Stigmatization can give rise to belonging uncertainty. In this state, people are sensitive to information diagnostic of the quality of their social connections. Two experiments tested how belonging uncertainty undermines the motivation and achievement of people whose group is negatively characterized in academic settings. In Experiment 1, students were led to believe that they might have few friends in an intellectual domain. Whereas White students were unaffected, Black students (stigmatized in academics) displayed a drop in their sense of belonging and potential. In Experiment 2, an intervention that mitigated doubts about social belonging in college raised the academic achievement (e.g., college grades) of Black students but not of White students. Implications for theories of achievement motivation and intervention are discussed.

http://lmcreadinglist.pbworks.com/f/Walton+%26+Cohen+(2007).pdf

A question of belonging: race, social fit, and achievement.

Probably few policy areas of higher education have received more recent attention than the issue of race on campus. Evidence appears in policies and programs related to college admissions, financial aid, affirmative action, discrimination and harassment, and desegregation. Yet, at the same time, probably no area of campus life has been so devoid of policy initiatives as the racial climate at individual institutions. Until recently, there has been no common framework for understanding the campus racial climate in a way that helps develop policies and practices that can be used to enhance the campus climate. We pose four possible explanations for this phenomenon. First, higher education leaders and higher education institutions have taken the laissez-faire [End Page 279] approach that people will (should) work things out interactively and that it is wrong to intervene too closely in student interactions (Horowitz, 1987). The second explanation involves ambiguity in the role that colleges and universities perform as agents of socialization. Administrators and faculty recognize that students bring with them to college a sense of identity and purpose shaped by their parents, their communities, their religions, etc., and that these influences are critically important to students' growth and development. The quandary lies in just how much of a resocializing agent higher education institutions wish to be. Higher education has not decided whether it should merely reflect our society or whether it should try to consciously shape the society. Third, while research findings document the important role that faculty serve as the "designated socializing agents" in higher education (Feldman & Newcomb, 1969, p. 227), policy initiatives that address faculty attitudes and behaviors have been implemented only with great hesitation and caution. Until now, it seems that only the most problematic discriminatory behaviors of faculty have been addressed. Finally, the situation has been exacerbated by neglect. A rich history of research on issues that affect the campus racial climate has existed for some time. However, this research has not always been valued by the higher education community. A study analyzing the major paradigms used in manuscripts published in "major" higher education journals found that fewer than 2% used paradigms that addressed issues of race from a critical perspective with the goal of producing meaningful change (Milam, 1989). Attorneys, policy-makers, and institutional leaders across the country are searching for research evidence that demonstrates the benefits of diversity and documents persistent discrimination and inequality in higher education. Perhaps at no other time in our history have higher education scholars had the opportunity to provide evidence of the educational outcomes of diversity in a way that puts the benefits of diversity at the center of the educational enterprise. The purpose of this paper is to illustrate how research on issues related to campus racial climate can be used to enhance educational policy and practice. Both classic and contemporary research can inform national policy and debates surrounding affirmative action and other policies to create diverse [P [S [J [Thi [ Ct

Enhancing Campus Climates for Racial/Ethnic Diversity: Educational Policy and Practice

College participation by minority students declined in the middle 1980s following a period of sustained growth [21]. This trend was particularly evident among African Americans and Hispanics [46] who exhibited both the lowest participation rates as well as the highest propensity to drop out from college. Porter's [45] analyses of the high-school senior class of 1980, for instance, revealed that Hispanic college students were 13 percent more prone to withdraw from college than were white students, whereas African American college students were 22 percent more likely to drop out than their white counterparts over a six-year period. These low persistence rates (even over extended periods of enrollment in college) are particularly troublesome from a policy perspective given the relationship that the attainment of a bachelor's degree has on subsequent occupational and economic attainment [44]. Several reasons have been advanced to account for these trends. Hauser and Anderson [21] explored the extent to which declines in college participation rates could be attributed to changes in college aspirations as well as to changes in high-school completion rates among African Americans. After analyzing college aspiration trends for both minorities and nonminorities over a period of thirty years and taking into account high-school completion rates and indicators of socioeconomic status, Hauser and Anderson could not find support for this hypothesis. Other researchers have speculated that the decline could be attributed to changes in the composition of federal assistance and to patterns of financing higher education exhibited by minority students. Porter [45] noted that declines in minorities' college participation rates correlated with the growth of student loans at the expense of grants. Olivas [41], Mortenson and Wu [31], and Mortenson [30] observed that African American and Hispanic students were less willing to go into debt to finance their college education than were white students. Moreover, Ekstrom [19] helped to establish and test the proposition that students willing to go into debt to finance their education were more likely to enroll and persist in college. An alternative explanation to the role of finances in the persistence process has stressed the influence of academic preparation for college. Tinto [56] argued that overall differences in persistence rates between minorities and nonminorities were primarily due to differences in their academic preparedness rather than differences in their socioeconomic backgrounds. Tinto further contended that these ability differences arise from prior educational experiences at the elementary and secondary educational levels which tend to favor the educational achievement of nonminorities relative to minorities. Some degree of support has been given to this hypothesis. St. John, Kirshstein, and Noell [50], for instance, reported that the effects of ethnicity disappeared once academic preparation for college was taken into account for the high-school class of 1980. The proposition that a lack of adjustment to predominantly white institutions and that perceptions of prejudice (racial climate) may lower the quality of college experiences of minority students has emerged as a competing explanation for the differences in persistence rates between minority and nonminority college students [for example, 1, 18, 23, 24, 28, 34, 35, 36, 53]. Fleming [18], in particular, has argued that adjustment problems with the curriculum, lack of support services, financial problems and the nature of interpersonal relationships with faculty, peers and academic staff are some of the experiences that negatively impact minority students attending predominantly white institutions. Likewise, Tracey and Sedlacek [57, 58, 59] have contended that noncognitive factors (that is, self-concept, an understanding of racism, and the ability to cope with it) play a more critical role in shaping academic performance in college and persistence decisions among minority students than do cognitive factors such as academic ability and study habits. …

