Federal discourse pertaining to college access requires clarified definition. Use of the college access construct has become commonplace, yet no unified refinement of meaning exists. This study, which covered U.S. presidential communications from January 2009 to October 2021, addressed the abstraction of language as leaders presented ideas,…

Where are the women in computing? This dissertation explores the underrepresentation of women in computing as a cultural issue. After considering the role of women in the history of computing, it examines contemporary interventions to address gender bias and promote gender diversity in the tech sector and Silicon Valley. Not for profit…

Previous policy analysis of the Top Ten Percent Plan (TTPP) has focused on the outcomes of the policy (e.g., Card & Krueger, 2005; Kain & O'Brien, 2004; Long, 2004), answering questions such as whether the TTPP led to increased or decreased access for particular groups. Absent from the literature is an analysis of the policy-change process…

The underrepresentation of women in STEM more generally and in physics specifically has been well established (e.g., Hyater-Adams, Fracchiolla, Finkelstein, & Hinko, 2018; Johnson, Ong, Ko, Smith, & Hodari, (2017); Lock & Hazari, 2016), and the field remains challenged by the negative consequences of this underrepresentation. Women's…

Women earn bachelor's degrees in engineering at a rate of less than 17% at public universities in California. The purpose of this study was to understand how women experience undergraduate engineering programs at public universities. To understand this lack of attainment, a qualitative methodology and Feminist Poststructuralist perspective were…

Diversity is valued and promoted in contemporary public discourse, but on the other hand, there is a strong tendency to homogenize differences in society. The tension between diversity and homogeneity is palpable on U.S. college campuses as the number of international students has been ever-increasing. A more nuanced approach is needed to grapple…

The number of females in senior level leadership positions in higher education is substantially fewer than males. Yet female students in these same institutions represent over half the population (National Center for Educational Statistics, 2010). The leadership gender gap is a phenomenon that has undergone numerous studies in search of reasons…

Disproportionality, the over- or underrepresentation of a particular group compared to its presence in a population, in special education is a long-standing issue (Dunn, 1968; U.S. Department of Education, 2006; Waitoller, Artiles, & Cheney, 2010). Some scholars have proposed group or universal screening for emotional and behavioral risk in…