Nonminority Students Research Articles

Ethnic minority multilingual young learners’ longitudinal development of metacognitive knowledge and breadth of vocabulary knowledge

Ethnolinguistic minority students may have lower levels of metacognitive knowledge and English vocabulary knowledge than non-minority students. Nevertheless, few longitudinal studies have examined their growth trajectories of metacognitive knowledge and English vocabulary knowledge over time. Drawing upon a latent growth curve model, the present study aims to contrast two groups of students’ growth trajectories in metacognitive knowledge and breadth of English vocabulary knowledge: with a sample of 115 ethnolinguistic Yao minority and 108 ethnolinguistic majority Han students. The results showed that both groups improved their metacognitive knowledge and breadth of English vocabulary knowledge from third grade to sixth grade in a cumulative trend. Metacognitive knowledge predicted the breadth of English vocabulary knowledge throughout the examined school years. The results also highlighted differences in the students’ development of metacognitive knowledge and breadth of English vocabulary knowledge. The ethnolinguistic Yao minority students lagged behind their ethnolinguistic majority Han counterparts. The findings suggest a need for pedagogical interventions to enhance ethnolinguistic minority students’ metacognitive knowledge and English vocabulary knowledge.

UNC System Math Pathways’ Digital Course Enhancement Collaboration to Improve Equity, Instruction, and Access During the COVID-19 Pandemic

This study examines how faculty members and students evaluated, perceived, and used a digital course content collection developed to support high quality remote instruction during the Covid-19 pandemic. The collections were the result of a multi-institutional, collaborative effort within the University of North Carolina System to support its students and faculty. Using surveys from faculty and demographically identified students enrolled in their classes, the authors evaluate the perceived utility and impact of the open educational resource collections. Faculty members rated the collections highly and typically found utility in at least some of the components of the collections. They found activities, videos and assessments to be the most useful tools. Students generally responded positively to the classes using the collections. While students who identified as minority found the materials useful or beneficial, they did not do so in proportional numbers to non-minority students.

Violence perpetration prevalence among Colorado (United States) high school students across gender, racial/ethnic, and sexual identities

Adolescent violence, including sexual violence, homophobic name-calling, and teen dating violence, are public health problems that cause harm to many adolescents in the United States. Although research on the perpetration of these forms of adolescent violence has increased in recent years, little is known about perpetration rates across gender, race/ethnicity, and sexual orientation. To address this gap, the current study descriptively examined perpetration rates between and across different identities, including self-identified race/ethnicity, sexual identity, and gender identity. In Fall 2017, 9th – 11th grade students (N = 4782) at 20 high schools in Colorado (United States) completed a survey that assessed demographics (e.g., race/ethnicity, sexual identity, and gender identity) and various forms of violence perpetration. Compared to female adolescents, male adolescents reported significantly higher perpetration rates for: any sexual violence (27% vs. 17%); sexual harassment (26% vs. 15%); unwanted sexual contact (8% vs. 4%); and homophobic name-calling (61% vs. 38%). Differences in perpetration rates were also observed among various racial/ethnic, sexual, and gender minority students compared to non-minority students. This emphasizes a need for more research on how minority stress that results from the dynamics of intersecting identities and societal systems of power–including racism, sexism, homophobia, and transphobia–contributes to violence perpetration. Evidence-based violence prevention approaches, particularly strategies targeted at changing social norms about violence, gender, and sexuality, need to be tailored and evaluated for students with diverse cultural and social identities to ensure safe school climates for all students.

Development of metacognitive knowledge and morphological awareness: a longitudinal study of ethnic minority multilingual young learners in China

ABSTRACT Metacognitive knowledge is essential to vocabulary knowledge development and possibly morphological awareness, but related research comparing nonminority Han and minority Yao students is scant. We conducted a longitudinal study in China to fill this gap. Specifically, we compared 112 Yao students’ and 101 Han students’ growth trajectories in metacognitive knowledge and morphological awareness from Grade 3 to Grade 6 during their primary school education. Findings supported the covarying development of metacognitive knowledge and morphological awareness in both groups. Findings exhibited a cumulative trend from the third to the sixth grade. However, Yao students significantly lagged behind Han students in terms of both factors. Results further showed the effect of metacognitive knowledge on morphological awareness. Findings also highlighted the extent to which Yao students diverged from Han students in their metacognitive knowledge development and morphological awareness. We conclude our paper by highlighting instructional needs for enhancing minority Yao students’ metacognitive knowledge and morphological awareness in multilingual development.

