This book explores why Black men continue to be severely underrepresented in the STEM disciplines. It provides chapters that explore factors that lead to underrepresentation of Black males in STEM (e.g., societal traditions of what type of work is appropriate; the ruptured pipeline that leads to higher rates of attrition at every level of career development; barriers in science fields such as subtle and overt discrimination; and inequitable resources and opportunities). The premise of this volume is if Black males are to compete in an emerging global economy fueled by rapid innovation and marked by an astonishing pace of technological breakthroughs, they must be present. The book makes new contributions to the field. The collective of higher education professionals and change agents whom are tied to STEM bring cutting-edge thinking in how best to address the leaky STEM pipeline which has left the industry/workforce void of talented Black men. The volume promises timely, relevant and emergent scholarship and perspectives for STEM leadership, scholars and supporters. It provides promising practices (best practices) and recommendations in recruiting and retaining Black males in STEM disciplines and the competitive market place.

Despite being an act that is widely practiced under the guise of a significant number of States, little is known about the intrinsic realities of enforced disappearances. General literature on the topic is lacking, and laws that address the problem are scarce. Enforced disappearances have only come to the attention of the international community fairly recently. At the dawn of this century, Thailand understandably remains one of the most active countries in the practice of enforcedly disappearing people as a means of removing them from the protection of the law because of no legally justifiable reason for arrest or detention - an ultimate breach of the Rule of Law. This book aims to attribute responsibility to the Kingdom of Thailand for failing to introduce legal mechanisms and safeguards to protect its citizens - in breach of its State duties - from enforced disappearances. In an attempt to remove pre-existing ambiguities on what basic human rights are being violated and by whom, the author comparatively analyses international human rights jurisprudence vis-a-vis certain Latin American and European countries. The jurisprudence reiterates that the human rights implications of enforced disappearances do not only depend on the State refraining from committing such acts directly, but also from its indirect acquiescence and tolerance of the act being committed by non-State agents. The repeated reports of enforced disappearances throughout its history make Thailand hypothetically accountable (since nothing can supersede State sovereignty). Still, the author hopes that this book will provide the guidance needed to help improve the human rights compliance in Thailand and, in due course, rid the country of this terrible practice. To this end, this book also contains first-hand contribution from experts and advocates to human rights in Thailand.

Popular education press and scholarly conversations have focused on the impact of COVID-19 on various aspects of school leadership during the induction process and after. However, voices heard directly from the students are often left out or not heard from in a comprehensive oral historical account. We argue that while the attention is deservingly placed on principals and superintendents in schools leading through the pandemic crisis, there has been less dialogue about the impact of COVID-19 on aspiring leaders who will take the helm amid the lingering crisis. Focusing on this population is explicitly significant as COVID-19 has disrupted and traumatized aspiring leaders who will begin to leave the principalship or superintendency en masse. The novelty and longevity of COVID-19 have also upended schools across the country. Thus, we are left at the moment when although many students are preparing to be school leaders, those preparing them are not expected to stay. Preparing to Lead – Narratives of Aspiring School Leaders in a "Post"-COVID World focuses on how graduate students in educational leadership preparation programs are experiencing their simultaneous preparation for leadership roles in the K-12 setting while working in schools in several districts across the United States. We approach this book as a way to elevate the voices of aspiring leaders who will enter the field in the current crisis-laden context. Chapter authors discuss both the challenges and opportunities they have experienced due to being in the dual role of aspiring leaders and current educators. Chapter authors also provide poignant feedback on how leadership preparation programs can assist their development as leaders and infuse equity-oriented approaches that mirror their own identity and the educational landscape they will lead in.

