ROSES in the Educational Margins: Analyzing the Impact of Unmet Resource Needs and Structural Trauma on School Pushout and Sense of Safety for Black Girls

• In Event: AERA Graduate Student Research in Progress Roundtable Session One
  In Roundtable Session: Responding to Trauma in Educational Contexts (Table 13)

Abstract

Engagement and belonging in educational settings are known protective factors for children and adolescents; yet girls, particularly Black and Latine girls, experience school pushout at disproportionately high rates compared to their white and/or male counterparts. Programs that seek to re-engage youth in their academic contexts typically fall short of addressing their complex needs, creating a pipeline from school discipline to legal and child welfare system contact. In my proposed dissertation, I examine the association between discrimination, and unmet needs and school pushout and belonging, and how these are linked with psychological (suicidality/self-harm) and school-related safety (study 1). These data will be informed by ~250 system-impacted adolescent girls and gender-expansive youth and analyzed cross-sectionally using structural equation modeling (SEM) to examine hypothesized direct and indirect associations. Finally, I examine the impact of a trauma-informed, gender responsive, advocacy intervention (called ROSES) on school and safety outcomes using an experimental design (study 2). These data will come from the same sample as study 1 and include follow up time points to allow for the analysis of program impact on individual and school-related safety. Based on previous literature, I predict that, controlling for individual experiences of trauma, youth who report higher levels structural trauma, unmet school resource needs, and school pushout via exclusionary discipline will report decreased sense of both psychological and school safety. Finally, I predict that involvement in ROSES advocacy will promote psychological and school safety, potentially through enhancing resource access and reducing unmet needs. Taken together, the studies in this dissertation aim to highlight the need to center girl's voices, promote collaboration with key stakeholders and decision makers in girl's legal/educational contexts, and promote youth-centered programming to address excessively punitive and ineffective responses in schools. This is important because, despite the recognition of persistent inequity in educational contexts, girls of color are frequently underserved and their needs unaddressed through programmatic and structural solutions.

Author

• Raquel E. Rose, New York University
  Presenting Author