Virtual exchange: a promising high-impact practice for developing intercultural effectiveness across disciplines

Virtual Exchange (VE), a pedagogy that uses technology to facilitate online, collaborative work among students and their peers in other countries, is viewed as a high-impact practice contributing to engaged learning and student success in higher education. This study investigates the impact of various types of VE on the intercultural effectiveness skills of undergraduate and graduate students enrolled in courses across disciplines. The relationship between VE and intercultural skills for minority and non-minority students was also investigated, along with the relationship between dosage (length and duration) of VE and intercultural skills. Results indicate VE positively impacts the development of intercultural skills of students and that there were no differences when the data are disaggregated by individual classes or disciplinary areas. There were no significant differences for minority and non-minority students and for the impact of dosage, but further research is recommended for these two important topics. Findings of this study underline the generalizability of VE across disciplines and its suitability for providing wider access to international experiences for all students.

Breaking the Binary

The need to make higher education curricula gender-inclusive is increasingly pressing as student cohorts diversify. We adopted a student-staff partnership approach to design, integrate, and evaluate a module that taught first-year science students the difference between biological sex, gender identity, gender expression, and sexual orientation in the context of genetics concepts at an Australian university. This module aimed to break the binary in misconceptions of both sex and gender, emphasising that both exist on separate spectra. Data triangulation was used to evaluate students’ attitudes towards the module and their learning of module concepts. Students’ attitudes were positive overall, and evaluation of students’ learning indicated that the majority of students understood and retained key concepts, while also identifying common misconceptions. Perhaps the most important finding was that students who identified as belonging to a minority group had significantly more positive attitudes towards the module than non-minority students. This finding supports previous research that has found inclusive curricula have greater benefit for students from minority backgrounds, indicating the importance of making such curriculum enhancements. Our results speak to both the co-creation process and students’ learning outcomes, providing valuable insights for practitioners both within science and beyond.

Playing catch up: A term-level investigation of the racial gap in STEM retention

This paper examines differences in STEM retention between minority and non-minority students enrolled at the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA) from 1980 through 2006. Using detailed administrative records of undergraduate students, we document that minority students and non-minority students take divergent pathways through the STEM major. Specifically, minority students take fewer lower division STEM courses in their early career, which delays their enrollment in upper division STEM courses and leads to lower graduation probability in STEM within four years and higher dropout rates. We investigate the potential reasons (and/or predictors) for this apparent discrepancy. To do so, we first identify a student’s major-specific Individual Performance Potential (IPP) from lower division course regressions. We find that once we control for the heterogeneity in the IPP’s and a rich set of term level controls, the differences in intermediate outcomes (declared major, STEM course load) between minority and non-minority students largely disappear, but that some of the gap in outcomes persist, with the exception being in graduation from STEM within five years, for which minority students are more likely after controlling for these factors. Our findings suggest that minority STEM majors would benefit from additional support such as early career course advising.

Learning styles of ethnic minority students: a matched case-control study in a dental school in Latin America

Introduction and objective: Little is known about the learning styles of ethnic minorities in Latin American universities. The objective of this research was to identify the learning styles of the ethnic minorities attending a dental school. Moreover, their grade point averages were explored. Materials and methods: A total of 30 ethnic minority students were matched with 30 non-minority students. All the students took a systematized questionnaire to categorize their learning styles. Results: A strong association between ethnic minority students and low reflector style was observed in the multivariate model after adjusting for age, sex, and the current semester (OR=11; 95% CI=1.2-99; p=0.03). In addition, a relevant association between minority ethnic group and low theorist style was observed in the multivariate model after controlling for the same variables (OR= 4; 95% CI=1.2-11; p=0.02). Finally, a statistically significant difference was observed in the grade point averages of non-minority and minority groups, with the minority group having the loweraverages (p=0.014). Conclusions: Ethnic minority students presented lower means for all learning styles compared to the control group. Similarly, theirgrade point averages were significantly inferior. These findings represent relevant precedents for creating educational strategies to improve the learning of ethnic minority groups in higher education in Latin America.

