We Matter Too: Employing Counterstorytelling to Expose the Equity Paradoxes Arresting Mattering and Racial Healing Among Faculty of Color

The present article problematizes faculty relationships within academic departments by applying critical race theory (counterstorytelling) to generate equity cases promoting racial healing. These equity cases illustrate the utility of an emergent typology, the equity paradox. More specifically, the equity paradox describes the web of reprisals endured by faculty of color who advocate for the authentic actualization of university-sponsored diversity goals. Each case is a fictional collage of counterstories created by the co-authors and informed by actual events personally experienced or directly witnessed. This approach allowed for ample complexity, authenticity, and utility because many faculty of color will relate to aspects of these case studies. Simultaneously, administrators and colleagues will gain insights into how racism impacts their colleagues of color. We integrate the racial healing and mattering construct throughout the equity cases to illustrate how racism impacts the individual, communal, and systemic functioning of academic departments. We conclude with implications for departmental transformation to redress the social, emotional, and professional harm of racism and reconstruct professional environments that foster healing and mattering among faculty of color.

Faculty of Color, Bulletproof Souls, and Their Experiences in Communication Sciences and Disorders

Purpose The purpose of this study was to explore demographic characteristics, job satisfaction, workload, challenges and rewards of working in academia, and recruitment/retention advice and recommendations for faculty of color (FOC) in communication sciences and disorders (CSD). Method A 43-item anonymous survey, composed of 38 closed-ended and five open-ended questions, was used to collect information from CSD FOC. Thematic analysis was used to capture trends in participant responses. Results The responses of FOC in communication disorders to closed-ended questions indicated that they were satisfied with their jobs. Overall, FOC reported spending a significant amount of their time on teaching and student-related activities. They also identified several common rewards and challenges of working in academia and offered key suggestions, advice, and recommendations to students, administrators, and the field. FOC responses to open-ended questions revealed noteworthy concerns related to racialized practices. Conclusion Research, policy, and practice focused on the needs of FOC must explicitly examine and address racism in CSD if the field is to develop adequate strategies and mechanisms to support the recruitment and retention of FOC. Supplemental Material https://doi.org/10.23641/asha.16435365

The Faces of Institutionalized Discrimination and Systemic Oppression in Higher Education: Uncovering the Lived Experience of Bias and Procedural Inequity

With seven cases drawn from both personal experience and informal interviews with colleagues from other research-intensive universities, we attempt to demonstrate the forms institutionalized discrimination and systemic oppression can take and if it is supported by policies or procedures encoded into an institution’s rules and regulations. We suggest heuristics for reexamining such procedures to more fully address such inherent biases. We proffer a qualitative methodological approach not only to explore the lived experiences of faculty of color but also to explore the latent as well as manifest meanings of these experiences for the faculty involved, which are frequently neither obvious nor transparent to both non-minority faculty and those responsible for carrying out institutional policies and regulations. Finally, we offer some criticisms of qualitative research in this arena to which organizational researchers must attend.

Epistemic Exclusion Toolbox Workshop Report [Technical report]

Workshop Summary:The Toolbox Dialogue Initiative conducted two workshops with Michigan State University faculty on May 4, 2017 and one with administrators on May 24, 2017. The first faculty workshop –“Group 1” in what follows – comprised white faculty, while the second, “Group 2”, comprised faculty of color. The administrator workshop, “Group 3”, comprised a mixed-race group of administrators. These 3-hour workshops included dialogue structured by prompt-based instruments customized specifically to emphasize epistemic exclusion. The instruments were designed by Michael O’Rourke and Stephanie E. Vasko, with significant input from Nicole Buchanan, Kristie Dotson, and Isis Settles. (See Appendix 1 for the Toolbox instruments and prompts used in each workshop.) The workshops were facilitated by Michael O’Rourke and Stephanie E. Vasko and began with a presentation briefly covering the Faculty Inclusion and Excellence Study, epistemic exclusion, the Toolbox approach, instrument design, and details about the workshop. The dialogue sessions lasted between 50 and 70 minutes and were followed by a co-creation activity. The cocreation activity during the faculty workshops was designed to inform the administration workshop, and the co-creation activity during the administration workshop was intended to inform MSU policy concerning valuing and evaluating scholarship at MSU. The workshops concluded with a debrief discussion and reflection on the process.

The Equity Paradox Typology: An Application of Critical Race Methodology to Redress Racial Harm Against Faculty of Color

This inquiry unearths the stratified nature of racial harm in higher education by applying counterstorytelling to fashion an equity case study on racial harm. Racial harm consists of four conditions (hyper-cognition, hyper-isolation, hyper-distress, and hyper-reactivity) brought on by persistent exposure to racial discrimination embedded subtlety within academic departments as a series of racialized conflicts (diversity & curriculum clashes, and relational & power dynamics). To advance the use of qualitative research to end racism in higher education, we offer a true-telling framework, a guide for talking back, a research typology to unearth the pandemic of racism infecting faculty relations.

Facing the Storm: Our First Annual Faculty of Color Writing Retreat as a Microcosm for Being a Black Woman in the Academy

In this article, four Black woman scholars explore their experiences in academia through the shared event of a writing retreat. This piece follows the rich storytelling history of Black women scholars who have carved out spaces where they can tell their truths. This work pairs narrative inquiry and autoethnography to address the question: How do Black women faculty create and navigate spaces to promote their success within academia?