. Lastly, the collaborators shared how their AfroLatine/a/o identity was a form of existence as resistance, a form of activism. This study presents various contributions to higher education theory, praxis, research, policy, and AfroLatine/a/o activists. My dissertation makes the following contributions: (a) understanding how marginalized communities navigate and resist oppressive systems, (b) validating the experiences and knowledge of AfroLatine/a/o activists, and (c) challenging a monolithic perspective of Latinidad by showcasing how AfroLatine/a/os embrace their Blackness.Item No Loans, No Problems? Exploring the Post-College Career Choices of No-Loan Program Students at an Elite University(2023) LaFave, Allison; Galindo, Claudia; Education Policy, and Leadership; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)This dissertation examines the post-college career choices of no-loan program alumni at Harvard College. Using a conceptual framework informed by elements of social cognitive career theory (Lent et al., 1994) and Perna’s (2006) model of college choice, it identifies what careers alumni chose after college and how and why they chose them. I approached this single case study from a constructivist perspective, collecting data from diverse sources (i.e., documents and artifacts, informational interviews, a brief screening survey). These data were used to answer two key research questions: 1) What are the post-college career trajectories of no-loan program students at elite colleges and universities? and 2) How do the college experiences of no-loan program students at elite colleges and universities influence their post-college career choices? My data revealed that the professional paths of Harvard Financial Aid Initiative alumni fit into six distinct career archetypes: High-Impact (38%), Hybrid - Pay and Impact (29%), Passion Pursuers (13%), High-Paying (8%), Switchers - Pay to Impact (8%), and Switchers - Impact to Pay (4%). The vast majority of HFAI alumni (75%) have pursued careers that make a positive social impact, often in well-compensated positions (e.g., medicine). Major college influences on their post-college career choices include the following: undergraduate employment experiences, academic performance (both positive and negative), interactions with faculty and administrators (both positive and negative), undergraduate social networks, extracurricular activities, a lack of undergraduate debt, and the signaling effects of their undergraduate degree.Item Learning Together: The Lived Experience of Bridging in Scholars Studio(2023) Nardi, Lisa; Hultgren, Francine H; Education Policy, and Leadership; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)This hermeneutic phenomenological investigation tends to the connections made in Scholars Studio—an interdisciplinary learning community for first-year students at a public Historically Black College and University (HBCU). In this study, I ask, What is the lived experience of bridging in Scholars Studio? I conceptualize bridging as a pedagogical orientation characterized by making connections across disciplines, between theory and praxis, across time and distance, and with one another. Bridging creates dynamic spaces that resist binary relationships, thus creating the potential for transformation. This study is grounded in the philosophy of Martin Heidegger, Mariana Ortega, Hans-Georg Gadamer, Edward Casey, and David Michael Levin, and follows the methodological structure set forth by Max van Manen. This research captures conversations that bridge the experience of twelve participants—including faculty, students, and staff—who partook in a learning community focused on Black men in education. Through these conversations, the participants affirm the importance of curricula grounded in African American and African history and culture. As participants cross the metaphorical bridge, they consider the “edges” they encounter that are both full of risk and possibility. These edges push them outside of their comfort zones in search of wholeness and create potential sites for improvisation. I end by opening new possibilities for Scholars Studio, including grounding the work in African principles and considering future directions.Item Exploring Multiraciality, Power, Privilege, and Oppression: A study on how multiracial students navigate their relationship(s) to socio-political power structures in higher education(2023) Williams-Yee, Abigail; Espino Lira, Michelle; Education Policy, and Leadership; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)There is limited research on the experiences of Multiracial college students (Matsumura, 2017). Current Multiracial narratives within higher education focus primarily on personal identity exploration. Far fewer study how Multiracial students maneuver through socio-political power structures. The literature has also not considered how other Multiracial people might influence how Multiracial students come to understand their position(s) within these systems. This study examined Multiracial students’ connection(s) to socio-political power structures within the United States by asking the following question: How do Multiracial college students, who interact with other Multiracial people, navigate their relationship(s) to power, privilege, and oppression? The findings from this study indicated that Multiracial students are navigating their relationships to power, privilege, and oppression within an anti-Blackness, anti-Multiraciality white supremacy paradigm by developing an understanding of the monoracially dominant paradigm they inhabit, coming to understand the roles that are placed on them as Multiracial people within this paradigm, and rejecting notions that constrict their ability to live as a Multiracial person. The findings suggested that Multiracial students are navigating this landscape by finding and/or creating community, maintaining friendships with Multiracial peers, and developing confidence in creating a core way of being.Item Rules of Engagement: The Role of Graduate Teaching Assistants as Agents of Mathematics Socialization for Undergraduate Students of Color(2023) Lue, Kristyn; Clark, Lawrence M; Education Policy, and Leadership; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)The field of higher education has been concerned with the retention of underrepresented students of Color in the science, technology, engineering, and math (STEM) fields over the last few decades. STEM identity development has emerged as a useful analytic framework in this research, as students with stronger STEM identities—students who recognize themselves and are recognized by others as “STEM people”—are more likely to persist in the STEM fields. STEM identity develops through the process of socialization, in which agents of socialization set and maintain the norms, culture, and values that newcomers in the STEM fields should emulate. At institutions of higher education, instructors act as primary agents of socialization, signaling who “belongs”—and who doesn’t—in the STEM fields. Although prior research has identified the ways in which mathematics courses gatekeep underrepresented undergraduate students of Color out of the STEM fields, little research has focused specifically on undergraduate mathematics socialization. Furthermore, the role of graduate teaching assistants (GTAs) as agents of mathematics socialization