a crt-informed model to enhance experiences and outcomes
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Journal of Student Affairs Research and Practice
ISSN: 1949-6591 (Print) 1949-6605 (Online) Journal homepage: https://www.tandfonline.com/loi/uarp20
A CRT-Informed Model to Enhance Experiencesand Outcomes of Racially Minoritized Students
Candice Powell, Cynthia Demetriou, Terrell R. Morton & James M. Ellis
To cite this article: Candice Powell, Cynthia Demetriou, Terrell R. Morton & James M. Ellis (2020):A CRT-Informed Model to Enhance Experiences and Outcomes of Racially Minoritized Students,Journal of Student Affairs Research and Practice, DOI: 10.1080/19496591.2020.1724546
To link to this article: https://doi.org/10.1080/19496591.2020.1724546
Published online: 09 Mar 2020.
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Innovation in Research and Scholarship Feature
A CRT-Informed Model to EnhanceExperiences and Outcomes of Racially
Minoritized StudentsCandice Powell, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill
Cynthia Demetriou, University of ArizonaTerrell R. Morton, University of MissouriJames M. Ellis, University of Michigan
Racial inequities in retention and graduation rates are a top concern in highereducation, yet scholars andpractitioners rarely look to racism to explain thesedisparities. Critical Race Theory (CRT) is a vehicle to reveal and challengepower and oppression dynamics between racialized groups. This articleproposes a practical model for student affairs professionals to leverage CRTconcepts to address racial inequities in student outcomes and experiences.
Introduction
Recent high-profile cases of racism at preeminent colleges and universities are sparking
national movements wherein students are demanding action and institutional reform around
issues of racial equity. These high-profile cases reflect institutional challenges in successfully
identifying and addressing the operating procedures and cultural norms that marginalize students
of Color (Scheurich & Young, 2002). University educators and professionals have been increas-
ingly called upon to respond to racism in higher education. However, clear guidelines, models, or
best practices for responding to today’s iterations of racial tension and inequity are not readily
available outside of traditional scholarly discourse and spaces.
Multicultural competence in student affairs practice articulates the need for practitioners to develop
heightened awareness and knowledge about the diaspora of students of Color as well as the skills to
initiate social justice advocacy for inclusive campus environments (Pope & Reynolds, 1997; Pope,
Reynolds, & Muller, 2019). However, this scholarship—while significantly advancing institutional
attention to the experiences and needs of students of Color and acknowledging the role of racism in
oppressing andmarginalizing these students in college—does not center racism as the primary mechan-
ism by which students of Color are marginalized as the primary focus of purpose. The intentional
decentering of race and racism within the multicultural competence literature in favor of speaking to
multiple marginalities more broadly significantly limits its capacity to guide student affairs practitioners
to address the very specific, current realities of racism on their campus and how racism impacts student
Correspondence concerning this article should be addressed to Candice Powell, University of North Carolinaat Chapel Hill, Chapel Hill, NC 27515, USA. E-mail: candicef@email.unc.edu
Powell, C., Demetriou, C., Morton, T. R., & Ellis, J. M. (2020).A CRT-Informed Model to Enhance Experiences and Outcomes of Racially Minoritized Students.Journal of Student Affairs Research and PracticeISSN: 1949-6591 (print)/1949-6605 (online)
JSARP © NASPA 2020 http://journals.naspa.org/jsarp doi:https://doi.org/10.1080/19496591.2020.1724546 1
experiences and outcomes. This gap in practical guidance about ways to directly address issues of racism
on campus comes at a great cost to institutions who strive to improve enrollment, retention, and
graduation rates for students as well as professionals of Color—metrics that are often considered within
an institution’s performance goals (Kuh, Kinzie, Schuh, & Whitt, 2010; York, Gibson, & Rankin,
2015). A deeper understanding and confrontation of the experiences of students of Color with racism as
a primary factor contributing to marginalization, and mechanisms to skillfully disrupt racism would
support more equitable student success efforts and outcomes.
To enhance collegiate experiences and outcomes for students of Color, we propose a model for
student affairs professionals (SAPs) that promotes race and racism consciousness, racial equity, and
improved student support. Student affairs professionals include educators, personnel, policymakers,
and administrators working to advance student success within and beyond the classroom at colleges
and universities. Our model is rooted in the principles of critical race theory (CRT). CRT is used
across academic disciplines to understand and challenge power and oppression (Harper, 2009; Lynn
& Dixson, 2013; Yosso, 2005). Our model aims to provide SAPs with an accessible model for
recognizing, validating, discerning, and acting on racial inequities as a part of their daily work to
enhance students’ educational experiences and outcomes.