Teaching physics concepts without much mathematics: ensuring physics is available to students of all backgrounds

ABSTRACT Recently, the University of Waikato introduced a first-year physics course requiring no specific physics or mathematics background, to support degrees in other subjects and allowing maximum diversity in student intake. This course uses the Investigative Science Learning Environment (ISLE) approach in which students develop their own experiments to tackle scientific questions. ISLE has proved successful with mathematically able classes; we have adapted it for a less capable cohort in a regional New Zealand context. We have assessed our approach for 2018 using: pre- and post-course concept tests; performance in exams; a student focus group; analysis of laboratory notebooks and marksheets; interviews with teaching staff; and student comments from the university’s course evaluations. Concept tests showed a mean normalised gain of 0.61. Students did well in the exam. Many students were initially unfamiliar with practical scientific investigation and record keeping but laboratory notebooks showed desired learning outcomes were achieved by the end. Students and staff engaged well with this course. Students’ final grades were not significantly different between genders and between under-represented minority and non-minority students. We cannot yet say whether this approach provides a sufficient platform for progress in engineering but students have learned fundamental practical physical concepts.

Self-regulation and STEM persistence in minority and non-minority students across the first year of college.

Psychological factors have been implicated in STEM persistence but remain poorly understood. In particular, the role of self-regulation--the cognitive, behavioral, and emotional skills that allow individuals to work efficiently toward their desired goals, especially when under stress--has received minimal attention. Psychological factors may be particularly important for persistence by underrepresented minority (URM) students, many of whom face significant barriers to success in STEM. We examined the extent to which self-regulation predicts STEM persistence in 732 STEM students and whether minority status moderated self-regulation's associations with STEM persistence. We found minimal differences in self-regulation styles between URM and nonunderrepresented minority students. Baseline cognitive-emotional self-regulation predicted intentions to persist in a science career, using alcohol and drugs to cope with stress predicted less persistence in STEM major across the year, and only URM status predicted end-of-year GPA. Minority status did not moderate these associations. Future research is needed on self-regulation skills and students' trajectories of STEM success.

Identifying differential benefits from a flipped-group pedagogy in introductory microeconomics

A growing literature documents the potential for benefits to be realized from non-traditional pedagogical approaches to teaching introductory economics at the undergraduate level. However, increased interest in and justification of the use of more engaged pedagogy that blends in class and online learning to reach a new and diverse generation of college students makes it imperative that we, as instructors, understand who is best served by such teaching innovations. In this paper, I present student outcome results from an informal post hoc experiment conducted over four semesters in which an Introductory Economics course is taught in its entirety three times over two semesters using traditional lecture methods and then three times over two subsequent semesters using a flipped-group pedagogy. In the latter, approximately 70% of class time is devoted to completion of graded in-class group assignments and the majority of content is delivered out of class through a series of publicly available videos. Results from the analysis indicate that in this particular context, the benefits of the flipped-grouped classroom pedagogy were not distributed equally. Specifically, while students with more developed math literacy and non-minority students benefited from the flipped pedagogy as evidenced by higher performance on the third semester exam and, to a lesser extent, on the averaged semester exams, the flipped format had a negative impact on weaker and minority students.

