Education Commons^™

Examining The Relationships Between Gender Role Congruity, Identity, And The Choice To Persist For Women In Undergraduate Physics Majors, Bronwen Bares Pelaez

FIU Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Persistent gender disparity limits the available contributors to advancing some science, technology, engineering, and math (STEM) fields. While higher education can be an influential time-point for ensuring adequate participation, many physics programs across the U.S. have few women in classroom or lab settings. Prior research indicates that these women face considerable barriers. For university students, faculty, and administration to appropriately address these issues, it is important to understand the experiences of women as they navigate male-dominated STEM fields.

This explanatory sequential mixed methods study explored undergraduate female physics majors’ experiences with their male-dominated academic and research spaces in the U.S. …

Beyond Bathrooms: Exploring The Negative Impact Of Hostile Campus Climates On Queer Students, Deaglan An

Global Honors Theses

Anti-Queer violence is a form of systemic oppression that exists on a global level. This paper focuses on anti-Queer violence in higher education, how hostile campus climates impact Queer students, and what communities can do to reduce anti-Queer violence at their institutions. Queer students who deal with hostile campus climates, experience anti-Queer violence from their fellow students, staff and faculty, and their institutions. Students who experience anti-Queer violence can experience emotional distress. This emotional distress can result in students preforming poorly academically, silencing their Queer identities to feel safer on campus, and can result in students leaving their academic institutions. …

How Far Have We Really Come? Black Women Faculty And Graduate Students' Experiences In Higher Education, Lori Walkington

Humboldt Journal of Social Relations

This paper presents a critical overview of the sociological research on Black women's experiences as graduate students and faculty in higher education, with a focus on research since 1995. In interaction with the social inequalities of race and class, how are Black women faculty and graduate student’s experiences with sexism, racism, and classism reproduced within the institution of higher education? What kinds of policies have been implemented to address these problems? What changes, if any, have there been in the experiences of black women faculty and graduate students over time? How do Black women scholars fare in relation to their …

Hiding In Plain Sight: How Binary Gender Assumptions Complicate Efforts To Meet Transgender Students' Name And Pronoun Needs, Dot Brauer

Graduate College Dissertations and Theses

Existing literature about transgender college students calls upon higher education organizations to support trans students' use of self-identified first names (in place of legal names, given at birth) and self-identified pronouns (in place of assumed pronouns based on sex assigned at birth, or other's perceptions of physical appearance), but that literature lacks guidance on how to achieve this work, which is deceptively complex. This study addressed this gap in the literature in two ways. First by using critical theory to show how hegemonic, binary notions of gender shape intellectual, social, and regulatory dimensions of higher education in ways that complicate …

The Long And Unconventional Road: Stories Of Financial Challenges And Systemic Barriers In College Completion For Adult Women Undergraduate Students, Michele Anne Tyson

Higher Education: Doctoral Research Projects

The following doctoral research studies the experiences and stories of adult post-traditional undergraduate women through a feminist narrative inquiry. The study focuses on the financing of a college degree and will be explored through understanding the educational journey of each participant to highlight personal struggle and system barriers. Currently literature about the importance of institutional and federal assistance for this population is absent from higher education. Using a feminist theoretical framework and narrative inquiry, this study describes the importance and value of educating women to both individual families and societal good.