First-Generation Faculty as Institutional Agents

• In Event: Thursday Roundtable Session 10:50 am
  In Roundtable Session: Power of Relationships (Table 25)

Abstract

Former first-generation students who become faculty members (FGF) are positioned as integral to student support programming throughout higher education despite a lack of systematic investigation to corroborate this assumption. Stanton-Salazar’s institutional agent theory, which delineates how non-kin actors positively influence college success among students from marginalized backgrounds, has rarely been applied to faculty members and never to study FGF. This critical narrative inquiry address these absences based on the differentiated, lived experiences of a diverse group of 20 FGF. Findings demonstrate how FGF act as institutional agents and that a subset of FGF are what Stanton-Salazar termed “empowerment agents” who act through a critical consciousness not only to support students but also to spur justice-oriented change in their university contexts.

Author

• derria byrd, Marquette University