Blossoming Together: Imagining New Relationships Between Racially/Ethnically Minoritized Students and Postsecondary Institutions Through Digital Storytelling

• In Event: AERA Graduate Student Research in Progress Roundtable Session Three
  In Roundtable Session: Storytelling: Narrative Analysis of the Experiences of Students of Color and Critical Exploration of Postmodern Picture Books (Table 16)

Abstract

My research draws on participatory methodologies to work with racially/ethnically minoritized students in a digital storytelling project. Through multiple group discussions and workshops, students explore their experiences with diversity, equity, and inclusion on campus, their racialized relationships with their institution, changes they want to see, and how digital storytelling might facilitate dialogue and create change. Through transcripts of meetings, field notes and observations, individual student reflections, and the digital stories themselves, the digital storytelling project as a process is analyzed using portraiture methods. Preliminary findings include student resistance and refusal to engage their college in transformative change work; in contrast, they found deep meaning in the relationships cultivated through the digital storytelling project. As an imagining of transformed relationships between students and institutions, this project could serve as a model for wider student engagement initiatives at institutions nationwide.

Author

• Kati Lebioda, University of Michigan
  Presenting Author