The primary aim of this text is to provide educators with specific strategies for engaging in equity and inclusion work on college campuses. We include the perspectives of faculty and staff with a range of experiences and expertise to address current topics evolving at various levels and functional areas in the academy. Rather than replicate findings and recommendations established in extant literature, we provide faculty, staff, and graduate students with the insight and tools they will require to transform established recommendations into actionable solutions and promising practices. This book offers theoretical and practical approaches to evolving diversity, equity, and inclusion concerns in higher education. The core themes of this volume center on diversity, equity, inclusion, and belonging in higher education. While some educators use these terms interchangeably, we define diversity as a concept that envelopes several modes of social identity, including race, ethnicity, gender, ability, sexual orientation, faith/non-faith affiliation, size, veteran’s status, etc. The practice of fortifying representation amongst minoritized populations without making considerations for structure and support has been the primary model for diversifying the academy for the past 40 years. Within the context of higher education and diversity, our conversation shifts beyond ensuring marginalized communities are represented. Within each chapter, the contributing authors address a wide range of diversity, equity, inclusion, and belonging topics that are unique to their positionality as educators in the postsecondary sector. As editors, we intentionally identify authors with diverse professional backgrounds who offer a range in their approaches to addressing emergent trends in their respective areas in higher education. In addition to submitting manuscripts that engage critical examinations of diversity, equity, and inclusion in the postsecondary sector, authors were encouraged to design supplemental material for their chapters, such as training modules, study guides, case studies, guides for utilizing critical research approaches and design, and interactive activities that can be replicated in various settings on campus (e.g., the classroom, residence halls, student organization trainings, etc.).

With the stagnant low percentages of women in STEM careers, identifying practices to satisfy the growing need for professionals in those fields is critical to improve recruitment and retention. Supportive relationships, like mentors and sponsors, have been shown to both inspire women to pursue those careers and to help them succeed in them. This book explores how developing supportive connections helps students, faculty, and teachers see STEM professions as being a place for women to grow and succeed. Early chapters provide essential mentor characteristics and explore engineering education gender inequity from a teacher's perspective of stereotypes, stereotype threat, and bias, offering culturally relevant teacher mentoring approaches to promote equitable pre-college engineering education. Middle chapters describe K-12 mentoring programs: mentorship initiatives empowering young South African Women and girls to advance to mathematical-related careers; programs, methods and activities to achieve the desired goal of making young students aspire to become scientists; and engagement year-round in grades 9-12 combined with 40 years of iterative evaluation created a finely-honed enrichment program for low-income Black women in urban public high schools. A longitudinal undergraduate mentoring program for mentoring early college students in Louisiana provides further insights in that section. The final four-chapter section describes mentoring programs for professors and teachers: reciprocal mentor relationships and role shifting within an informal peer mentoring group; differences between mentoring relationships and sponsoring relationships within academia; the impact of culturally responsive mentorship (CRM) on the development and expression of a pre-service teacher’s woman of science identity; and a program that aims to recruit and retain STEM pre-service teachers and STEM teachers of color. With several longitudinal mentoring programs, several programs for women of color, this book fills a gap to help grow the numbers of women in STEM.

It is not surprising that in order to meet the job demands of the future, we need to ensure that students have the knowledge and opportunity to choose from an array of postsecondary options before graduating from high school. Particularly as our society continues to increase in diversity, providing access to college and career choices for all students is imperative. However, there are many barriers that keep students from reaching their potential and envisioning a future that is personally and professionally rewarding. Many of these barriers are systemic in nature and others are related to individual circumstances. Regardless from where the barriers stem, school counselors and others who provide postsecondary readiness services to students must advocate, work to create equitable access, and assist with navigating through complex systems. This book compiles information and strategies from experts in the field. Each chapter in this book offers definitions of specific populations, evidence-based culturally responsive counseling strategies including those related to collaboration, case studies and interventions, and opportunities for readers to reflect on their understanding of that population to inspire professional growth. Groups included in this book include students who are experiencing homelessness, students in English Language Learner programs, families experiencing poverty, students with special needs, and many others that school counselors and college advisors will encounter in their career.

