Browsing by Author "Smulyan, Lisa"
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- ItemAffirmations From “Home”: The Role of Relational Counterspaces in the Success of Underrepresented Minority Undergraduates in STEM(2022) Edziah, Amy-Ann; Smulyan, Lisa; Vollmer, Amy ChengWhy Study Persistence and Attrition in Underrepresented Minorities in College Biology? When I took my first steps on campus as a freshman, I had no intention of majoring in education at all. I had never seriously considered education as a field of study or as a career I could pursue, but as a product of an inner-city public school system, the aspect of education I had always been attuned to was the inequity in the experiences of students like myself compared to the students of the suburban public schools and the private schools, many of whom would be my classmates in college. When I got to my first STEM (science, technology, engineering, and math) course at Swarthmore, it was glaringly obvious that I would spend the next 4 years being “one of the only” in more ways than one. As a Black, non-male, low-income student of biology, I naturally found myself asking why there were so few people who shared my identities in the courses and the department as a whole. As I processed hearing many of my Black femme peers express that the intro biology courses had killed their joy for the subject and watching some drop the courses and change their academic trajectories, I also found myself balancing my own love for the subject and the reality that, honestly speaking, biology at Swarthmore was not treating me well. It felt like I was always struggling—struggling to understand, struggling to be seen, and ultimately failing to see the justification of my struggle. We could all agree, my friends and I, that things were harder than they should be and we weren’t to blame. My decision to pursue biology and education was born of my desire to approach what was clearly a systemic issue from a critical pedagogical perspective. What was it about the structure, the content, the landscape of college biology, Swarthmore biology in particular, that made so many underrepresented students feel the same way?
- ItemApprendre du programme français de langues étrangères : priorisation de l'enseignement précoce des langues aux États-Unis(2022) Nguyen, Han Thuy Truc; Robinson, Christopher; Smulyan, LisaLes États-Unis ne sont pas à la hauteur de leur réputation de creuset de cultures et de langues. Malgré la montée de la mondialisation et de l'immigration ces dernières années, le pays a perdu sa réputation de refuge sûr pour les immigrants à la recherche de nouvelles opportunités. Au lieu de cela, avec la xénophobie qui augmente, on est obligé de s'aligner sur une identité américaine monolithe, quelle que soit sa définition. Pour de nombreuses personnes, être américain signifie parler couramment l'anglais, créant ainsi un « language graveyard » bien que les États-Unis n'aient pas de langue nationale officielle (Kern, 2017, p. 4). Le mépris pour les langues étrangères1 parlées par les immigrés se répercute sur la perception nationale des programmes d'enseignement des langues étrangères, ce qui fait qu'un maigre 18 % des États-Unis sont bilingues, contre 53 % en Europe (Middlebury Interactive Languages, 2015).2 Lorsque l'on examine des statistiques spécifiques, la situation est plus sombre : un sondage mené par General Society Social en 2006, dans lequel 25 % des adultes ont déclaré avoir des compétences en langue seconde, révèle que seulement 7 % ont appris ces langues à l'école, tandis que les autres ont été exposés à la langue à la maison. (Kern, 2017, pp. 2-3). Avec ces perspectives décevantes, il n'est pas surprenant de voir que les États-Unis se classent plus bas que leurs pairs en termes de maîtrise des langues étrangères (Steinke, 2021).
- ItemAs We Trudge Through: An Autoethnography of my College Experience(2022) Samuel, Destiny R.; Foy, Anthony; Nelson, Joseph; Smulyan, LisaI wonder if something counts as fundamental if the entire world witnessed and experienced it simultaneously. Together, at the same time, we witnessed and experienced the world crumble with no sense of when it would piece itself together again. I wonder if it is cliche to write about the COVID-19 pandemic. I already see the art, in its many visual and written forms, deriving from this era. At what point does the world become oversaturated with too many Coronavirus stories and “pandemic reflections”?
