We're All Fighting: Experiences of Black Women HBCU Graduates Enrolled in HWI Doctoral Programs.

다국어 초록 (Multilingual Abstract)

The contributions of historically Black colleges & universities (HBCUs) go beyond degree conferrals and are displayed in the positive effects of community, support, and persistence of their students. For Black women at the intersection of race, class, and gender, the benefits of this environment can prove vital to their post baccalaureate success. Several studies have shown that Black women at HBCUs have greater satisfaction with the campus climate, more positive experiences with faculty and peers, and greater overall satisfaction with their college experience as compared to their peers at historically white institutions (HWIs) (Alexander & Bodenhorn, 2015; Mitchell, 2018). HBCUs provide an environment that is advantageous to the development of Black women and nurture the elements of cultural capital as outlined by Yosso’s (2005) conceptual model of community cultural wealth. This wealth creates a counternarrative to existing research on Black women in higher education that has labeled them as at risk due to their marginalized identities, or paradoxically exemplary based on their ability to overcome these deficits (Kaba, 2008). Thus, Black women’s cultivation of cultural capital in the HBCU environment produces an array of knowledge, skills, abilities, and relationships to help them succeed. However, the transition from an HBCU to an HWI for the pursuit of a doctoral degree can challenge the value of this cultural capital and negatively impact the doctoral socialization process. This qualitative dissertation used a Black feminist methodology to explore the experiences of ten Black women graduate students that earned their bachelor’s degree at an HBCU and transitioned to an HWI for a doctoral program. Community cultural wealth was applied as a conceptual lens to understand their experiences. Findings from this research suggest that Black women HBCU graduates enrolled in HWI doctoral programs cultivated community cultural wealth during their enrollment at an HBCU, and were able to apply the six types of cultural capital to help them navigate the distinctly different environment of an HWI doctoral program. Major takeaways included the significance of HBCUs in cultivating cultural capital for Black women, the existence of pressure to acculturate to dominant values of educational merit in HBCU and HWI environments, and an increased understanding of the many challenges faced by Black women in higher education and the tools they use as resistance. Implications of this research include the necessity for increased diversity and support in HWI doctoral programs for Black women, the need for HBCUs to reject damaging and counterproductive ideologies of white superiority, and an increased need for studies that investigate Black women’s postsecondary experiences that employ the use of methodological approaches that are akin to their cultural identity.