Critical Race Theory
Critical race theory is an interdisciplinary area of scholarship drawing from perspectives in
law, history, sociology, ethnic studies, and women’s studies (Yosso, 2005). CRT holds that
racism undergirds and operates within all institutional systems in the United States, unpacking
the dynamics of power and oppression exerted onto racialized groups (Harper, 2009; Ladson-
Billings, 1998; Lynn & Dixson, 2013). Principles of CRT included in our model include: racial
realism, the myth of meritocracy, White supremacist narratives, essentialism and intersection-
ality, and interest convergence.
Racial Realism
Racial realism holds that racism is an endemic and permanent function of U.S. society
perpetuated by discriminatory ideology stemming from the legalized enslavement and oppression
of people from African descent (Bell, 1992; Haney López, 1994; Harris, 1993; Omi & Winant,
1994). Bell (1992) asserted racial realism is not a hopeless stance; rather, it raises an individual’scritical consciousness, bringing awareness toward the possibility of actual social progress given
the acknowledgment of racism. Racial realism empowers marginalized individuals and allies by
providing a sense of purpose to organize actionable strategies as they combat institutional racism
and navigate everyday assaults (Anyiwo, Bañales, Rowley, Watkins, & Richards-Schuster, 2018).
For SAPs, embracing racial realism is critical for appreciating and implementing effective racial
equity practices. Accepting and understanding the deep-rootedness of racism as causes of
inequity within U.S. society enables individuals to adequately address inequity among and within
student experiences and outcomes. For example, many people of Color at predominantly White
institutions (PWIs) encounter overt and covert acts of racial discrimination and, to directly
challenge these experiences, is to engage in individual and collective acts of resistance to support
the community and make a difference for current and future generations. SAPs who embrace
racial realism may be more likely to identify where an institution is complicit in perpetuating
racism, and, understand its impact on the lived experiences of students of Color.
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The Myth of Meritocracy
Meritocracy is a system of allocating opportunities and resources built upon the assumption that
hard work of equal caliber by any person—regardless of their social identities—yields equal access and
outcomes (Bergerson, 2003). In CRT, meritocracy as a general and sole practice for allocating
student resources and opportunity is inherently inequitable as it fails to account for the systematic
exclusion and marginalization of people of Color (Bergerson, 2003; McNamee & Miller, 2018).
Historically, White people gained access to Ivy League and elite public institutions while Black
people and other persons of Color were excluded based on racial discrimination resulting in
disparities in access to positions of power within various professional communities and careers
(Katznelson, 2005; Ladson-Billings & Tate, 1995). As meritocracy enables disproportionately
more White individuals to assume positions of power, it allows them to control narratives about
which norms and experiences are valued, upheld and espoused as the common college experience.
Additionally, it supports the inaccurate framing of opportunities typically more accessible for White
people as equally accessible for people of Color (Bergerson, 2003). Many high-impact programs at
PWIs, including internships, global study, and research, are merit-based and tend to select students
based on GPA and pre-professional experiences.White students from wealthier means may be more
likely to have social networks and experiences preparing them to better meet the merit-based
standards of high-impact programs than students of Color. Meeting merit-based requirements are
more difficult for racially, ethnically, and economically minoritized students because of systemic
inequities narrowing their access to requisite resources and opportunities that facilitate the attain-
ment of those requirements. PWIs embracing meritocracy as a mechanism for choosing students
worthy of high impact experiences do so through SAPs who have power to grant access to high-
impact programs in ways that often discount, minimize, and frame racial inequities as indicative of
the lack of individual effort, fit, or preparedness rather than a consequence of racial disparities in
education (Posselt, 2014).
White Supremacist Narratives
White supremacist narratives are descriptions of circumstances constructed to protect and
perpetuate power, prestige, and privilege among White individuals in power at the expense of
people of Color (Patton, 2015). Such narratives assert whiteness as property ideology, or a White
person’s right to use space, resources, opportunity, and authority at the exclusion of other
racialized groups (Harris, 1993). White supremacist narratives in higher education are dissemi-
nated via the reframing of racialized circumstances to influence institutional decision-making in
favor of White people (Yosso, Parker, Solórzano, & Lynn, 2004). White supremacist narratives
protect a PWI’s reputation and prestige, perpetuate ideologies of meritocracy and colorblindness,
minimize the effect of racial realism, and frame students of Color as inherently deficient and
lacking experiences requisite to be successful in college (Harris, 1993; McGee & Stovall, 2015).