- ItemBetween Drama and Danger: The Effects of Latino Second Graders' Identities on Gendered Patterns in School Success(2013) Panepinto, Samantha; Smulyan, Lisa; Viscelli, SteveIn this study, I used participant observation in a second-grade Sheltered English Immersion classroom to investigate how race and gender identities in elementary school may be affecting the gendered achievement gap among Latino students in high school. I spent two weeks working closely with the teacher in this classroom, and gathered data on standardized test scores, discipline in the classroom, and achievement in the classroom as they related to gender. I found that, while boys and girls acted out at about an equal rate, boys who acted out did so frequently and severely, while nearly all girls acted out, but less intensely. This led to the impression of boys being more troublesome, even though half the boys in the class were not disciplined at all while I was there, and all but one ofthe girls were. Behavior was also not linked to academics; students navigated behavior and school success independently, allowing some students to behave badly yet achieve highly, or vice versa. The patterns of behavior, however, fed back into a loop ofteacher expectations that classified boys as aggressive and girls as subdued, yet dramatic and catty. These classifications may be seen as precursors to patterns found among Latino adolescents; that boys are dangerous, and girls are sexualized and social. In order to work towards providing more equal access to school success for all genders and ethnicities, teachers should try to provide multiple definitions of "success" in the classroom. Positive feedback should be balanced between academics and behavior, both in terms ofprevalence and publicity.
- ItemBetween Drama and Danger: The Effects of Latino Second Graders' Identities on Gendered Patterns in School Success(2013) Panepinto, Samantha; Smulyan, Lisa; Viscelli, SteveWhile it is often seen as natural for me, as a woman, to study gender, it is frequently questioned why I have chosen to focus this research project on a minority group to which I do not belong. The implication is that I perhaps could not understand, or should not be concerned about, the experiences of Latino students. It is true that I have not personally had the experience of moving to a country where I don't speak the language, and being thrown into a school system there. However, this experience is something more and more students in American public schools have had, and a close look at what that experience is like is necessary in thinking about the future of American schools, if they are truly to benefit all students. The question of what it is like to go through U.S. public schools as a Latino immigrant is not just a "Latino issue", but an educator's issue.
- ItemThe Community of the Deaf in Nicaragua: Language Acquisition and Educational Policy(1990) D'Alonzo, June; Napoli, Donna Jo, 1948-; Smulyan, Lisa; Kegl, Judy
- ItemThe Culture Wars and the School District of Philadelphia's African American History Mandate: 1980-2005(2022) Schlaker, Ruby; Weinburg, Robert; Smulyan, LisaIn February 2005, the School Reform Commission of the School District of Philadelphia (SDP) convened and unanimously passed the “Resolution for African American Studies.” The resolution made Philadelphia the first and only district in the United States to mandate a year-long, African American history course as a graduation requirement. In the years since 2005, district-level mandates and requirements to, in some capacity, incorporate African American history into curricula have proliferated nationwide. Still, to date, Philadelphia is the only school district in the nation with a mandate to teach African American history (AAH) through the specific policy mechanism of a mandated, year-long course required for graduation.1 Scholars of Educational Studies have crucially historicized the 2005 African American history mandate in its local, Philadelphia context. In contributing to this work, this paper undertakes a historiographical departure by exploring the ways in which ideologies proffered by the national-level culture wars of the 1980s and 1990s—specifically as they were fought on the terrain of teaching history—interacted with and were reflected in the Philadelphia context of the 2005 AAH mandate in question. Following an extensive review of the journalistic coverage of the context in which the mandate was implemented, I analyze a journalistic account that I consider representative of the interacting national-level culture wars and the Philadelphia context. As such, this paper seeks to answer the following questions: In what ways does the local, early 2000s, Philadelphia context filter the larger national-historical context of the culture wars of the 1980s and 1990s? What does this reveal about the historical factors at play surrounding the 2005 origination of the only mandated, year-long course required for graduation in a public school district in the nation today?
