A Critical Look at Undergraduate Mathematics Classrooms: Detailing Racialized and Gendered Experiences for Latin@ College Engineers (original) (raw)
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An Intersectional Analysis of Latin@ College Women's Counter-stories in Mathematics
In this article, the author discusses the intersectionality of mathematics experiences for two Latin@ college women pursuing mathematics-intensive STEM (science, technology, engineering, and mathematics) majors at a large, predominantly White university. The author employs intersectionality and poststructural theories to explore and make meaning of their experiences in relation to discourses of mathematics ability and pursuits of STEM higher education. A cross-case analysis of two Latin@ college women’s counter-stories details the development of success- oriented beliefs and strategies in navigating the discourses that they encountered institutionally and interpersonally in their mathematics experiences. Implications are raised for P–16 mathematics and STEM education to broaden equitable learn- ing opportunities for Latin@ women and other marginalized groups’ construction of positive mathematics identities at intersections of gender and other social identities.
Although urban Latinas/os have participated in mathematics workshops in urban universities for over three decades as part of the Emerging Scholars Program (ESP), few studies have explored Latina/o students' perspectives of how and why these learning environments support them in attaining mathematical success. This article presents an in-depth case study of how Vanessa, a Latina undergraduate student from an urban community, simultaneously constructed her mathematics and racial identities as she engaged in a culturally diverse, collaborative ESP Calculus I workshop situated within broader sociopolitical contexts. Vanessa's story was selected because she offered a unique perspective of how encountering identity-affirming workshop spaces aided her in constructing a strengthened self-perception as a Latina mathematics learner. Her counter-story challenges dominant ideologies that disregard the importance of viewing Latina/o students' mathematics participation and learning as racialized forms of experience.
Understanding the underrepresented minority experience in undergraduate calculus courses
2016
This paper is dedicated to the late Julia Lewis Reid and Clifton "Gator" Lewis. Thank you for watching over me and helping me see this through. v ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS I wish to acknowledge the support and guidance I have received from so many people. First, let me send thanks to Dr. Fred for his continued support, advice, and guidance throughout my master's and doctoral studies. I would not be the scholar I am today without you. Next, to my professional friends and colleagues, including Scott Richardson, Kathy Von Duyke, and Eugene Matusov for shaping me into the ultimate social justice warrior. Additional thanks go to Tom Palmer and those loving friends who kept the music alive in me when I thought I had none left. A heartfelt thank you goes to my Father, for his unyielding support throughout my entire academic journey. And last, but not least, to my mother; without her personal and professional guidance I would not be the person or the academic technologist I can call myself today. Thanks, Ma. vi TABLE OF CONTENTS LIST OF TABLES .
Journal for Research in Mathematics Education, 2013
CITATION: Stinson, D. W. (2013). Negotiating the “White male math myth”: African American male students and success in school mathematics [Special issue]. Journal for Research in Mathematics Education, 44(1), 69–99. ABSTRACT: This article shows how equity research in mathematics education can be decentered by reporting the “voices” of mathematically successful African American male students as they recount their experiences with school mathematics, illustrating, in essence, how they negotiated the White male math myth. Using poststructural theory, the concepts discourse, person/identity, and power/agency are redefined or reinscribed. The article also shows that using a poststructural reinscription of these concepts, a more complex analysis of the multiplicitous and fragmented robust mathematics identities of African American male students is possible—an analysis that refutes simple explanations of effort. The article concludes, not with “answers,” but with questions to facilitate dialogue among those who are interested in the mathematics achievement and persistence of African American male students—and equity and justice in the mathematics classroom for all students.
Mathematics Identities of Non-STEM Major Female Students
2015
The mathematics education literature has documented gender differences in the learning of mathematics, interventions that promote female and minority students to pursue STEM majors, and the persistence of the gender, achievement, and opportunity gaps. However, there is a significantly lower number of studies that address the mathematics identities of students not majoring in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM). Even more elusive or non-existent are studies that focus on the factors that shaped the mathematics identities of female students not pursuing STEM majors (non-STEM female students). Because the literature has shown the importance of understanding students' mathematics identities given its correlation with student achievement, motivation, engagement, and attitudes toward mathematics, it is vital to understand the factors that influence the construction of mathematics identities in particular of those students that have been historically marginalized. To address this issue, I explored the mathematics identities held by 12 non-STEM major students (six taking a remedial mathematics course and six others taking a non-remedial mathematics course) in one urban business college in a metropolitan area of the Northeastern United States. This study used Martin's (2000) definition of mathematics identity as the framework to explore the factors that have influenced the mathematics identities of non-STEM female students. The data for this qualitative study were drawn from mathematics autobiographies, one questionnaire, two interviews, and three class observations. I found that the mathematics identities of non-STEM major female students' in remedial and non-remedial mathematics courses were influenced by the same factors but in different ways. Significant differences indicated how successful and non-successful students perceive, interpret, and react to those factors. One of those factors was non-successful students believe some people are born with the ability to do mathematics; consequently, they attributed their lack of success to not having this natural ability. Most of the successful students in remedial mathematics attribute their success to effort and most successful students in non-remedial mathematics attribute their success to having a natural ability to do mathematics. Another factor was successful students expressed having an emotional connection to mathematics. This was evident in cases where mathematics was an emotional bond between father and daughter and those in which mathematics was a family trait. Moreover, the mathematics activities in both classrooms were scripted and orchestrated with limited room for improvisation. However, the non-remedial students experienced moments in which their academic curiosity contributed to opportunities to exercise conceptual agency and author some of their mathematics knowledge. Further, successful students in remedial mathematics did not have the ability to continue the development of positive mathematics identities given rigid classroom activities that contributed to a limited sense of community to support mathematics learning.
Math Counts: Major and Gender Differences in College Mathematics Coursework
The Journal of Higher Education , 2019
Mathematics is an important and hotly contested aspect of U.S. postsecondary education. Its importance for academics and careers and the extent and impact of math achievement disparities are all subject of longstanding debate. Yet there is surprisingly little research into how much and what types of mathematics courses are taken by U.S. undergraduates and the extent of math achievement differentials among students. This article advances the understanding of math course taking by developing course-taking metrics for a nationally representative cohort of bachelor’s graduates. Using NCES transcript data to construct consistent measures of mathematics and quantitative course taking, our analysis finds large variability both within and between STEM/non-STEM majors and a large population of non-STEM graduates earning mathematics credits comparable to their peers in STEM fields. Mathematics course taking differs substantially from course taking in other subjects.We also find that often observed gender differentials are a function of major, not gender, with females in the most mathematics-intensive programs earning as many or more mathematics credits than their male peers.
A Framework for Understanding Whiteness in Mathematics Education
In this article, the authors provide a framework for understanding whiteness in mathematics education. While whiteness is receiving more attention in the broader education literature, only a handful of scholars address whiteness in mathematics education in any form. This lack of attention to whiteness leaves it invisible and neutral in documenting mathematics as a racialized space. Naming White institutional spaces, as well as the mechanisms that oppress students, can provide those who work in the field of mathematics education with specific ideas about combatting these racist structures. The framework developed and presented here illustrates three dimensions of White institutional space—institutional, labor, and identity— that are intended to support mathematics educators in two ways: (a) systematically documenting how whiteness subjugates historically marginalized students of color and their agency in resisting this oppression, and (b) making visible the ways in which whiteness impacts White students to reproduce racial privilege.