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"My Race/Ethnicity is an Asset": Recruiting Racially Minoritized Students to Optometry School by Acknowledging Their Community Cultural Wealth

Alberto, Christian (2021) "My Race/Ethnicity is an Asset": Recruiting Racially Minoritized Students to Optometry School by Acknowledging Their Community Cultural Wealth. Doctoral Dissertation, University of Pittsburgh. (Unpublished)

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Abstract

Enrollment inequities among racially minoritized (RM) students is an ongoing challenge facing health professions programs in the United States, including optometry schools. As the Director of Admissions for one Doctor of Optometry program located in Northeastern United States, I aim to increase the percentage of RM applicants by 4% (from 12% to 16%) by March 1, 2025 through concerted efforts aimed at improving its recruitment process. For this inquiry, I developed a recruitment program that acknowledges RM students’ community cultural wealth (CCW) and integrates it into the existing recruitment strategy which has historically failed to center RM students. The inquiry was guided by two questions: (1) How does a recruitment program that acknowledges RM students’ CCW influence their habitus, aspiration, and application for optometry school?; and (2) How does a recruitment program that acknowledges RM students’ CCW influence SFV’s ability to attract them to the organization?
The inquiry was guided by English and Umbach’s (2016) Graduate School Choice model and Yosso’s (2005) Community Cultural Wealth theory, and redefined habitus as “an RM student’s sense of self and place within a health professions school context as influenced by their community cultural wealth.” It utilized an improvement science approach and adopted quantitative methods for assessing RM students’ self-reported measurements of their CCW (habitus), access to resources, aspirations for applying, and engagement with the optometry program over time. Data were collected via a pre-, immediate post-, and delayed post-survey administered via Qualtrics XM.
The key findings demonstrate that acknowledging RM students’ community cultural wealth in recruitment may improve their self-assessed perceptions of CCW (habitus) and how they may be assets in the application process. While this is a positive implication for increasing RM students’ pipeline flow to optometry school, structural barriers concerning total costs and standardized exams persisted among participants and further consideration of these barriers is warranted. The inquiry provides recommendations for centering and empowering RM students in recruitment to meet an organization’s diversity, equity, inclusion, and belonging goals.


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Details

Item Type: University of Pittsburgh ETD
Status: Unpublished
Creators/Authors:
CreatorsEmailPitt UsernameORCID
Alberto, Christiancia6@pitt.edu
ETD Committee:
TitleMemberEmail AddressPitt UsernameORCID
Committee ChairGarcia, Ginaggarcia@pitt.edu
Committee MemberAlbieri, Guilhermegalbieri@sunyopt.edu
Committee MemberMeans, Darrisdarris.means@pitt.edu
Date: 31 August 2021
Date Type: Publication
Defense Date: 16 June 2021
Approval Date: 31 August 2021
Submission Date: 30 July 2021
Access Restriction: No restriction; Release the ETD for access worldwide immediately.
Number of Pages: 123
Institution: University of Pittsburgh
Schools and Programs: School of Education > Administrative and Policy Studies
Degree: EdD - Doctor of Education
Thesis Type: Doctoral Dissertation
Refereed: Yes
Uncontrolled Keywords: racially minoritized students professional school health professions school recruitment of racially minoritized students graduate enrollment targets community cultural wealth graduate school choice diversifying graduate student bodies centering racially minoritized students underrepresented minorities empowering racial minority students graduate school aspirations graduate school applications structural barriers
Date Deposited: 31 Aug 2021 18:12
Last Modified: 31 Aug 2021 18:12
URI: http://d-scholarship.pitt.edu/id/eprint/41533

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