Using narrative inquiry methodology grounded in the polymorphous paradigm and intersectionality as a conceptual framework, this study explored the experiences of seven college student sex workers. Together, we uncovered substantial differences between the experiences of college student sex workers with dominant identities largely present in extant…

This research shares testimonios from 11 Latina undergraduates attending a 4-year PWI in the Western US to better understand how they defined and measured their success in higher education. Traditional success measures, like graduation and persistence rates, are based on the institution's values and do not fully represent Latine values. While…

Women in male-dominated majors (MDMs), such as computer science, experience higher attrition rates than their male peers. Women in MDMs retrospectively report via surveys more negative events, sexism for instance, and fewer positive events, such as support from male peers in MDMs and female peers in gender-neutral majors (GNMs) like history. To…

Upward social mobility is often framed in research in ways that may disguise the unique journeys that Women of Color travel in college and as they aspire toward graduate degrees. This assets-based approach to a multisite case study explored how undergraduate Women of Color who aspire toward graduate education viewed the meaning of their potential…

Higher education researchers have defined the need of feeling connected to a place or community as a sense of belonging or a student's ability to connect to campus through support systems, positive interactions, and mattering (Hurtado & Carter, 1997; Strayhorn, 2012). A student belonging to or within an institution has been associated with…

This critical narrative inquiry explored how white women's racialized emotions are structured by whiteness as a technology of affect (Leonardo & Zembylas, 2013) and connected to particular college experiences. Specifically, white women college students used claims of niceness and demands for emotional comfort as cover for racial harm, while…

In recent years, opportunities for student affairs educators to pursue professional development have increased. These opportunities include pursuing additional degrees or learning experiences sponsored by professional associations. However, these opportunities come with physical and financial costs that need to be collectively assessed and…

There are many informal rules regarding women's premarital relationships in Turkey and Islamic cultures in general. It is an unspoken rule that Turkish families disapprove of their daughters' dating. We explored women's experiences hiding their romantic relationships from their families during the COVID-19 pandemic. Participants included nine…

Although graduate preparation programs are a key entry point for the higher education and student affairs (HESA) profession, many programs fail Black women practitioners who later serve in predominantly white work environments (PWWEs). While a dominant narrative suggests Black women perform well as learners in higher education, there is limited…

Student activism plays an important role in student development, so understanding student activists' thoughts, identifying challenges they have encountered, and figuring out ways to support their activities are critical for higher education institutions. A group of college students in Korea has established a student organization actively engaging…

Higher education historians agree that the earliest direct antecedents to today's student affairs professionals were deans of women (DOWs) and deans of men (DOMs), administrative positions that first arose in the 19th century. While DOWs were expected to supervise women students within newly coeducational environments, they professionalized the…

College-educated white women across social classes support and uphold racism. Using narrative methods in a secondary analysis, we, as two white women, explored how white non-trans women make meaning of social class using the revised model of multiple dimensions of identity (RMMDI; Abes et al., 2007) as positioned within the context of white…

Women have long held leadership roles in society and education, yet little attention has been given to the experiences of women student body presidents. We studied 20 women student body presidents at multiple four-year institutions to understand their experiences in student leadership. We found that these women felt extreme responsibility and…

Higher education scholarship has underscored how contextual influences within and outside institutional settings influence students' developmental journeys. A subset of research has examined how Latinx/a/o students broach questions of identity while in college and how families inform their development. Yet, little scholarship has investigated how…

The purpose of this study was to explore how Hip Hop informed the construction of gendered racial and sexual identities among Black women at predominately white institutions (PWIs). Ten Black women undergraduates at a PWI in the midwestern region of the US engaged in individual and focus group interviews, which included participating in an…