- Item"A Door to a Good and Happy Life": Building Social and Cultural Capital in a College Success Program(2015) Kronstat, Zachary; Smulyan, LisaThis thesis aims to answer the question of how the people involved in a college success program’s middle school component understand the work being done at their site. Using data from two and a half months of participant observation, interviews, and materials collection at the site, the author concludes that this program is an intentional community of practice aiming to close the opportunity gap through developing the social and cultural capital of low-income students of color. The author finds that the site understands the development of social and cultural capital to create career choice and a happy life through college success.
- ItemFoul: A Critique of Collegiate Athletics, Recruitment, and Admissions(2021) Moyo, Pempho; Smulyan, LisaThe college admissions process is nothing short of complicated. There are repetitive forms to fill out, standardized test scores to send out, letters of recommendation to ask for, financial aid to apply for, and dozens of essays to write all in the hope of being accepted to at least one of the various colleges applied to. When the acceptance letters finally roll around in early spring amid the pollen and cheers of joy there reminds one question that remains unanswered: how exactly did you get into the college or university that you attend? While you can argue that your application was a perfect fit for the institution given a variety of reasons (i.e. GPA, standardized test scores, or extracurricular activities) the answer may still be unclear. Others may argue that affirmative action played a role in an individual’s admittance into a college especially if the individual is not white. Yet there still remains another group of people that may argue that upper-middle-class white students had more advantages when applying to college due to the variety of resources they had access to when initially applying. However, if you were recruited to play a sport at a college or university the answer to the posed question becomes significantly easier to answer in spite of the complexity of the admissions process.
- ItemFrighteningly the Same: The Impact of the Enclosure-to-Enclosure Web on Black, Queer Youth(2020) Savo, Lauren; Johnson, Nina; Bradley, Jennifer; Smulyan, LisaPresence. I think that is what my whole thesis is truly about. That is what I have finally come to at the end of this year and a half process: presence. The reason why I am introducing this story with my ultimate finding is because I hope you can be presence, to the best of your capacity, in order to soak in the power that lies within and between these pages. Presence and present are not to be confused with one another, for they are entirely different. Being present means that someone is physically there —i t is what you say after your name is said during roll call. Sure, you are present, but are you pressence? Presence for you is both similar and different than how presence is for me. Presence knows no bounds and is hard to describe, especially with typed words. However, within this chapter and throughout the rest of my thesis, I will try to create a foundation in which presence can be understood.
- ItemFrom the Margins to the Center: Queer and trans teachers of color in K-12 Public School(2018) Cabrera-Duran, Esteban; Laurison, Daniel; Smulyan, LisaInterviews with nine self-identified queer and trans teachers of color (QTToC) address how teachers both work within and resist the reproductive function of schools. Findings suggest that QTToC enter the profession with a set of values and conunitments. The pedagogies of these teachers can have a trans formative effect on the academic outcomes of students and prepare them to be critical of ideologies and systems of oppression. To fulfill this role and conunitment, teachers must have the support of the school context and culture. This thesis adds to the growing body of literature on QTToC and presents a more optimistic outlook on the profession.
- ItemMajor Problems: Choice of Major by Transgender College Students(2021) Barton, Lux K.; Smulyan, LisaDespite the increasing visibility of LGBTQ identities in today's society, there is still a lack of research on how students of these identities navigate higher education. In particular, the factors that determine the choices of major of transgender college students are not well known. This study aimed to answer several questions about how transgender students select majors, including whether they select majors differently than their cisgender peers, what factors drive their decisions, and how they navigate their chosen majors. The study utilized a mixed methods approach, including the use of a survey on major choice and satisfaction with majors distributed to LGBTQ collegians (N=53) as well as a series of semistructured interviews conducted with five volunteer transgender students. Surveys were analyzed quantitatively to determine whether several surveyed variables differed between cisgender and transgender populations. Interviews were transcribed, coded, and analyzed for trends in a qualitative analysis. Findings suggest that, while transgender students often face many challenges and a general lack of support for their identities regardless of major, these students display several forms of resilience within their majors that allow them to navigate their chosen fields. The paper concludes with a discussion of the implications of this research as well as suggestions for future research.
