Critiquing High-Achieving: How Black Women in Honors Make Meaning Around Their Identity

• In Event: Poster Session 7
  In Poster Session: College Student Learning and Development

Abstract

Honors students are often regarded as the best and brightest at their universities. But how do ethnic minority students, particularly Black women, make meaning around their high-achieving status and its intersection with their various other social identities? How well do the definitions of high-achievement fit for identifying talented Black undergraduate women? Based on a qualitative study on the experiences of high-achieving Black women inside and outside the classroom at an urban PWI, this paper presents data from Black women that critiques operative definitions of high-achievement in higher education, using the voices of these women to expand the discourse on student identity.

Author

• Adrianne Musu Davis, Temple University