"They Talk About It": An Ecological Perspective on Black Lives Matter in School on Sociopolitical Threats in School (Poster 46)

• In Event: AERA Promising Scholarship in Education Research: Dissertation Fellows and Their Research

Abstract

Black Lives Matter (BLM) is an important part of our society and has shifted conversations about race and injustice dramatically. The most recent set of protests in 2020 and the ensuing conversations they sparked intensified an ongoing debate about what young people know and understand about race, racism, systemic injustice, and police brutality, and the role that schools play in students' meaning-making. Recent psychological inquiries in this vein have identified that “sociopolitical threats” shape how young people are socialized by their parents and interpret their sense of belonging and motivation. The present study aims to understand how a sample of racially diverse youth discusses and makes meaning of the larger sociopolitical context of race, and BLM specifically. Using critical qualitative methods, we conducted 9 same-race semi-structured focus groups (N = 32) to investigate how Black, (non-White) Latinx, White, and Multiracial youth think about and make sense of police violence against Black people, school shootings, and other relevant sociopolitical issues. We find that there are unique topics young people discuss based on their identities as well as some conceptual overlapping meanings young people associate with the sociopolitical context across racial groups, such as the ongoing and systemic nature of racial injustice and the social and political opposition to racial justice movements. I end with discussing the theoretical and practical implications of this research for researchers and educators in supporting students to navigate threatening contexts.

Author

• Josiah Rosario, Northwestern University