Black History Month — February in the U.S. — provides an opportunity to both celebrate the Black community’s past contributions and consider the issues and obstacles to equity of today and tomorrow. Research and scholarship is a vital component of this work and is instrumental to creating policies, practices, and procedures that improve lives.
Read MoreFor the second event in our “Reimagining Social Institutions” series, a panel of experts will be exploring what anti-racist higher education would look like. The series is a public forum created in partnership with SSRC for cultivating equitable, anti-racist social institutions. The discussions acknowledge that human behavior and outcomes are shaped by historical, political and social forces, and that lasting change today can only come from tackling the existing structures themselves. The event will be taking place on December 17, 2020.
Read MoreThis year has exposed a lot of glaring flaws in how modern society functions, not least of which its relationship with race and racism. We all, as individuals and as part of institutions, had to take a long hard look at ourselves and the ways we were contributing to the problem. Racism has a long history within the academy—from unethical research methodology and cruel experimentation to outlandish theories about the hierarchies of human races—and no field was exempt, including the social sciences.
Read MoreThough protests across the world are raising awareness about racist inequalities that affect the Black community, as well as Brown, Indigenous, and Asian communities, mass media’s coverage often disregards and under-represents first generation students. Institutional racism has been a topic of discussion, but there are still many underlying issues that are not seen by anyone except for the people that live through those hardships. With this blog post, I will describe some of the issues that target Hispanic first gen students within my community, including funding, at-home responsibilities, and a lack of mentorship.
Read MoreFuture postsecondary faculty, researchers, scholars, and administrators are not insulated from hunger, debt, financial anxiety, nor the need for a secure place to sleep. Coupled with the unpredictable post-graduate labor market, it is urgent we attend to the challenges and risks doctoral students take. This is especially important given what we know about the oppressive structural and cultural hurdles faced by doctoral students from all backgrounds (Posselt, 2018) and Black and Latinx doctoral students in particular (Gildersleeve, Croom, & Vasquez, 2011), often in distinct ways by gender (Ingram, 2013; Winkle-Wagner, Johnson, Morelon-Quainoo, & Santiague, 2010).
Read More“Let me make clear,” Stephanie A. Jirard, J.D., began. “Silence on the topic of race with your students is no longer an option.”
Read MoreIn the United States, 82.7% of all public school teachers are white and it is estimated that 62% of all U.S. educators are white women. In higher education, a 2019 report by the American Council on Education found that only one in five full-time faculty were faculty of color. These statistics reflect the ongoing call to improve the academic pipeline so that it supports Black, Indigenous, and People of Color. Educational institutions must work to strengthen the diversity of their staff, putting valuable, anti-racist measures in place. And white educators also need to put in work themselves.
Read MoreIn the wake of George Floyd’s killing, protests across the U.S. are amplifying deep-seated issues on structural racism and calling for society to finally engage in critical, culture-changing conversations. While many might find these conversations uncomfortable or not know how to start, research from the social and behavioral sciences can help. We’ve compiled a list of freely accessible, research-based resources on the importance of these discussions, best practices for carrying them out, as well as tools you can use to initiate discussing racism and policing with your students.
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