Latinx Students Charting Their Own STEM Pathways: How Community Cultural Wealth Informs Their STEM Identities

Abstract

Addressing Latinx student underrepresentation in STEM requires an assets-based reimagining of STEM experiences and pathways that facilitate student success. Drawing on data from two qualitative studies of Latinx students pursuing STEM majors, findings reveal that Latinx students draw on at least six distinct forms of cultural assets to facilitate their, and at times their peers’, persistence in STEM. Latinx students then utilize these cultural assets to develop culturally grounded understandings of themselves as STEM individuals.

How stereotypes and relationships influence women and underrepresented minority students' fit in engineering

“…For example, in her analysis of two rounds of interviews with 10 Black women persisting in their engineering degree programs, Gregory (2015, 2016) found that women of color in STEM manage stereotype threat with social capital by leaning on the support of family and friends and creating counterspaces—safe spaces for marginalized groups that offer a haven from microaggressions and isolation (Ong et al, 2018). Research on the influence of social connections with family or friends from professional networks on persistence found that personal relationships help students feel they fit and stick with STEM (Rainey et al, 2018), including for Latinx and African American students (McGee, 2020; Rincón & Rodriguez, 2020). Ortiz et al (2019) identified how family members 14 Black STEM majors (half at a Predominantly White Institution [PWI] and half at an Historically Black College/University [HBCU]) provided representation of Black people in STEM or encouraged an interest and persistence in STEM.…”

Curando La Comunidad [Healing the Community]: Community-Centered STEM Identity

“…Our study responds to the call for a community-based framework to better understand how the relationships between students and their families/home communities are tied to STEM identity development (Mwangi et al, 2021; Rincón & Rodriguez, 2020). We propose a comprehensive model of community-centered STEM identity for underrepresented minoritized students emphasizing that this development is shaped by sociohistorical, political, and economic contexts with oppressive power structures that devalue community contributions.…”

The big potential of the small frog Eleutherodactylus coqui

“…Collaborating with local scientists on coquí research in its native and invasive range will help increase the representation of Puerto Rican and other Latinx countries in ecology, neuroscience, and conservation. Coquí provide an opportunity for Puerto Rican scientists to do high-quality work close to home and in fields historically lacking Latinx representation ( Lewis et al, 2009 ; O’Brien et al, 2020 ; Quirk, 2017 ; Rincón and Rodriguez, 2020 ). It is difficult to quantify the representation of Native Hawaiian and Pacific Islanders in STEM because Pacific Islanders are traditionally grouped together with Asian Americans, despite being a group with multiple racial and ethnic identities ( Maramba, 2013 ).…”