ackground: Historically Black College and Universities (HBCUs) have for decades played a pivotal role in producing Black scientists. Research found that HBCUs, despite being under funded and resourced, were responsible for over 10% of Black scientists with doctorates. Even though most earn their doctorates at Historically White Institutions (HWIS), understanding the experience of Black STEM doctoral students at HBCUs is of paramount importance to impacting opportunity for success for underrepresented population groups.
HBCUs are recognized for approaches to learning and learning environments that are more relational, encouraging peer to peer and student to faculty relationships, particularly in the form of same-race and same sex mentorships, resulting in less negative racialized gendered experiences and less competitive atmospheres. In spite of what appears to be accepted truths, such as HBCUs offering more culturally affirming experiences, some researchers suggests that little empirical research exists on the quality of support structures available for graduate students at HBCUS in STEM academic fields, particularly mentoring. Increased understanding would provide essential framing necessary for developing more effective mentors at HBCUs, especially given that there are limited numbers of Black faculty in STEM, even at HBCUs.
Theoretical Framework: Anti-racism and critical capital theory are employed as theoretical frameworks. Both are well suited for questioning taken-for-granted assumptions about the lived experiences of racialized others and for deconstructing systemic issues influencing common faculty practices. These frameworks highlight the contextual experiences of STEM doctoral learning.
Research Design: The researchers were interested in understanding how STEM doctoral faculty at HBCUs perceive their role as mentors.
An NSF AGEP sponsored social science research project explored the dispositions, skills, and knowledge of eight STEM faculty at a HBCU. Attitudes towards culturally liberative mentoring were explored through a qualitative case study. The participating faculty were involved in an institutional change program and were interviewed for an average of 60 minutes. Constant comparative data analysis method was used. Additionally, STEM faculty from participating departments completed two mentoring competency and attitude inventories. This case was drawn from a larger multiple embedded case study.
Research Findings: The research findings indicate that STEM doctoral faculty mentors at HBCUs express attitudes about mentoring that are not all that different from their PWIS counterparts. They have a tendency to hold deficit views of domestic Black students and have minimal awareness of how culture inhibits or facilitates a positive learning experience for Black students. Further the culture of science tended to blind them from the culture of people.
Research Implications: In order to enhance the learning experiences of Black STEM doctoral students at HBCUs, the Black student experience at HBCUs must be deromanticized. Understanding the impact of anti-Black racism even within an environment historically and predominantly Black is imperative. Recognizing the ways in which anti-Black attitudes are insidiously present in faculty attitudes and practices and in environments perceived as friendly and supportive for Black students highlights opportunities for STEM faculty development that can move toward a more culturally liberative framework.
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Invisibilized Hypervisibility: Black STEM Doctoral Students, HBCUs, and Mentoring
Background: Even though Historically Black College and Universities (HBCUs) make up only 3% of higher education's institutions, they play a pivotal role in producing Black scientists by virtue of the fact that many received either their undergraduate or doctorate degree from a HBCU. HBCUs are credited with providing a more supportive and nurturing environment that thrives on communal mindsets and practices, emphasizing the importance of relationships, offering opportunities for Black students to "see themselves" as part of the academic and social milieu whereas Historically White Institutions (HWIS) are characterized as being hostile and discriminatory.
Mentoring is said to be pivotal in the attainment of the PhD. Mentorships have an inherent gatekeeping mechanism, better positioning those who receive effective mentorships while disadvantaging those who do not. It has potential to harm and marginalize when not engaged with deliberate care and a culturally liberative mindset. Mentoring, when not under the thumb of colonizing mindsets, can contribute to more equitable experiences and outcomes for students who hail from AGEP population groups. Literature has indicated that Black students are less likely to have a mentor or be engaged in effective mentorships.
The HBCU narrative of supportive environment is consistently told but has scant empirical validation for Black students pursuing STEM doctoral degrees. In fact, the lure of having faculty and peers who look like you is something of an enigma given that even at HBCUs there are limited numbers of Black faculty in STEM. How are same race, same gender mentorships attained when, not unlike their HWIS counterparts, HBCU STEM faculties have a large number of White and Asian men? If the environment is indeed different at HBCUs, is it different for Black STEM doctoral students? Is STEM doctoral mentoring at HBCUs emblematic of anti-Blackness or is it yet another tool used to oppress marginalized students?
Theoretical Framework: Anti-black racism and critical capital theory serve as critical theoretical frameworks and were selected because they highlight the ways violence is enacted through taken for granted colonized practices such as mentoring. Fanon understood that thoughts and mindsets are the progenitors of violence and dehumanization is the process through which violence is enacted. Anti-black racism and critical capital theory can be useful in unearthing the structural inequalities that uphold the current system in place for STEM doctoral learning.
Research Design: An embedded multiple qualitative case study research project sought to understand the nature and quality of STEM doctoral mentorships at an HBCU. The analysis on the HBCU subcase asked, how are STEM doctoral mentorships understood by Black STEM doctoral students at HBCUs? Black STEM HBCU students were interviewed and completed a mentoring competency assessment survey. In addition STEM doctoral students from three universities also completed the survey. The qualitative data was analyzed using narrative analysis and the survey data was analyzed using descriptive and inferential statistics. This project is part of a larger NSF AGEP sponsored research study.
Research findings: The findings from this study expose that Black STEM doctoral students at HBCUs have not reached the proverbial Promise Land. In spite of being in a space that is more diverse, they manage to simultaneously be invisible and hypervisible. An unmerited sense of assumed cultural belonging was highlighted with students reporting a lack of selfethnic reflectors in their programs. In many ways the systemic and institutional structures on HBCUs with respect to STEM doctoral programming mirrored the colonial structures more often associated with HWIS. Their culture and cultural-based experiences as domestic students as well as their academic strengths were often not recognized by mentors while that of international students were. Three themes were supported by the data: Conspicuous Absence, Race Still Matters, and Invisibilized Hypervisibility.
Implications: Better understanding how STEM doctoral mentoring is facilitated at HBCUs holds the promise of informing a mentoring practice that supports cultural liberation instead of cultural degradation and suppression. It becomes one avenue as the “The Call'' suggests to "confront our own complicity in the colonial enterprise" by holding STEM doctoral mentors and the institutions they represent accountable for socially just mentoring practices. Greater intentionality as well as mandated training informed by the study's results are recommended. HBCU faculty doctoral mentors are challenged to be scholar activists who engage mentoring from an advocacy and accomplice framework. The development of STEM scholar activists is the aspiration of more culturally liberative STEM doctoral mentorships. Black students need mentors who are willing and equipped to be advocates and accomplices in their success.
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- Award ID(s):
- 1820536
- NSF-PAR ID:
- 10422250
- Date Published:
- Journal Name:
- ASEE Annual Conference proceedings
- ISSN:
- 1524-4644
- Format(s):
- Medium: X
- Sponsoring Org:
- National Science Foundation
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