remains unexamined, despite the large role they play in teaching lower-level undergraduate mathematics courses. This qualitative dissertation, which is grounded in Critical Race Theory and Critical Whiteness studies, utilizes critical ethnographic methods in order to examine the ways in which GTAs at a historically white [college and] university (HWCU) serve as agents of mathematics socialization for underrepresented undergraduate students of Color. Through fieldwork, individual interviews, and a series of focus groups with ten GTAs at a large, public, research-1 institution in the Mid-Atlantic region of the United States (MAU), this dissertation study explored: (1) GTAs’ perceptions of the dominant culture (e.g. values and practices) of the mathematics department at their institution, and whether they sought to align with or diverge from this culture, (2) the opportunities and constraints GTAs faced in breaking from these normative values and practices, and (3) whether the ways in which GTAs described trying to break from these practices reinforced the systematic exclusion of underrepresented undergraduate students of Color in their mathematics department. Key findings include four major themes: a culture of individualism and the hidden necessity of social ties in the mathematics department at MAU, the valuation of teaching as a means of doing research, attempts by GTAs to shift normative narratives of mathematical success, and identity tensions in supporting underrepresented undergraduate students of Color. These findings highlight the importance for agents of mathematics socialization to explicitly center race, racism, and power when trying to be inclusive of underrepresented undergraduate students of Color in university mathematics settings. Without doing so, racism and whiteness are reproduced and perpetuated in the mathematics socialization of underrepresented undergraduate students of Color, despite good intentions.Item The Development of Students' Understandings of Identity, Inequality, and Service during a Critical International Service Learning Program in the Dominican Republic(2022) Gombin-Sperling, Jeremy Ryan; Klees, Steven J; Education Policy, and Leadership; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)International service learning programs have continued to rise in popularity across U.S. institutions of higher education as a way of offering students comprehensive formats to engage with communities in other countries, learn how social issues of inequality impact people around the world, and strengthen student learning on global issues. However, many of these programs lack a critical perspective, and often struggle or avoid conversations on the power dynamics of service, and, therefore, the potential harm that international service learning courses can cause and reproduce. At the same time, programs that do promote a critical approach to service abroad, fail to address the vital role that social identity plays in these programs (e.g., race, gender, sexuality, nationality, social class, etc.), and often ignore how those dynamics impact the differentiating experiences of students, and how they connect to the social issues community partners face. This dissertation study is an attempt to analyze a critical international service learning program to the Dominican Republic that I and a colleague co-led from 2018-2020. This program intended to offer intervention to both issues of critical awareness and identity dynamics through our integration of intergroup dialogue pedagogy and theory into all aspects of the program. Utilizing qualitative case study methods such as participant interviews, document analysis, and participant observations, I look at the impact that the 2020 version of the course had on 8 of the 11 students that year by analyzing their evolving learning in the areas of social identity, structural inequality, and service, as well as the program components that influenced this learning. Findings from the study overall suggest that participation in the program helped push students to reevaluate numerous aspects of their identity across areas such as race, gender, and SES/social class, and also better identify different forms of inequality and their impact – mostly in the context of the Dominican Republic and to an extent in the United States. With that said, learning outcomes were deeply tied to the positionality of students and their preexisting level of engagement with course themes. Generally, it seemed that students of greater racial and/or financial privilege were less willing to think critically about their positionality within systems of inequality and therefore their connection to the phenomena we observed abroad. This differed from students of less declared privilege who approached course materials through the intersection of social identity and inequality. Despite these gains, findings suggest that the course reproduced power hierarchies between our service group and community partners and within our group. Implications for research and theory include the need to further study the integration of intergroup dialogue in international service programs, the impact of greater community partner collaboration vis-à-vis dialogue and program involvement, and the exploration of increased affinity group work within service learning programs to better attend to student needs, especially those of students from marginalized positions.Item EVALUATING THE EFFECT OF STATE TITLE IX POLICIES ON COLLEGE CAMPUSES THROUGH DIFFERENCE-IN-DIFFERENCES INVESTIGATION(2022) Licata-Hoang, Christine Alexis; Titus, Marvin A.; Education Policy, and Leadership; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)One in five women and one in 15 men will experience sexual assault while enrolled in college. Rates of sexual assault in higher education have remained relatively constant over the past 50 years (Cantor et al., 2020). Nevertheless, the industry has seen a resurgence of focused pressure to eradicate the issue more effectively. Despite several decades of excellent work on campus sexual violence and higher education policy research, scholars have not addressed the intersection of these two areas to explore state-level outcomes. This study examines a new pathway of policy research focused on the effect of state-level Title IX policies on sexual assault incident reports on college campuses within the United States. Using difference-in-differences regression techniques, principal-agent theory (Kivisto, 2005; Lane & Kivisto, 2008), and the policy adoption framework (Hearn et al., 2017), the purpose of this research is to determine the effect of state-level Title IX laws on the frequency of recorded incident reports at four-year public institutions of higher education between 2010 and 2019. This research utilizes data from IPEDS and the U.S. Department of Education. California and New York serve as the two treatment cases in the study. Each state is compared to regional compact or neighboring states and a national set of never-adopting states. This study examines the policy’s average treatment effect over ten years, as well as year-to-year, to uncover the policy effect from enactment to normalized implementation. Ultimately, this study illuminates the efficacy of these state-level Title IX policies and determines whether the policy serves as a valuable intervention tool to eradicate campus sexual violence.