Many programs are created at PWIs with the espoused intention of supporting minoritized
students’ transition to the university. Such programs are typically designed to enculturate margin-
alized students to university norms, rules, and expectations that were cultivated by historical
campus traditions deeply rooted in White and male perspectives. Yet, the creators of such
programs rarely consider the influence of racism and race as part of the need for the programs’creation, nor do they utilize the traditions and knowledge of students and faculty of Color as
assets to the holistic historical intellectual legacy at PWIs distinct from diversity and inclusion
efforts (Delgado & Villalpando, 2002).
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Essentialism and Intersectionality
Essentialism is the idea that a social group can be defined by a narrow set of common experiences
or characteristics shared by all members of that group (Delgado& Stefancic, 2001;Harris, Barone, &
Patton, 2015). Essentialism is problematic because no social group holds a singular perspective and
every member holds multiple, salient, and intersecting identities producing unique experiences
(Crenshaw, 1991; Harris, 1990). Understanding how the intersections of these identities are
experienced dismantles essentialism by valuing the complex and multidimensional identities of
people of Color such as race, class, and gender, and how collectively they yield unique standpoints
and epistemologies for navigating dominant spaces like PWIs (Collins & Blige, 2016; Crenshaw,
1991). At a PWI, a student could simultaneously self-identify as a member of a racially minoritized
group, be part of a gender majority group, and come from a high socio-economic background.
Furthermore, this student may identify as a full-time student, a parent, and an immigrant.
Intersectionality challenges the systematic structure of acknowledging and valuing how these iden-
tities influence individual students’ college experiences and outcomes.
Interest Convergence
Interest convergence details that social and economic progress for people of Color only
occurs when such progress serves the interests of White people in power (Bell, 1980). Provisions
made to advance the position of people of Color tend not to be transformative investments for
dismantling racial inequity; rather, they are symbolic gestures that function to appease those
without power and protect the interests of those in power (Bell, 1980). Institutional initiatives
catalyzed by interest convergence are rooted in good intentions but are not equitable for students
of Color (Harris et al., 2015). For instance, many PWIs create temporary forums, committees,
and one-day conferences with the intention of understanding the experiences and needs of
minoritized groups without endeavoring to change long-standing, oppressive policies or practices
(Harper, 2013). PWIs also often employ recruitment strategies to increase enrollment of students
of Color and tout the benefits of increasing student diversity for the institution, yet seldom do
institutions change aspects of the campus environment, such as monuments, curriculum, and
elitist programs, that marginalize students of Color (Smith, 2009).
Overall, the principles of CRT explicate how racism undergirds and influences the norms,
culture, and procedures of higher education. CRT also helps decipher how traditional notions of
support that do not readily account for racism and oppression fail to change racial disparities in
student outcomes. CRT helps promote race-consciousness and racial equity in higher education
toward more socially just experiences for students, faculty, and staff of Color (Cabrera, 2018; Harper,
2012a). Exploring and embracing CRT concepts can encourage SAPs both familiar and unfamiliar
with CRT to engage in socially conscious action and decision-making (Harper, 2009; Patton, 2015;
Robbins & Quaye, 2014).
Dialogic Action
Dialogic action is work entered in solidarity with oppressed people and has been used within
CRT scholarship to address educational inequities (Smith-Maddox & Solórzano, 2002). True
solidarity and social revolution are not possible without the humbling of the privileged, empower-
ment of the oppressed, and appreciative dialogue (Freire, 2005). In efforts to promote social
advancement and change, Freire (2005) wrote about the need for “acts of cognition” or recognizingand interweaving the voices and consciousness of all those present in a shared space (p. 79). Through
intentional acts of inclusion and validation for others’ ways knowing and experience, learning is
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transformed from a process that transmits information from one to another or molds other indivi-
duals to replicate the presentation and behaviors of the dominant power, into a shared space where
the roles of teacher and student are blended, and everyone progresses forward.
A Model for Student Affairs Professionals to Take a CRT-Informed Approach
Our model, illustrated in Figure 1, encourages SAPs to take a CRT-informed approach to
their work. Specifically, our model provides a point of entry for appreciating and applying CRT
concepts to practice among people who work directly with and make decisions about students
who may be unfamiliar with the CRT literature and terms. This model, which attempts to
reframe select CRT concepts into more accessible language, can be individually applied to one’sdaily efforts as well as the collaborative developments of teams, systems, and programs support-
ing student success outcomes for marginalized students. The model consists of four key practices:
validate, reflect, discern, and act.
