My Sister’s Keeper: The Need for Persistence and Retention Mentoring Programs for Underrepresented Undergraduate Black Women Dr. Tasha Davis, Governors State University Monday, March 13, 2017 Convention Center, ROOM# 215

Research Question Are Undergraduate Black Women Receiving the Necessary Resources to Persist Through Institutions of Higher Education and Graduate?

Undergraduate Enrollments by Race and Gender

Underrepresented Undergraduate Black Women First Generation Low Income Single Mother

Frameworks Used Black Feminist Thought (1990, 2000) Patricia Hill Collins Black Feminist Epistemology (2012) Critical Race Feminism Adrien Katherine Wing (1997,2003)

Intersectionality/INCLUSION Intersection of Race, Gender, Class, Culture Kimberle’ Crenshaw: My Sisters Keeper Diversity Inclusion

Themes Emerged from the Literature Need for Mentoring (Moses, 1998;Henry, 2008; Evans 2008; Bartman, 2015) Culture of Hip Hop-multiple marginalized identities Racial Climate on Campus Lack of Critical Mass Lack of Black faculty Gender Gap The dating relationships between the Black male and female Need for a Black Female Pedagogy (hooks, 1994; Berry, 2010; Richardson, 2013)

Issues that Affect Persistence The New Direction of Student Services: 1997-2014 Glancing Back, Looking Forward (Whitt & Schuh, 2015) Call Out to Leaders in Higher Education Administration Need for Change Implementation of New Diverse Programs Student Affairs Allocation of Funds History on Retention and Persistence (Tinto, 2007) Lack of data collected to address the needs of these students

Methodology Five Stage Integrative Review of Literature Iterative Process Comprehensive Pearl Growing Critical Interpretive Synthesis Methodology Thematic synthesis Meta Ethnography Grounded Theory 43 published scholars made the inclusion list on my review of literature 40/43 Recommended Mentoring (14 out of 43 Scholars) Recommended an Engaged Pedagogy (26 out of 43 scholars) Data Collected on Three Four-Year Public Universities in Illinois to test the hypothesis

Methodology Five Stage Integrative Review of Literature Iterative Process Comprehensive Pearl Growing Critical Interpretive Synthesis Methodology Thematic synthesis Meta Ethnography Grounded Theory 43 published scholars made the inclusion list on my review of literature Recommended Mentoring (14 out of 43 Scholars) Recommended an Engaged Pedagogy (26 out of 43 scholars) 40/43 Data Collected on Three Four-Year Public Universities in Illinois to test the hypothesis

Future Implications My Sister’s Keeper Mentoring Initiatives A Critical Black Female Street Pedagogy 4 Mentoring Models (Davis Long, 2016) Peer Mentoring (Henderson, Hildreth, & Hunter, 2010) Cross-Cultural Mentoring (Bartman, 2015) “Sister Circles” Mentoring (Henry, 2008) Networking through Mentoring Model (Moses, 1989) Advocate for an engaged pedagogy from a Critical Race Feminist perspective. bell hooks,1994; Theodora Berry, 2010; Elaine Richardson, 2013) Critical Pedagogy (Aliakbari & Faraji, 2011) Pedagogy of the Oppressed (Freire, 1970 ) Street Pedagogy(Zambrana-Ortiz, 2011) A Critical Black Female Street Pedagogy (Davis-Long, 2016)

A Critical Black Female Street Pedagogy

Cross-Cultural Mentoring Model

Peer Mentoring Model

Sister Circles Mentoring Model

Networking Through Mentoring Model

Conclusion My research will use the 2020 deadline set by the White House as the recommended timeframe for institutions to make changes through the implementation of “My Sisters Keeper” mentoring initiatives. Using A Critical Black Female Street Pedagogy to their assess needs Institutions of higher education leaders and Black underrepresented undergraduate women will implement “My Sisters Keeper” (a Black female mentoring initiative) as an exclusive mentoring program that centers the lives of Black women, MSK initiatives should be implemented to help overcome inclusion and diversity issues, persistence and retention issues, increase graduation rates at U.S. institutions of higher education as a whole.

Thank you for joining us today! Please remember to complete your customized online evaluation following the conference. See you in Philly in 2018!