Black College Student Retention: The Implications of Intersectionality and Multiple Identities on Perceptions of Racial Climate

• In Event: Roundtable Session 79
  In Roundtable Session: Making It Through Postsecondary Schooling: A Collection of Studies Attending to Race and Higher Education Success

Abstract

This study examines the experiences of 23 Black undergraduate students attending two highly selective research-intense institutions on the west coast. Study participants were recruited using "purposeful sampling" and included students that were currently enrolled as African American Studies minors or majors.

Using the lens of intersectionality, our analysis of the data also paid particular attention to other salient identity labels that add to the differential experiences of Black students on college campuses.

This study represents data demonstrating that there are multiple identities that shape Black students' raced experiences within predominantly White normed Institutions, and these intersecting forms of disadvantaged and/or privileged group statuses shape the differential campus racial climates they encounter and ultimately their success on campus.

Authors

• Uma Madhure Jayakumar, University of San Francisco

• Cheryl Ann Brown, Stanford University