Validate involves embracing racial realism as a permanent component in social systems and
developing an awareness of how racism detrimentally impacts students of Color. It is not possible
to engage in social justice action without validating racial realism as the force perpetuating the
social minoritization and marginalization of populations racialized as nonwhite (Harper, 2012b).
Reflect involves exploring one’s positionality, or one’s power and privileges within an environment
Figure 1. Model for student affairs professionals to take a CRT-informed approach.
ACTTake (Dialogic)Action
REFLECTExplore
Positionality
VALIDATEEmbrace Racial
Realism
DISCERNRaise Critical
Consciousness
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that is afforded to them or limited by their education, class, race, ethnicity, gender and physical
abilities (Milner, 2007; Taylor, Tisdell, & Hanley, 2000). Such active reflection, which could
take place via group discussion, individual journaling, or a workshop led by an expert on racism
and power, helps individuals understand the lens through which they see the world and how that
lens influences their understanding and decision-making for improving conditions for margin-
alized students (Relles, 2015).
Our model also encourages SAPs to “discern” normalized situations with critical conscious-
ness—a deep awareness of how societies oppress people—along with a personal commitment to
not perpetuate oppression (Freire, 2005). SAPs with a critical consciousness can understand new
realities and truths separate from the confines of one’s own privilege and can discern how one’spower and privilege consistently preserves dominance for one group at the expense of others
(Freire & Ramos, 2014). Embracing racial realism and exploring one’s positionality are effectivepractices for raising critical consciousness (Zamudio, Bridgeman, Russell, & Rios, 2009). For
example, SAPs should question the historical context for programs designed to support students
of Color, if students of Color have an equal place at the decision-making table regarding the
program, and if the assumptions undergirding the program (e.g. its reputation and notoriety)
promote a deficit-based narrative about students’ cultural wealth and belonging at the institution.
Critical consciousness is developed as a person begins to critically analyze the underlying
structures shaping social norms and creates an opportunity for dialogue and anti-subordinate
action to dismantle oppressive systems (Freire, 2005; Lynn, Johnson, & Hassan, 1999).
Individuals who effectively engage in the first three practices are prepared for the next compo-
nent: “act” by taking dialogic action. Dialogic action describes work entered into solidarity with
oppressed people to disrupt inequitable practices, systems, and conditions (Freire, 2005). Fruitful
work to improve the experience of individuals must occur in partnership with those individuals.
Unfortunately, such partnerships do not frequently occur in higher education. Faculty, adminis-
trators, and staff rarely engage students as equitable partners when making decisions about how to
create better conditions, policies, and programs for students. Rather, SAPs often view themselves as
holding knowledge about what students need rather than considering students as the holders of
knowledge about their experiences (Delgado, 2002). Dialogic action treats students as equitable
partners in designing student supports, services, and programs, and ensures students are at the table
for decision-making processes regarding their experience.
While independently significant, each of the four practices influences one another. Validate,
reflect, and discern are interconnected but not necessarily linear in their development. Act, however,
is not possible to effectively practice without engaging the first three components of our model. To
act effectively, one must first practice validating, reflecting, and discerning in the everyday settings of
higher education: classes, meetings, conversations, programming, and planning. All practices are
iterative and continuous, requiring ongoing activity and learning across time through continued
reading of the growing body of CRT-informed higher education literature and meaningful listening
to the stories of People of Color. Such intentionality creates a shared responsibility to improve the
experiences and outcomes of students of Color wherein which SAPs continuously reflect and refine
their activity and work with students as engaged and equal partners.
Tangible Ways to Take Dialogic Action
Higher education scholars have used CRT concepts to encourage SAPs to reflect on inequities
of practice and to partner with students in developing approaches to enhance their experiences and
outcomes (Harper, 2009). However, minimal guidelines exist for what this process could look like in
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everyday practice. Table 1 provides four key practices for SAPs to apply the tenets of CRT to take
dialogic action.