Maturity and minorities: the impact of redshirting on achievement gaps

ABSTRACTThere are sizable and pervasive academic achievement gaps between minority and non-minority students in the United States. Non-minority students – particularly boys – are more likely to enroll in school one year after they become eligible, a practice known as ‘redshirting.’ Consequently, non-minority students are on average more mature than minority students when they take standardized tests. Many studies have documented that differences in maturity at the moment of testing translate into large differences in test scores. Thus, differences in redshirting behavior across minority and non-minority students may be a contributing factor to achievement gaps. This study analyzes the effect of redshirting on achievement gaps using a reform in North Carolina that shifted the cutoff date for school eligibility in 2009 from October 16 to August 31. We use the reform to create an instrumental variable for redshirting behavior. Using data for eight cohorts of 3rd graders in the Wake County Public School System and a difference-in-differences approach, we estimate that redshirting increases the achievement gap by 28%–30% among boys born close to the cutoff date for school eligibility, and 3%–4% among all boys. For girls, the estimates are 8%–11% for those born close to the cutoff and 1% overall, but these estimates lack statistical significance. We discuss some policy implications of shifting the cutoff date for school eligibility – 14 states have done since 2000 – and growing redshirting rates.

RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN ACADEMIC ANXIETY AND EMOTIONAL INTELLIGENCE AMONG MINORITY AND NON–MINORITY STUDENTS: A STUDY

The present study is an attempt to compare minority and non-minority students on academic anxiety and emotional intelligence; and to study the relationship between academic anxiety and emotional intelligence. Sample for the study consists of 120 students of class XI (60 minority students and 60 non-minority students). Emotional Intelligence Inventory developed by S.K. Mangal and Shubhra Mangal and a self-prepared Academic Anxiety Scale has been used to collect the data. t-ratio and product moment coefficient of correlation has been computed for the analysis of the data. The findings of the study revealed that as compared to minority students, non-minority students have high academic anxiety; minority and non-minority students have similar emotional intelligence; Academic anxiety is negatively related to emotional intelligence among minority as well as non-minority students.

Investigating the Relationship between University Students' Psychological Flexibility and College Self-Efficacy.

For many, college is a period of transition, marked with acute stress, threats to success, and decreases in self-efficacy. For certain groups of students, the risk of these poor outcomes is elevated. In this study, 348 students from a large residential university in the western United States were surveyed to understand the role of psychological flexibility and inflexibility on self-efficacy and the potential moderating impact of year in college and underrepresented racial minority (URM) status. Results indicated that students who are psychologically flexible reported greater college self-efficacy, whereas students who are psychologically inflexible reported lower college self-efficacy. The impact of psychological inflexibility on self-efficacy was moderated by URM status and year in school; psychological inflexibility had a stronger impact on URM students' self-efficacy than non-minority students, and psychological inflexibility had a greater effect on college students starting college as opposed to students who had been enrolled for multiple years.

Segregation paradox? School racial/ethnic and socioeconomic composition and racial/ethnic differences in engagement

This study examines the associations between school racial/ethnic and socioeconomic composition and school engagement levels among Mexican-origin Latinos/as, African Americans, and non-Latino/a whites. Prior research suggests that whiter and more affluent schools should promote engagement, but some studies reveal paradoxes of school segregation whereby minority and socioeconomically disadvantaged students exhibit worse outcomes in schools with white and socioeconomically advantaged peers. Using data from the Education Longitudinal Study of 2002, this study examines the associations between the percent of non-minority students in the school, average school socioeconomic status, and three engagement outcomes: Liking school, involvement in school-sponsored activities, and coursework engagement. The findings reveal an affective-behavioral trade-off for students in schools with higher proportions of white students. Students who attend whiter schools are less likely to report that they like school, but they are more engaged in coursework. This affective-behavioral paradox is not unique to any particular racial/ethnic group.

Will Public Pre-K Really Close Achievement Gaps? Gaps in Prekindergarten Quality Between Students and Across States

Publicly funded pre-K is often touted as a means to narrow achievement gaps, but this goal is less likely to be achieved if poor and/or minority children do not, at a minimum, attend equal quality pre-K as their non-poor, non-minority peers. In this paper, I find large “quality gaps” in public pre-K between poor, minority students and non-poor, non-minority students, ranging from 0.3 to 0.7 SD on a range of classroom observational measures. I also find that even after adjusting for several classroom characteristics, significant and sizable quality gaps remain. Finally, I find much between-state variation in gap magnitudes and that state-level quality gaps are related to state-level residential segregation. These findings are particularly troubling if a goal of public pre-K is to minimize inequality.

