Prior Socialization and Campus Racial Climate for Latinas/os in STEM

• In Event: Roundtable Session 24
  In Roundtable Session: Hispanic Issues: Language and Other Cultural Topics

Abstract

As the United States population approaches a minority majority, the need to address educational inequities is intensified, especially for Latin@ students who are among the fastest growing ethnic minority group across the United States and at four-year colleges and universities. Concerns for national security, human capital development, and equity also call for increased representation of domestic under-represented groups in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics fields. Informed by student-level data from six Midwestern, large, public, research-intensive universities, this study examines whether students’ high school racial context serves as a moderating factor for negative racial climates students of color experience in STEM and finds no evidence that prior socialization moderates the relationship between climate and college departure or departure from STEM.

Author

• Blanca E. Rincon, University of Connecticut - Storrs