United States Representative Maxine Waters made the phrase "reclaiming my time'' famous in the wake of explosive U.S. political debates, sparking workplace misogyny that Black women experience often in order to belittle or devalue them simply based on the color of their skin. The cultural genealogy of Black womanhood has been attributed to…

There is, a significant gender representation gap in higher education. Along similar lines are the aspect of hiring faculty that identify as female within an ethic minority group, despite the noted benefits of hiring a diverse faculty. Unfortunately, many studies on minority hiring do not differentiate between the two genders, as a result there is…

This thesis consists of two projects I worked on simultaneously throughout my PhD. Although neither project builds on the other, both investigate social systems as networks, and draw on a common set of statistical tools and methods.In the first project, I analyse the academic employment and doctoral education of tenure- track faculty at all…

The purpose of this study was to consider if the method of a professional book club was an effective learning tool for teachers who wanted to be more culturally responsive in the classroom. This study occurred at a public elementary school with 11 racially diverse teachers who all identified as women. This study employed a basic qualitative design…

The United States is witnessing an overwhelming teacher shortage that shows no signs of slowing down. With a tarnished profession of being underpaid and overworked, districts are lowering requirements to hire teaching faculty. Research has shown that lack of training significantly predicts a teaching career's longevity. With White female teachers…

American students are far more diverse than their teachers. Some 79 percent of U.S. teachers are white compared to 44 percent of students. As a result, students of color are far less likely to have a same-race teacher than are white students, a phenomenon that has attracted the attention of philanthropists and policymakers alike. Foundations have…

This study identifies and analyzes factors impacting students' perceptions of international instructors' teaching effectiveness at a U.S. public university. The researchers conceptualized teaching effectiveness as a combination of factors and applied structural equation modeling to analyze the effects on students' perceptions of effectiveness.…

Internationalization has become a priority at many higher education institutions. The larger presence of international students and faculty on campus has occurred at a time when societies around the world are increasingly racially, religiously, ethnically, and culturally diverse. Changing demands require flexibility and understanding among faculty…

Nationwide, Latinx students access dual enrollment (completing college coursework while still enrolled in high school) at lower rates than their white peers. Research on dual enrollment programs is limited and what does exist does not account for rural Latinx students' experiences. The purpose of this qualitative narrative inquiry was to…

The aim of this study is to understand how African American students perceive the impact of diversity on their education's success. The research explored African American student's perspective of having a diverse faculty, administrative staff, and peers in higher education and how this influences their chances of completing their program of study…

Many academic institutions have looked at various ways to make their faculty a more diverse and inclusive group of people that better reflect the demographic swath of their current and future student bodies. This is even more so important in chemistry departments, where there has long been a discussion on the "leaky pipeline" for women…

Extending and challenging existing research about LGBTQIA+ life in rural educational contexts, this ethnographically informed qualitative study describes how Lulu--a white, cisgender, queer secondary English language arts teacher in a rural, public school in the Midwest--discursively constructed the functions of her humor with respect to teaching,…

The Kentucky Council on Postsecondary Education's (CPE's) diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) efforts help ensure that all students, no matter their story, succeed in college. This is achieved through statewide policy that fosters strategic planning and accountability at the campus level and facilitates improvement in three key areas: (1)…

Purpose: In spite of ongoing and recent initiatives aimed at broadening participation in engineering, the representation of diverse groups of learners in engineering graduate programs in the USA remains a challenge. Foregrounding the voices of 26 Black male engineering faculty, this study aims to investigate how institutions might recruit and…

Efforts to mitigate bias in faculty hiring processes are well-documented in the literature. Yet, significant barriers to the hiring of racially minoritized and White women in many STEM fields remain. An underreported barrier to inclusive hiring is assessment of risk. Guided by theory from behavioral economics, social psychology, and…