From One Culture to Another: Years One and Two of Graduate School for African American Women in the STEM Fields

Introduction Historically Black Colleges and Universities (HBCUs) have long been an intellectual resource for the African American community. HBCUs have provided and continue to provide an educational pathway for many African American students, particularly women who seek advanced degrees. From 2003 through 2007 seven of the top ten colleges that awarded bachelor's degree in the fields of Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics (STEM) to African Americans were HBCUs (NSF, 2009a). In addition, the top ten baccalaureate institutions of doctoral degree recipients between 2003 to 2007 were all HBCUs (NSF, 2009b). Despite the overwhelmingly positive presence of HBCUs in the African American community, the academic training of students who graduate from HBCUs is often perceived as insufficient by Predominantly White Graduate Institutions (PWIs) and their faculty (Kim & Conrad, 2006). As a result, African American students from HBCUs that move on to attend PWIs for graduate education may not be well integrated into their respective departmental communities and cultures, and may be perceived as less-skilled (Burgess, 1997; Kim & Conrad, 2006). They are also likely to leave graduate programs within the key transition period of the first two years (Herzig, 2004; Tinto, 1993). HBCUs and majority White research institutions are known to exhibit cultural differences (Weidman, Twale, & Stein, 2001). At HBCUs at the undergraduate level, associations and involvement are university-wide (across disciplines and respective academic units), and the culture is perceived to be open and encouraging from the time the students step on to campus (Perna, Lundy-Wagner, Drezner, Gasman, Yoon, Bose & Gary, 2009; St. John, 2000). In contrast, PWIs have been described as places where faculty are indifferent, where little advice is offered, where students are expected to work independently, and where students associate almost exclusively within their respective departments (Morelle, 1996). Thus while HBCUs may provide the support and grounding that engages their students academically and launches their pursuit of higher degrees, they may not prepare them to meet the climate they face upon reaching their graduate programs. To understand the fundamental characteristics of HBCUs and why they differ from PWIs, it is helpful to first consider the six goals that serve as their framework: 1) the maintenance of the Black culture and historical traditions; 2) the creation and retention of Black leadership within the HBCU; 3) the commitment to being an economic unit within the community in which each school respectively stands; 4) the creation of Black role models to interpret the dynamics that impact other Black people outside of the college community; 5) the creation of leaders that are confident and competent in their dealing with of issues that affect all people; and 6) the creation of change agents that can conduct research, training, and disseminate information benefiting everyday lives of all minority communities (Brown & Davis, 2001). Although all HBCUs are not alike, their cultural traditions are such that they all intuitively enforce the belief that the goal of education should be couched in terms of social responsibility (Mays, 1942). HBCUs consider themselves "social agencies" and "social equalizers" for students of color that have been denied access to higher education and marginalized in society. The purpose of this paper is to present the experiences of African American women who transition from HBCUs to majority institutions in STEM fields and what impact this transition has on their persistence and commitment to their disciplines. Specifically this article is the result of a case study inquiry focused on the experiences of six African-American female students who transition from undergraduate studies at HBCUs to graduate studies (during the first two years) in mathematics and chemistry at PWIs. …