Do I fit in? Impact of race on hospitality student perceptions of departmental climate

ABSTRACTRecent reports by the NAACP show there is lack of minorities in upper management positions in the hospitality industry. One possible reason this deficiency exists is that the pipeline of qualified minority hospitality program graduates is slow. This study examined the perception of cultural climate held by hospitality students about their department as a possible antecedent of this stagnation. Current students in hospitality programs evaluated the cultural climates within the department and its effect on satisfaction using the Student Perception of Racial Climate Scale (SPRCS) and items from the Cultural Attitudes and Climate Questionnaire (CACQ). Results indicate a positive attitude toward cultural climate in hospitality management programs; however, both minority and nonminority students highlighted a lack of minority role models both in the classroom and the industry. Theoretical and practical implications for hospitality education and the industry are identified.

Students’ social media engagement and fear of missing out (FoMO) in a diverse classroom

With the growing attention paid to fear of missing out (FoMO) psychological phenomenon in explaining social media engagement (SME), this mixed-method research measured the relative impact of FoMO on students’ SME for personal reasons during lectures. The moderating effect of culture (minority vs. non-minority students) on the connection between FoMO and SME was also considered. Quantitative data were gathered from 279-undergraduate students. The structural equation modeling results showed a positive moderate connection between the FoMO and SME variables. The bootstrapping result showed a significant indirect effect between the minority group of students and SME through increased levels of FoMO. A sequential explanatory strategy was used to refine and interpret the quantitative results. Accordingly, qualitative data were gathered by using semi-structured interviews to assist in explaining the findings of the quantitative phase. The qualitative data suggested several explanations for students’ distractive behavior enabled by technology during class. The main recurrent theme was the frequently used instructional activities based on the teacher-centered pedagogical approach. This approach imposed greater challenges for minority students as they tend to grapple with a host of language barriers. These students reported using social media tools to seek help from friends during lectures and feared missing out a useful assistance. Another finding showed that mainly non-minority students who experienced FoMO admitted using social media during lessons regardless of the teaching method implemented.

Factors of Persistence: How Minority Athletic Training Students Compare to Nonminority Students

In Volume 3, Issue 1 of the JSMAHS you will find Professional research abstracts, as well as Under Graduate student research abstracts, case reports, and critically appraised topics.

RETRACTED ARTICLE: Summer Research Training Provides Effective Tools for Underrepresented Minorities to Obtain Doctoral Level Degrees

The ethnic, racial, and cultural diversity of the USA is not reflected in its healthcare and biomedical workforce. Undergraduate research programs are used to encourage underrepresented minorities to pursue training for biomedical careers, but there is limited published data on doctoral degree completion rates by participants in these programs. This study evaluates the attainment of doctoral degrees by a NIH-funded cohort of undergraduates from the 1998–2002 Baylor College of Medicine’s Summer Medical Research Training (SMART) program. Variables collected included race, ethnicity, gender, tier status of undergraduate institution, and terminal degree status. The majority of cohort participants were underrepresented minorities, while the rest were socio-economically underserved, or first generation college students. Of the 163 participants, 65 (56%) were confirmed to have completed doctoral level biomedical or healthcare degrees: 48 MDs (41%), 22 PhDs (19%), 4 MD/PhDs (3%), and 1 PharmD (1%). There was no statistical significant difference in doctoral degree attainment based on gender, ethnicity, or tier status of participants. The completion rates of doctoral degrees by underrepresented minority participants (65%) in this program exceeds that of underrepresented minority graduate students (38%) and that of non-minority graduate students (51%) nationally based on National Science Foundation data for US citizens and permanent residents, suggesting that this 9-week summer research experience provides a pathway for underrepresented minorities to successfully attain the doctoral degrees required for careers in the health sciences.