Teaching, Learning, Policy & Leadership Theses and Dissertations
Permanent URI for this collectionhttp://hdl.handle.net/1903/2759
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Item ACTIVATING TECHNOCAPITAL: A CASE STUDY OF MARGINALIZED MIDDLE SCHOOL YOUTHS’ EXPERIENCES WITH INFORMATION COMMUNICATION TECHNOLOGY.(2023) Crenshaw, Kenyatta Lynn; Elby, Andrew; Croninger, Robert; Education Policy, and Leadership; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)This case study explores ways that socio-cultural and environmental factors influence the technological experiences of marginalized, underrepresented youth at an urban summer learning program, which supports Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics (STEM) and environmental sustainability education. The study specifically explores the socio-cultural and environmental aspects of students’ experience with digital literacy/ information communication technology (computer based and mobile technologies), and the pedagogical practices applied by educators (teachers, family members, and peers) that influence the students’ experiences with digital learning over the period of eight weeks. The principal focus is on eight middle school students ranging from nine to twelve years of age who reside in an urban environment with their parents/caregivers. In efforts to better understand the experiences of the students, the focus is shared (but not centered) on the parents/caregivers, educators, and volunteer community members who contribute to the students’ perception and use of technology. A major finding of the study is that community-embedded resources, what have been referred to in the literature as funds of knowledge or community cultural wealth, can play a positive role in shaping students’ experiences with technology, especially when students, parents, and educators use those resources to create culturally relevant learning experiences that contribute to building technocapital. In general, the findings address beliefs and contextual ecological factors that contribute to the appearance and activation of social and cultural capital in the technological practices of marginalized youth. The accounts of youth and parent perspectives uniquely display the ways the funds of knowledge and community cultural wealth act as social and cultural capital. The participant stories present how the networks of the participants’ parents and community contribute to social connectivity and the awareness of civic participation in both the exosystem and mesosystem of their lives. Overall, the findings present an evidence-based contribution to further support the need to understand and advocate for funding and the development of policy to address: 1) racial/ethnic and socioeconomic differences in education; 2) the positive processes by which cultural resources in the communities of marginalized youth are converted into social and educational advantages; and 3) increasing knowledge and utility of the various forms of capital embedded in moderate-to-low income, non-majority communities that play a positive role in youths’ motivation to utilize ICT and develop digital literacy skills that increase productivity and achievement. Keywords: underrepresented youth, supplemental learning program, information communication technology, digital learning, social capital, cultural capital, funds of knowledge, community cultural wealth.Item WHAT'S CULTURE GOT TO DO WITH IT? AN INVESTIGATION INTO THE INDIVIDUAL AND INSTITUTIONAL FACTORS THAT SUPPORT UNDERREPRESENTED MINORITY AND FIRST-GENERATION WOMEN GRADUATE STUDENTS' SUCCESS IN STEM FIELDS(2018) DeCrosta, Lauren Ashley; Stromquist, Nelly; Education Policy, and Leadership; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)This qualitative research study applies feminist standpoint theory and community cultural wealth to investigate the individual and institutional factors that underrepresented minority and first-generation women graduate students report as having contributed to their gaining access to and navigating through their graduate STEM degree programs. Through the presentation of five women graduate students’ testimonios, this study offers the women participants an opportunity to provide a counternarrative in their own voices to the prevailing deficit lens with which education literature views them. This study highlights the ways in which the assets from the women’s community cultural wealth, although overlooked by their graduate institution, are instrumental to their success. In addition, this study asks the women participants to share their perceptions of the institutional resources and services available to them and evaluate their utility in supporting them. The women’s narratives are testimonios to their experiences as underrepresented minority and first-generation women graduate students in STEM fields. The findings both provide a counternarrative to the deficit literature on underrepresented minority and first-generation women students in STEM fields and add to the literature that uses Yosso’s (2005) community cultural wealth as a conceptual framework by expanding its application to other underrepresented populations in the United States and to advanced, highly technical STEM fields. Additionally, the findings have implications for educational practice and further research: they suggest that universities need to better understand the multiple aspects of students’ individual cultures and reconfigure their campus and STEM classroom cultures in ways that are structured by and reflective of students’ community cultural wealth