- ItemThe Mathematician's Shadow: Unraveling the Mystery of Mathematics(2019) Ruley, Garrett M.; Smulyan, Lisa; Laurison, Daniel
- ItemPolitical or APolitical? AP Economics teachers, neoliberalism, and the political classroom(2018) Cheng, Min; Nadkarni, Maya; Smulyan, LisaIn this qualitative study, I find that progressive public school teachers of AP Economics experience a multitude of institutional constraints that are direct descendants of the way that neoliberalism has mapped onto the teaching and structure of AP Economics. One particular constraint that I highlight is the internalization of the cultural narrative of the apolitical teacher. I examine, using semi-structured interviews, how these institutional and cultural constraints have manifested in the AP Economics classrooms of four mid-Atlantic public schools, and how the teachers leading those classrooms view their own agency to use their classrooms as sites for social change.
- ItemPushout, Persistence, Pullback, and Resistance: The Unnecessarily Complicated Experiences of Women of Color in STEM(2021) Olvera, Edna A.; Smulyan, LisaIn this thesis project, I explore the unnecessarily complicated path of persistence for women of color in STEM. I find that these students are pushed out by the larger culture and climate of STEM which is hostile to their existence. However, there are students that are not pushed out but rather chose to leave STEM in favor of other academic pursuits. For students that do persist, the strategies they engage in order to persist are strategic and agentic. These students are aware that they must navigate STEM carefully. Within persisting, students also resist and push back against the dominant STEM culture, many doing so in hopes of changing the landscape for the next generation of women of color in STEM.
- ItemTeaching for Social Justice in Rural Dominican Republic(2015) Sacks, Isabel Miranda; Smulyan, Lisa; Machuca-Galvez, MiltonThis thesis explores how teachers at Escuela Cat61ica de los Bateyes (ECB), a rural school in the Dominican Republic, define and enact social justice education. The research is based upon semi-structured interviews with four teachers and the author's field notes during her work with nine ECB teachers on her Lang Opportunity Scholarship project in the summer of 2014. She finds that local and national contextual factors, including the Catholic mission of the school, the rural poverty of the area, and the presence of undocumented Haitian students in the school, were crucial to how the teachers viewed social justice education. Rather than the Freirean aims of consciousness building, uprising, and liberation, ECB teachers saw the central goals of social justice education as creating convivencia (living in harmony in community and society), instilling valores (morals and values), and ensuring their students' right to education.
- ItemUnderstanding the Right to Education in the Early 21st Century South African Context(2018) Zipp, Robert; Smulyan, Lisa; Rhoads, Emily PaddonEvaluating the implementation of human rights norms as broad as the right to education at the domestic level requires the use of supplemental analytical frameworks. In this project, I discuss the implementation of the core norm of the right to education as it manifests in the prescriptive norms guided by the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs). Using the framework set forth by Betts and Orchard, I find that the current structural and ideational factors influencing access to primary education in South Africa are impacted by the country's historical legacy of racial inequality and the economic decisions of the post-apartheid government in the 1990s. I also draw attention to the methodological gaps ofthe current frameworks currently in use to evaluate norm implementation.
- Item"Very different from most other people": Identity Exploration and Development in Queer and Ally Youths in Out of School Programs and on Social Media(2015) Huang, Joan; Smulyan, Lisa; White, Patricia, 1964-This thesis explores what elements of programming at the Attic Youth Center, a LG BTQ youth drop in center in Philadelphia, encourage identity development for both LGTBQ and ally youths. Through interviews and field notes, it argues that the Attic is a unique context for identity development because it not only provides space for youths to explore all elements of their personal and social identities -- not just their gender and sexuality, but more importantly because it equips youths with the skills needed to shape their own space, at the Attic and on social media.