U.S. colleges and universities are rapidly diversifying. In 2018, the U.S. Census Bureau estimated that nearly half of undergraduate students were of non-white racial identities, with that number only increasing for future generations. This increase in diversity holds true for many other identity groups. Yet, faculty demographics remain disproportionately white and male. For years, students have called for institutions of postsecondary education to support their success through adopting more culturally relevant practices for teaching and learning. Scholarship on student success in college has also echoed this call. Developing Culturally Responsive Learning Environments in Postsecondary Education was developed to help postsecondary educators answer this call through a multilayered view of student support within the college classroom and beyond. Specifically, this book features twenty-three chapters divided into four parts. Each part corresponds with four thematic areas identified as an important component in developing culturally responsive learning environments: unpacking educator cultural competence; learning experiences of the 21st century college student; culturally responsive teaching and instruction; and transforming curriculum, content, and environments. Authors representing diverse backgrounds and institutional contexts come together to offer their own scholarly and practical expertise to tackle issues ranging from combating implicit bias and building cultural competence to exploring specific student experiences and practical ways to implement culturally responsive pedagogies. In addition to each chapter, this volume provides a companion case scenario exercise for you to directly apply the content from the book. Ultimately, we hope this book provides you with a meaningful starting place to help you honor the diversity of your students and support their success within your learning context.

Although STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics) has been diversely defined by various researchers (e.g. Buck Institute, 2003; Capraro & Slough, 2009; Scott, 2009; Wolf, 2008), during the last decade, STEM education has gained an increasing presence on the national agenda through initiatives from the National Science Foundation (NSF) and the Institute for Educational Sciences (IES). The rate of technological innovation and change has been tremendous over the past ten years, and this rapid increase will only continue. STEM literacy is the power to “identify, apply, and integrate concepts from science, technology, engineering, and mathematics to understand complex problems and to innovate to solve them” (Washington State STEM, 2011, Internet). In order for U.S. students to be on the forefront of this revolution, ALL of our schools need to be part of the STEM vision and guide students in acquiring STEM literacy. Understanding and addressing the challenge of achieving STEM literacy for ALL students begins with an understanding of its element and the connections between them. In order to remain competitive, the Committee on Prospering in the Global Economy has recommended that the US optimize “its knowledge-based resources, particularly in science and technology” (National Academies, 2007, p. 4). Optimizing knowledge-based resources needs to be the goal but is also a challenge for ALL educators (Scheurich & Huggins, 2009). Regardless, there is little disagreement that contemporary society is increasingly dependent on science, technology, engineering, and mathematics and thus comprehensive understandings are essential for those pursuing STEM careers. It is also generally agreed that PK-12 students do not do well in STEM areas, both in terms of national standards and in terms of international comparisons (Kuenzi, Matthews, & Mangan, 2006; Capraro, Capraro, Yetkiner, Corlu, Ozel, Ye, & Kim, 2011). The question then becomes what might PK-12 schools do to improve teachers’ and students’ STEM knowledge and skills? This book will look at equity and access issues in STEM education from PK-12, university, and administrative and policy lenses.

This volume dedicated to the engagement of African American males in community colleges furthers the research agenda focused on improving the educational outcomes of African American males. The theme engagement also supports the anti-deficit approach to research on African American males developed by renowned research scholars. The true success of African American males in community colleges rests on how well these institutions engage young men into their institutions. This will require community colleges to examine policies, pedagogical strategies, and institutional practices that alienate African American males and fosters a culture of underachievement. The authors who have contributed to this volume all speak from the same script which proves than when African American males are properly engaged in an education that is culturally relevant, they will succeed. Therefore, this book will benefit ALL who support the education of African American males. It is our intent that this book will contribute to the growing body of knowledge that exists in this area as well as foster more inquiry into the achievement of African American males. The book offers three approaches to understanding the engagement of African American males in community college, which includes empirical research, policy perspectives and programmatic initiatives.