Stephen John Quaye

Student Organizations as Venues for Black Identity Expression and Development among African American Male Student Leaders

Ways in which membership in student organizations, both predominantly Black and mainstream, provide space for Black identity expression and development were explored in this study. Based on individual interviews conducted with African American male student leaders at six predominantly White universities, findings reveal a nexus between Black identity status, the selection of venues for out-of-class engagement, and the use of student organizations as platforms for racial uplift and the advocacy of racial/ethnic minority student interests. Moreover, the acquisition of cross-cultural communication skills, the development of care for other disenfranchised groups, and the pursuit of social justice via leadership and student organization membership were reported by the participants and are connected to racial identity development theories in this article.

Toward an Intercultural Perspective of Racial and Ethnic Minority College Student Persistence

Six of every 10 Black and Latina/o undergraduates who begin higher education at a four-year institution will fail to earn a bachelor’s degree within six years. These low rates of attainment are accompanied by negative consequences for individual students and the larger society. Consequently, scholars have advocated for the importance of considering new perspectives of minority college student persistence in higher education research. This study is aimed at generating a new intercultural framework for understanding racial/ethnic minority student persistence processes using existing literature and the voices of students of color. Implications for future research and practice are discussed.

White Educators Facilitating Discussions About Racial Realities

Facilitating democratic discussions about race among students in classroom environments continues to be a problem facing educators. When these discussions occur, they are facilitated mostly by faculty of color. However, given the underrepresentation of faculty of color within higher education institutions and that white students respond differently to these discussions when facilitated by members of their own race, it is critical for white faculty to learn how to facilitate these exchanges among learners. The present study focused on exploring the role of white faculty facilitating discussions about race in their courses. Findings are presented through case examples from two white participants. Implications for research and practice are also discussed.

Hope and Learning: The Outcomes of Contemporary Student Activism.

Often quietly and behind the scenes,Americas college students are effecting positive change in their local communities and around the globe.What do students learn through this kind of activism, and how can educators help them learn it?

Advancing creativity for pedagogy and practice

ABSTRACT In this paper, the authors advocate for using creativity in ones pedagogy, believing that it can be the catalyst for self-empowerment, deeply powerful dialogue, and substantive critique. Creativity as pedagogy does more than offer an aesthetically diverse approach to complex issues, as it pushes against cultural conformity and domination, prompting participatory methods, reflexivity, and provocation. One possibility for this push is through the praxis framework rehearsal, named in this paper. The tenets of rehearsal are: (re)membering, recall, and representation. Rehearsal, as a radical site, insists on preparing for, or practicing, owning ones voice and body simultaneously as a means of disrupting norms and the status quo. This paper will illustrate the possibilities, tensions, and potential outcomes of creativity for pedagogical practice while simultaneously proposing how educational spaces can be theorized, enacted, or resisted in ways that unsettle neoliberal, regulatory, and colonial discourses and practices while imagining alternative possibilities and futures.

Early Childhood Open-Mindedness: An Investigation Into Preservice Teachers’ Capacity to Address Controversial Issues:

We investigated the characteristics of early childhood education (ECE) preservice teachers (PSTs) who were identified as closed minded and their capacity to deal with controversial issues. We define open-mindedness as the willingness to consider experiences, beliefs, values, and perspectives that differ from one’s own. First, we used quantitative surveys to identify PSTs with less open-minded thinking dispositions among those who responded (n = 84). Then, we selected and ultimately interviewed five participants who indicated that their religious views played a significant role in the way they developed their epistemological and ontological views. Interviews suggested that concepts of social justice and the common good were seen as inimical to their core religious beliefs. As such, some respondents avoided these ideas without sufficiently entertaining the complexity involved with their religious beliefs and democratic ideals. This study has numerous implications for the macrocurriculum of teacher education.

Queering Black Racial Identity Development

Abstract: We used queer theory to encourage readers to think differently about previous theories about Black racial identity development. Queer theory facilitates new and deeper understandings of how Black people develop their racial identities, prompting more fluidity and nuance. Specifically, we present a queered model of Black racial identity development and offer implications for using this model in practice in working with Black college students.

A vision of social justice in intergroup dialogue

Intergroup dialogues (IGD) – face-to-face, structured interactions between people of different social identities – is one educational intervention used to foster engagement across differences and to promote social justice. Using an 18-month case study methodology, we examined the experiences of IGD students and facilitators at one campus to gain a deeper understanding of what happens in IGD, specifically how social justice is understood and cultivated. Findings suggest that the primacy and limitations of individual experience, the tension facilitators experience about stepping in to dialogue, and the confounding nature of comfort in IGD contribute to a dialogue experience that better addresses some aspects of social justice than others.

Deconstructing Privilege: Teaching and Learning as Allies in the Classroom Edited by Kim A. Case.

Deconstructing Privilege: Teaching and Learning as Allies in the Classroom, an edited book by Kim A. Case, is written with postsecondary educators in mind—particularly professors in psychology and related therapeutic fields, the academic disciplines from which many of the chapters’ authors originate. Deconstructing Privilege recognizes a need to acknowledge the privilege that remains largely invisible in most college classrooms. Each author provides compelling examples for how conversations and assignments can disrupt hegemony in simple yet meaningful ways. Some professors intentionally infuse critical pedagogy within their classrooms, while others overlook the fundamental ways in which privilege and oppression affect students’ lives. Reasons like this precisely identify why books like Deconstructing Privilege are needed. Although the fields of student affairs or gender studies were not intended as audiences for this book, relevant pieces and exercises within the work can be adapted to contribute to educators’ daily practices, introduced into courses and trainings that educators in these fields lead, and impart them with a desire to be better allies to their colleagues and students. Deconstructing Privilege is comprised of a host of brief pedagogical interventions for helping educators infuse privilege studies within the classroom. The book is broken into three sections: