Educational Studies

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Affirmations From “Home”: The Role of Relational Counterspaces in the Success of Underrepresented Minority Undergraduates in STEM
(2022) Edziah, Amy-Ann; Smulyan, Lisa; Vollmer, Amy Cheng
Why 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?
Angular Scale Expansion of Adults and Children
(2015) Oh, Jaehyun; Durgin, Frank H.
Aquí no hay protestas: Activism Against Gender-Based Violence in Cuba
(2018) Anouna, Jasmine; Liu, Roseann; Berger, Benjamin
This thesis examines why, despite Cuba's global preeminence in gender equality advocacy, inequality remains a deeply entrenched issue. My work focuses on one specific component of inequality, gender-based violence, and explores what is currently being done to address this injustice. Through qualitative interviews with a variety of stakeholders, participant-observation, as well as a content analysis of literature on women's rights in Cuba, I came to realize that there is an important yet under-documented discrepancy between state-led and grassroots work regarding gender-based violence. Although state-led work, mainly through the Federation of Cuban Women (FMC), receives widespread praise in foreign and domestic literature as the entity responsible for securing women's rights nationally, my participants in particular noted that this narrative is misleading and outdated. In the last decade, non-state actors have begun to augment the role of the FMC. Interviewees consistently noted that the issue in question is more effectively being addressed through grassroots activism. Accordingly, I bring the non-state actors to the forefront of change, thus shedding new light on the quest to ameliorate gender-based violence in Cuba. This case fits into international dialogues regarding gender-based violence activism work. Particularly, my study contributes to transnational activism studies exploring different causes and strategies to alleviate the issue. The Cuban experience serves as a unique and important case to compare with other countries in Latin America and the broader context. The study also contributes in expanding preexisting work on women's rights in Cuba carried out by NGOs such as the Center for Democracy in the Americas (CDA), that seek to build more informed understandings of Cuba, and break away from historic prejudices of the island. Keywords: gender equality, gender-based violence, FMC, transnational activism.
Art Education: An Interdisciplinary Approach to Combining Literacy Learning and Artistic Processes
(2021) Harris-Harrell, Liyi; Anderson, Diane
For as long as I can remember, I have been a reader. My mom frequently tells me about how she would read to me every opportunity that she could when I was little. That was until I began to read to her instead. My relationship with books and reading only continued to grow exponentially through grade school. There was even a point where I read so many books that rather than keep newly purchased books my mom would return them to the store as soon as I finished them. Looking back I think I consumed books more than I did read them. In addition to being a reader, I have alternated on whether I identify myself as a writer in the same respects. It seems like I have always know the importance of being able to explain one’s own ideas and a part of my process of explanation includes being able to covey it through writing. However, even in this understanding, I realize that somewhere along the line I would not consider myself a writer in the same way that I did when I was younger and knew less about the conventions that govern writing. Recently I have rediscovered my love for reading through the medium of comics. It seems that this medium of storytelling captures many of the parts of reading and writing in a way that does not seemed to be bogged down with expectations. At this point, in my life, writing feels weighed down by ideas and conventions and a need to be perfect. These expectations come not only internally but externally. In this semester I thought that comic writing would free me from these expectations, and while it helped clear my mind from external expectations the ones that I held for myself still weighed heavily on my ability to work.
Arts-Based Education for Social Justice
(2015) Stevens, Samantha; Allard, Elaine; Fraga, Christopher Michael
This thesis explores the arts as a potential framework for achieving social justice through the system of education. The author uses her experience as a student-teacher in a charter school with an arts-based social justice framework as a springboard for discussion, identifying points of tension that arise as educators translate social justice theory into practice in today’s schools. Faced with the challenges of oppression and systemic inequality, educators work to transform schools into vehicles for social justice. Some teachers turn to the charter school model in an effort to sculpt environments fit to meet the needs of students form marginalized populations. The author explores theoretical differences in conceptualizing what it means to work for social justice, claiming that the arts is particularly well-suited as a framework for social justice work.
As We Trudge Through: An Autoethnography of my College Experience
(2022) Samuel, Destiny R.; Foy, Anthony; Nelson, Joseph; Smulyan, Lisa
I 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”?
Autonomy of the Student: Maintaining Ballet's Relevance as an Art Form Through Pedagogy
(2015) Cho, Daniel; Brenneman, Elaine
In response to the negative critique that denounces ballet as an irrelevant art form, I was interested in analyzing alternative methods of teaching classical ballet. Comprised of a brief history of classical ballet, a literature review of writings within the fields of modern educational theory and dance pedagogy, and interviews of students and teachers, my inquiry argues that the autonomy of the student needs to be maintained within the classroom for classical ballet to maintain its relevance through pedagogy.
Between Drama and Danger: The Effects of Latino Second Graders' Identities on Gendered Patterns in School Success
(2013) Panepinto, Samantha; Smulyan, Lisa; Viscelli, Steve
In 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.
"Breaking Out of the Bubble": Becoming self-reflexive in community-based learning classes at Swarthmore College
(2015) Choi, Natalia; Nadkarni, Maya; Brenneman, Elaine
In my Sociology/Anthropology and Educational studies thesis, I explore the processes of self-reflexivity in the context of community-based learning (CBL) classes at Swarthmore College. Drawing upon interviews with professors and students in CBL classes, written materials such as syllabi and students’ reflections, and participant observation in CBL classes, my findings suggest that professors have a critical role to play in supporting students’ process of becoming more self-reflexive. By pairing students’ experiences with critical reflection in the curricula and leading by example, professors can guide students to have profound learning experiences about themselves as well as other communities. Such engagement in self-reflexive practices can enable students to work with (not for) communities in a meaningful way.
The Burdens They Carry: How Black College Students Resist and Internalize Received Messages about Race and Racism
(2018) Koku, Lydia E.; Laurison, Daniel; Nelson, Joseph
At predominantly white institutions, black college students' understandings of their campus climate are complicated by their experiences of racial microaggressions and racial battle fatigue. In addition to navigating discriminatory encounters with peers, faculty and staff, black college students must contend with systemic inequality. Although prevalent research notes that positive racial socialization practices can prepare young people to think about, address and cope with racism, few studies have qualitatively explored black college students' perceptions of their socialization, and particularly, whether or not they were adequately prepared to experience and conceptualize racism in college. My thesis addresses these gaps by considering how black college students come into consciousness about racism through racial socialization, how effective they perceive their socialization history to be, how socialization informs their responses to racism and how their sociopolitical development manifests through their perceptions of their extracurricular involvements on campus as activism. Relying on racial socialization theory (Lesane-Brown 2006) and sociopolitical development theory (Watts 2003; Anyiwo et al. 2017; Freire 2000), my research questions are: How have black college students' racial socialization histories affected their sociopolitical development? What is the role of sociopolitical development in governing how black college students perceive and respond to racism on their predominantly white campuses? This phenomenological study analyzes in-depth interviews with ten students at Swarthmore College and Bryn Mawr College to explore the messages students received about race and racism during childhood and to identify how those messages prepared or did not prepare them to experience racism in college. The majority of participants describe feeling unprepared; the processes by which they prepared themselves (through education and activism) are critical to understanding how they construct meaning of Blackness, resistance, and liberation at their PWIs.
Can I Be a Scientist? Adolescent Exposure to STEM Literacy and Students’ Conceptions of Identity
(2021) Alvarado, Cristopher Castrellon; Anderson, Diane D.
There is a crisis of disenfranchised students dropping out of STEM majors and careers. The national STEM major retention rates in undergraduate institutions hovers around 40%, and this number is disproportionately smaller among marginalized students, especially women and students of color (Dagley et. al, 2015). These students, who struggle to identify within academic STEM communities, are failed by the inadequacy of texts that are unable to stimulate interest and engagement in their STEM identities. Based on student interviews, research of the literary market, and my own experiences, there is a severe de-emphasis on STEM nonfiction literature in the classroom for adolescent-aged students. Using a theoretical framework informed by Gholdy Muhammad’s Historically Responsive Literacy (HRL) framework, Pierre Bourdieu’s five major concepts, and Jean Lave & Etienne Wenger’s theory of situated learning informed by Claude Steele’s research on stereotype threat, I will argue for a need for more STEM nonfiction texts aimed at engaging a “young adult demographic” to further engage students that may otherwise decide to stop pursuing STEM.
Climate Change Education through a Social Justice Framework: A necessary first step towards solving the climate crisis
(2021) Owen-Oliner, Leah
Global climate change is one of – if not the most – urgent crises of the modern era. Every decade in the past forty years has been successively hotter than any decade preceding it since the 1850s, a historically unprecedented acceleration resulting in heat waves, droughts, cyclones, and other weather and climate extremes (IPCC, 2021). Barring profound and swift decreases in greenhouse gas emissions, recent models predict an increase of at least 1.5˚C greater than pre-industrial measures (IPCC, 2021), surpassing the previously established international maximum goal (UNFCCC, 2015). As should be all too clear, dramatic yet rapid changes must be made now to preclude the increasing severity, frequency, and duration of climate-related disasters accompanying every additional degree of warming (IPCC, 2021). However, despite this ostensibly bleak picture, room for hope exists: scientists posit that reaching net-zero carbon emissions by approximately 2050 would arrest and plateau global warming at around 1.5˚C, forestalling the sharp escalation in risks associated with increases exceeding that threshold (Plumer & Fountain, 2018).
Curating "Safe Space": Supporting Refugee Children in the United States through the Arts
(2017) Branch, Sarah; Ghannam, Farha; Liu, Roseann
This thesis examines two existing case study summer programs for refugee children in the United States. Both programs recognize art intervention as a means though which to “curate” support for students’ multinational identities and offer “safe spaces” that encourage vulnerability. These programs have identified the necessity of encouragement of vulnerability as a way in which to meet the specific needs of refugee youth. Individuals posed with the responsibility of curating these “safe spaces” are the art educators themselves. Through interviews with teaching artists, program directors and volunteers employed by the two case study programs, this thesis offers insight into the emotional labor intrinsic in working with students who have experienced trauma. Understanding the ways in which American culture dismisses professions that involve emotional labor as well as the current Presidential Administration’s negative and false portrayal of the experiences of refugees further add to the stress of these educators’ already complex roles.
"A Door to a Good and Happy Life": Building Social and Cultural Capital in a College Success Program
(2015) Kronstat, Zachary; Smulyan, Lisa
This 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.
Envisioning Community: The Promise of Teacher Leadership for Career Sustainability
(2013-05-27T13:43:14Z) Jones, Spencer; Jones-Walker, Cheryl
This thesis explores the sustainability of the teaching profession by examining teachers’ professional identities and goals and their work conditions. The author concludes that most teachers, while committed to their classrooms, cannot remain teachers in public schools for many years because there are too many structural conditions that compromise their morale and energy. The author further explores teachers’ visions for their careers – primarily opportunities for professional community and collaboration and teacher leadership. Stronger professional communities and more access and opportunities for teacher leadership in the realms of curriculum development, professional development, assessment, and teacher evaluation will benefit schools and student achievement. Implementing these visions of professional community will also better prepare white teachers to serve the needs of minority students.
Ethnographies Revisited: English Learners and Language Ideologies
(2017) Rosales, Alondra; Allard, Elaine
As the public school populations all over the United States continue to change to include more linguistically diverse student demographics, English language education continues to show many of the issues that it has faced for decades. With deep roots in colonization and imperialism, English language education policy and practice shows evidence of language ideology shaping the way education and policymakers think about the linguistic practices of their students. Using a critical lens that focuses on language ideologies, two canonical educational ethnographies that highlight the experiences of English Learners in the United States will be analyzed using three trends of language ideologies: Language as Capital, Language and Race, and Language as Deficit. Using this lens the two works-Fu's "My Trouble is my English" and Olsen's Made in America-to demonstrate how students view Standard English as necessary for gaining economic and cultural capital without always considering the role of their peers and teachers in distributing capital among those that are not in the culture of power. Additionally, they show how non-monolingual English speakers are racialized and excluded from being legitimate members of the school's social structure. Lastly, the works show how the non-English linguistic practices of the English Learners are ignored and viewed as detrimental to their English language acquisition. This new lens on the works of Fu and Olsen sheds light on how language ideologies manifest in the actions and language of students and teachers, along with the effect these have on the educational experience English Learners.
Femicide in Buenos Aries: Social Change Through Interpersonal Education
(2016) Bleskachek, Mckinley; Schuetze, Christine; Liu, Roseann
This paper explores the trajectory of social thought concerning femicide, particularly as it relates to the 2015 #NiUnaMenos movement in Buenos Aires. Through framing gender as a social construct, this paper illuminates the connection between cultural, structural and personal violence. In this framework, individual murders become a social phenomenon. The critical consciousness fostered by the #NiUnaMenos movement reveals the potential of interpersonal education to effect social change.
Foul: A Critique of Collegiate Athletics, Recruitment, and Admissions
(2021) Moyo, Pempho; Smulyan, Lisa
The 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.
From the Margins to the Center: Queer and trans teachers of color in K-12 Public School
(2018) Cabrera-Duran, Esteban; Laurison, Daniel; Smulyan, Lisa
Interviews 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.
Graphic Novels in the English Language Arts: Teacher Use of Multiple Texts and Literacies in the Classroom
(2015) Talian, Emmy; Schmidt, Peter, 1951 December 23-; Anderson, Diane Downer
This thesis examines the how and why of use of graphic texts in the teaching practice of six secondary English teachers. Through a semi-structured interview study, I investigated how they discussed their use of graphic texts, focusing on how they taught the visual portions, why they chose the texts they did, as well as how these texts fit into their larger curriculum. I found that teachers' attention to visual and multimodal potential in graphic texts exists on a spectrum, ranging from a lack of focus to primary focus in the course. Their reasons behind using these texts included the importance of the visual, accessibility, content, and transferability of skills. Teachers articulated the paradox of adherence to and a resistance of hierarchical notions of text and literacy within the classroom. Finally, while most saw the incorporation of graphic novels as a resistance of traditional hierarchies of literature, their use of these texts often reflected hierarchical notions of text forms and literacies, demonstrating the inescapability of hierarchical organization of texts and knowledge of text within the English discipline. However, I ultimately conclude that the inclusion of graphic texts into the curriculum and teachers' practice can result in expanded opportunities for students to engage with a range of texts as well as increase teachers' creativity and intentionality in their teaching.

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