The Role of Perceptions of Prejudice and Discrimination on the Adjustment of Minority Students to College

This chapter synthesizes fifteen years of published research on campus racial climates. It also presents nine themes that emerged from a qualitative study of campus racial climates at five predominantly White universities.

Nine themes in campus racial climates and implications for institutional transformation

Benefits associated with a college degree are multiple. From a societal standpoint, a college graduate is far less likely to commit a crime and approximately 30% less likely to be unemployed compared to a student who has simply earned a high-school diploma (Hossler, Braxton, & Coopersmith, 1989; Pascarella & Terenzini, 1991). From an individual perspective, each additional year of schooling past high school seems to prolong life by 0.4%, or nearly 2 percentage points, upon graduation from college (Hossler, Braxton, & Coopersmith, 1989). Moreover, earning a college degree is known to produce greater gains in occupational prestige (e.g., Lin & Vogt, 1996) and economic returns (e.g., Leslie & Brinkman, 1986) as compared to simply attaining a high-school diploma. A precondition for the attainment of these benefits is persistence to graduation. Although persistence rates have remained remarkably stable at roughly 45% as far back as 1885 (Tinto, 1982; Porter, 1990), there are notable variations when the ethnicity of the student is introduced. Compared to White students, African Americans are 20% less likely to complete college within a six-year period (Porter, 1990). For every two White students who drop out in that time frame, three African Americans have departed from a postsecondary institution (Porter, 1990). Several hypotheses have been advanced that may account for enrollment and persistence trends of minority students. Hauser and Anderson (1991) explored the extent to which declines in college participation rates could be attributed to changes in college aspirations and changes in high-school completion rates among African Americans. Tinto (1987) argued that overall differences in persistence rates between African Americans and non-minorities were primarily due to differences in their academic preparedness rather than differences in their socioeconomic backgrounds. Tinto contended that differences in ability arise from prior educational experiences at elementary and secondary school levels that tend to favor the educational achievement and persistence of nonminorities relative to minorities. Other researchers speculate these trends could be attributed to changes in the composition of federal financial aid packets and patterns of financing higher education exhibited by minority students (Mortenson & Wu, 1990; Olivas, 1985 Porter, 1990; St. John, 1994). Exposure to a climate of prejudice and discrimination in the classroom and on campus has gained attention as the main factor accounting for differences in withdrawal behavior between minorities and non-minorities (e.g., Fleming, 1984; Hurtado, 1992, 1994; Hurtado, Carter, & Spuler, 1996; Smedley, Myers, & Harrel, 1993). The role of perceived discriminatory behavior on the maladaptive behavior of minority students to college has been scrutinized through two conceptualizations. The first approach relies on Student-Institution Fit models (Bean, 1990; Spady, 1970; Tinto, 1993) and views prejudice and discrimination as a factor interfering with a student's integration into his or her social and academic environments. A second, more recent approach uses transactional models of stress and coping behaviors as their theoretical premises (Munoz, 1987; Smedley, Myers, & Harrell, 1993). The transactional model (Munoz, 1987; Smedley, Myers, & Harrell, 1993) regards experiences of racism and discrimination on campus as psychological and sociocultural stressors. Like other stressors, experiences of prejudice and discrimination are associated with psychological distress that can lead to the maladjustment of students at their respective institutions. Unlike other stressors, however, experiences of discrimination are considered unique in that they (a) are present only among minority students and (b) heighten the feeling of not belonging at the institution with spillover effect on a student's academic performance. Proponents of the Student-Institution Fit perspective argue that intolerance toward the minority student plays a key role for explaining his or her maladjustment with the institution. …

Campus Racial Climate and the Adjustment of Students to College: A Comparison Between White Students and African-American Students.

Despite civil rights legislation, the national goal of providing ethnic minorities with equal access to quality institutions of higher education and opportunities for academic success has yet to be realized. Actualizing this educational vision requires understanding the forces that preclude and those that promote equal opportunity and academic success. Higher college dropout rates, lower levels of academic preparation in high school, lower socioeconomic status, and greater alienation or isolation in the white college environment have been cited as problems facing ethnic minority college students [2, 3, 14, 22, 29, 30]. There is a need at the national level for research on ethnic minority and white college students' attitudes and perceptions. Despite this need, little such research has been conducted [10]. Comparative studies have either been conducted among various white student populations [12, 18, 24] or between white students and only one ethnic minority group [13, 25, 28]. At a state and local level, the underrepresentation of ethnic minori-

Garry Rolison

Papers

Alienation of Ethnic Minority Students at a Predominantly White University