The Influence of Educational Supports for African American Female Students in Middle School
Open AccessResearch suggests that current school structures and teaching strategies allow for a performance gap between African American female students compared to their counterparts from other racial backgrounds (Bonomo, 2010; Bouchamma et al., 2014; Childers-McKee & Hytten, 2015; Crenshaw, 2010; Evans-Winters, 2011; Gershenson & Papageorge, 2018b; Ricks, 2014a). Eradicating this performance gap and changing the current academic trends for many African American female students, school leaders, teachers, and society requires understanding and infusing the mechanisms and strategies known to positively impact their learning experience. This study sought to identify and research best practices incorporated by administrators and teachers to create a culture of achievement for African American female students in middle school. The theoretical framework for this study, Critical Race Feminism, known as (CRF), is a derivative of Critical Race Theory (CRT), which according to the work of Ladson-Billings and Tate (1995), offers "a way to rethink traditional educational scholarship" (p. 60). This study utilized interviews from several schools on the East Coast of the United States with programs designed to improve African American middle school female students' academic outcomes. The best choice of methodology to examine the academic structures supporting African American girls is a basic interpretive qualitative study (Merriam, 2009a; Saldaña, 2016a). Semi-structured interviews with 13 teachers or administrative team members. This study also explored the perceived impact of targeted educational practices through interviews with administrators and teachers. It is important to note that a global pandemic, SARS-CoV-2, or COVID 19, occurred during this study, which caused significant disruptions on an international scale. Regarding this study, this virus impacted the researcher's ability to conduct in-person interviews. The changes to all aspects of life likely impacted potential participants' availability. The data collected from this descriptive study will help school leaders select strategies to adapt to educational settings for this specific subgroup of students. Findings from the data analysis included the following:1. Relationship building between students and teachers was vital in building a positive culture for African American female students. 2. Gender-based affinity space was central to the structure of the participant's schools. 3. Expectations of building student accountability were central to participants. 4. Exposure and representation of African American females in careers were frequently employed practices that participants deemed effective.
- All rights reserved
Notice to Authors
If you are the author of this work and you have any questions about the information on this page, please use the Contact form to get in touch with us.
| Thumbnail | Title | Date Uploaded | Visibility | Actions |
|---|---|---|---|---|
|
|
EvansSmith_gwu_0075A_15473.pdf | 2021-05-10 | Open Access |
|