Academic underachievement among Black students, particularly Black male students, is a troubling trend that has long attracted scholarly attention. The prevailing consensus is that the shortcomings of some Black male students in academic achievement may be attributable to traumatic experiences arising from environments of violent, inner-city poverty that disproportionately affect Black men. Traumatic experiences have been shown to negatively affect Black men’s self-perception, emotions, self-image, and social and cognitive skills, with consequences in the form of measured shortfalls in retention and graduation rates. My qualitative, phenomenological study sought to explore how previous traumatic experiences of Black men affected their academic experiences and achievement while attending a community college. This study was conducted in a virtual environment setting using Zoom video conferencing and each interview ran approximately 45 minutes. Ten Black men were selected from a demographic survey to take part in this study. When asked about traumatic experiences, several participants mentioned the death of a family member as affecting their academic progress. Interpersonal loss may contribute to long-term effects on student engagement. Another reoccurring theme was negative stereotypes related to Black men being reinforced intentionally or unintentionally in the classroom. The findings from this study on the social and cultural experiences of Black men may encourage educational leaders to create more effective academic supports and services designed to improve the success rate of Black, male students who have suffered previous traumatic experiences.

The purpose of this dissertation is to improve the racial conditions of USAmerican education and to highlight how racial politics influence the facework practices of Black male teachers, their perceptions of and responses to face threats, and how the classroom, as a context, shapes perceptions and issues of face, facework, and face threat. I utilized identity management theory to examine how Black male teachers construct facework and face threat within the classroom. Additionally, I used semi-structured respondent interviewing and grounded theory as my method and analytical method (respectively) to complete my study. Using key concepts, such as positive face, negative face, face threat, and identity freezing, I concluded that perceptions of racism and racial stereotypes that are sometimes contingent on their gender identity impact how they constructed positive and negative face. Additionally, racism and racial stereotypes shaped which facework strategies the interview participants utilized, what they considered face threatening situations, how they responded to face threatening situations, and what they considered identity freezing situations. Overall, their constructions of facework and face threat were utilized to avoid stereotypes that depicted them as angry and incompetent. Considering the positive potential of this study, I concluded with how this research can help administrators and colleagues to improve the education system for Black male teachers.

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Boys to Men: Building Resilience in Young Black Male Students Stuart Rhoden Doctor of Philosophy Temple University, 2013 Will J. Jordan, Ph.D. Chair The main purpose of this research was to help identify persistence as reported by Black male college students who were the inaugural graduates of the Class of 2011 from a predominantly Black, all-male Charter High School in the Mid-Atlantic region. Examining this population of students was significant because too often Black male educational choices have been examined through the lens of deficit models. This study adds to the growing body of data which has begun to identify positive attributes of Black male role models at the secondary and postsecondary level. Identifying relevant factors which helped Black male students successfully navigate through high school despite these traditional challenges and achieve academically, has the potential to give educators strategies to help increase the likelihood of more Black males attaining higher educational achievement. One of the ways young Black males countered the toxicity of negative influences and expectations was through persistence. Thus, despite the fact that these young Black males often had to navigate through a history of racial discrimination in this country, challenges in family structure, low income, and in many cases, extremely violent neighborhoods, communities and schools, they had still experienced positive supports and maintained positive attitudes that carried them through to positive academic achievement. Central to this persistence and positive attitude was trust. In order to create more positive educational outcomes, it is critical to examine why some young Black males succeed in the face of adversity while many of their peers do not. This study was conducted qualitatively through interviewing ten graduates of a predominantly Black, all-male charter high school in the mid-Atlantic region of the country. Interviews focused on subjects background experiences growing up, their high school experiences while at DuBois Charter High School (pseudonym) and their experiences either currently attending or formerly attending college. A group interview with two key administrators, the CEO and the College Counselor at DuBois Charter high school also took place. These interviews provided contextual background information on the participants' high school experience. The significant actors who helped these young Black males achieve and attain positive academic outcomes are threefold; parent(s), peers who attended their high school, teachers and administrators of their high school. Some of the actions these mentors took to help them achieve college attendance included; teaching them how to seek academic assistance when needed, helping them become self-advocates, showing them how to learn from setbacks and move forward, helping them to present themselves in a manner that was both authentic to their culture, as well as to their academic abilities, teaching them to rise above perceived expectations of what it meant to be Black and male, and guiding them through the navigation process in a new, unfamiliar environment and being successful. Conclusions drawn from this study included; 1. Trust was essential to overcoming perceived and real structural inequalities. Educational resilience can only be demonstrated when institutions are willing to provide a safe, nurturing environment which allows for failure to contribute to positive growth. 2. Seeking academic and social assistance from peers and adults was constructive in contributing to increased positive academic achievement. 3. Cultural capital and exposure to an expansive array of experiences can help minimize the negative effects of poverty if done purposefully and reflectively. 4. Family, peers, and individual agency were critical in sustaining persistence throughout the identity development which resulted in the demonstration of resilience. 5. Understanding and nurturing the social-emotional, racial and gender identity of young Black men was an essential component to positive academic and social achievement. / Urban Education

This study was designed to examine the experiences of a small group of Black males in a college of aeronautical science, a major traditionally dominated by White males. The study also considered the differences in how African American males and Caribbean black males perceived and acted upon the same experiences. Through a social learning theoretical approach, the study examined the relevant factors, processes, and experiences involved in these Black males' choice of aeronautical science as a major and piloting as a career. Eleven (11) persisters and 4 non-persisters participated in the study, which centered around a premier aeronautical university in the southeastern part of the United States. Questions guiding the study were: (1) What experiences have been influential in a small group of Black males' selection of aeronautical science as a major, piloting as a career? (2) What factors outside of and previous to the collegial environment contribute to (and detract from) persistence in pursuit of completion of a major in piloting? (3) What factors in the collegial and occupational environment contribute to persistence in a major in piloting? (4) How do patterns of persistence compare for these Black males at a college of aeronautical science? Qualitative methodology included both individual in-depth interviews and small focus groups. Participants were recruited through both purposive and snowball samplings as well as volunteering. Criteria for persisters were Black male former aviation students who had already graduated with an aeronautical science degree and pursuing a career as a pilot or Black male students currently enrolled as juniors and seniors, in good academic standing. Non-persisters in this study were Black males who left their aeronautical science major prior to completion. Findings clearly indicated that a number of factors, such as family, individual, social, and environmental, influenced this small group of Black males' persistence in aeronautical science. Additionally, this study attempted to ascertain the differences and similarities in perceptions and experiences among African American and Caribbean black males. The Caribbean black males in this study did not perceive their race as having a negative impact on their persistence, whereas most of the African American male participants felt their race was a contributing factor to their non-persistence. This study provided the groundwork for the development of a conceptual model of academic persistence with implications for recruiting, retaining, and graduating Black males from a college of aeronautical science. / Ph. D.

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