Partnering With and Learning From Undergraduates to Uncover the University's Hidden Curriculum

• In Event: Researcher-Practitioner Collaborations Committed to Improving the Experiences of Marginalized Students Along the Academic Pipeline

Abstract

College is often depicted as a mechanism for social mobility. Yet, students who may be motivated by this pathway (e.g., low-income, first generation, and/or students of color) often have lower college completion rates compared to their White, middle-class peers. These challenges may stem from the fact that American academic institutions reflect and privilege the cultural norms of upper-middle class, White families. For students not raised in these contexts (e.g., working class) or who have less access to these norms, these middle-class practices that enable students to successfully navigate the culture of academic institutions remain largely hidden. This hidden curriculum has been well documented in K-12 settings, but only more recently has work begun to explore these ideas in American universities. Through interview methods with small samples, much of this work provides in-depth insight into how social class informs students experiences at elite, predominantly White institutions. Yet, these studies have not incorporated measures of wellbeing that may also relate to students’ experiences with the hidden curriculum. Using a survey approach, this study seeks to extend prior research by comparing working-class and upper-middle class students’ experiences of the hidden curriculum and further, begin to capture other significant differences in psychological factors (e.g., stress, college adjustment) at a public, socioeconomically and racially diverse, Hispanic Serving Institution.
To better understand how students learn and adapt to the hidden curriculum, we partnered with undergraduates from diverse backgrounds to develop a quantitative approach to capture many and more diverse student experiences. Using online surveys, we aimed to measure the hidden curriculum in three ways. First, students (n=328; 53.8% men; 63.9% upper-middle class) were asked to describe the unanticipated challenges they faced in college. They then were exposed to open- and close-ended questions, informed by prior research, to capture the subtle ways students encounter the hidden curriculum. We then examined social class differences between these responses, as well as potential links to well-being (e.g., stress, adjustment to college).
Inductive thematic analysis (Braun & Clarke, 2006) suggest that all students encounter many unanticipated challenges in college (e.g., difficulty with the workload and pace of courses, selecting classes and majors, managing time, and connecting with instructors). Across both open- and closed-ended measures of the hidden curriculum, students reported similar themes (e.g., establishing and managing connections, visiting office hours, asking for help). Chi-square analyses suggest no significant social class differences between students’ reports of unanticipated challenges or the hidden curriculum. However, working-class students reported lower college adjustment and higher experiences of stress, compared to their peers. Although this implies that, regardless of class, all students encounter similar challenges, working-class students face additional difficulty in regards to their wellbeing. Findings from this study have directly informed our next phase of research: interviews conducted by and with undergraduates. Through engaging with and learning from student partners, this project identifies the inconspicuous ways in which universities reproduce inequity, and will inform a campus wide intervention to uncover this hidden curriculum.

Author

• Giselle Laiduc, University of California - Santa Cruz