Black Graduate Women With Faculty Aspirations

• In Event: From Baccalaureate to Professoriate: Voices of Black Women From Within the Academy

Abstract

Black women comprise roughly 1.26% of all full professors. Their scarcity at the senior faculty rank is indicative of the challenges they face as graduate students. The pipeline toward successful faculty careers for Black women is wrought with challenges that affect their representation. Institutions provide few role models and mentoring opportunities (Johnson-Bailey, 2004; Patton, 2009), fail to provide sufficient research and funding opportunities (Lovitts & Nelson, 2000; Turner & Thompson, 1993), and foster environments that are extremely isolating for women of color (Gildersleeve, Croom, & Vasquez, 2011; Watt, 2003). These issues can prohibit Black graduate women from aspiring to, let alone, pursuing faculty careers. A Black doctoral student with plans to pursue an academic career might easily conclude that the academy is the last place that Black scholars should be, given the literature. This scholarship, while important, reveals little about why Black graduate students, women in particular, choose faculty careers in light of all the “problems” that lie ahead. This study examined the experiences of Black graduate women who have faculty aspirations through the use of Black Feminist Thought (Collins, 2000) and narrative inquiry methodologies, while challenging conventional wisdom regarding doctoral education and the socialization of graduate students to the profession. Findings illuminate the critical role that graduate schools/programs play in Black graduate women’s socialization to faculty work. Moreover, authors will provide recommendations and strategies that graduate schools/programs could employ to better recruit, prepare, and sustain Black graduate women with faculty aspirations.

Authors

• Lori D. Patton, Indiana University

• Nicole Michelle Joseph, University of Denver