Challenge Notions of Neutrality and Meritocracy. SAPs concerned with student success
should ask which social group experiences are disproportionately rewarded, punished, or
simply not considered under a policy and to consider equitable alternatives. SAPs making
conscious efforts to look for racial inequity in their work is an extension of the validate and
discern components in our model. Critically reflecting on one’s social position to effectively
navigate power dynamics predicates efforts to challenge assumptions of neutrality and
meritocracy and look for the presence of racial biases within the foundational perspectives of
practices, programs, and systems at PWIs (Harper, 2009).
Participation in high-impact educational practices like internships, studying abroad, and research
opportunities are critical contributors to success in college, especially for Students of Color (Finley &
McNair, 2013; Harper, 2009; Kuh, 2008). Yet, pathways to these opportunities are often merit-based
and fail to consider disparities in access to resources and experiences thatWhite students aremore likely
to acquire because of the racial and socioeconomic privilege afforded by Whiteness (DiAngelo, 2010;
Ladson-Billings, 2006;Museus, Palmer, Davis, &Maramba, 2011). SAPs can challenge neutrality and
meritocracy by partnering with directors of high impact programs and students of Color to conduct an
equity audit of their recruitment, admissions, and support strategies. These partnerships can generate
critical reflection about the criteria high impact programs use to select students (Wells, 2008). Such
reflectionmay also reveal racialized perspectives among SAPs aboutwhat kind of experiences contribute
to the psychological, academic, and social factors necessary to thrive in high impact programs. This
revelation can allow room to deconstruct racist program policies and to reconstruct more equitable and
inclusive metrics for student recruitment and support.
Recognize, Legitimize, and Elevate Experiential Knowledge. Recognizing, legitimizing, and
elevating the experiential knowledge of students of Color includes collecting data about the lived
experiences of marginalized students and using data to guide program development and research
agendas. Participatory action research (PAR) is one method to recognize, legitimize, and elevate
Table 1
Ways to take dialogic action
CRT-Informed (*Dialogic) Action
Description: *Action is only dialogic when informed by solidarity andpartnership with racialized students – especially students who are
racially minoritized.
Challenge notions of neutrality andmeritocracy
Consciously look for or seek the presence of racial biases; criticallyreflect on the foundational perspectives of a practice, program orsystem; pose alternatives and solutions that reject reflections of hiddenracist ideology and history in consultation with students.
Recognize, legitimize, and elevateexperiential knowledge
Partner with students to ensure their voices, experiences, ideas, insightsare directly guiding program development and research agendas.
Storytelling Uncover and promulgate those stories often “unseen” or “untold” tovalidate students’ experiences and empower them to seek change.Promote positive and celebratory stories to disrupt deficit andstereotypical narratives of student capabilities and possibilities.
Challenge dominant White supremacistand essentialist narratives
Advocate for accurate descriptions of university histories and programsthat include the racialized experiences of students of Color; celebratetheir contributions and acknowledge their diverse backgrounds.
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the experiential knowledge of marginalized students at PWIs. PAR empowers the community of
study by repositioning the power of knowledge from researchers to the study participants and
treating them as active and equitable contributors of the research process and related
interventions (Herr & Anderson, 2005). The goal of PAR is for the researcher to reflect on
their socialized experiences and collaborate with the community of study to educate all
stakeholders toward social change (Harper & Kuykendall, 2012; Minkler, 2000; Nelson,
Ochocka, Griffin, & Lord, 1998). PAR differs from existing interventions, such as the equity
scorecard, designed to foster collaboration among SAPs in responding to racial-ethnic disparities
in student outcomes by including undergraduates as equal partners experts in their assessment of
their lived-experience on campus (Harris & Bensimon, 2007). Inviting students of Color to
collaborate in the construction of research agendas and program development can provide
a channel to validate their experiences and cultural ways of knowing (Delgado, 2002). These
opportunities push students to conceptualize and think through their racialized identities,
empowering them to speak about their racialized experiences and better navigate contentious
campus climates (Johnston-Guerrero, 2017).
Storytelling. Human narratives of lived experiences with racism add critical context for
challenging the assumed neutrality of social circumstances (Ladson-Billings, 1998). Students of
Color’s stories encountering racism at PWIs are important for raising critical consciousness, making
meaning, empathizing, and connecting with minoritized students (Ladson-Billings, 1998). Such
empathy plants seeds of critical consciousness to emerge as people who can discern situations in a newlight after having an emotional connection to another person’s lived experience. This process
contributes to the ability to validate others’ lived experiences as parallel realities constructed by
oppressive social positioning.
Storytelling provides students of Color a platform to express a positive identity and celebrate
their cultural ways of knowing within institutions that frame them as problems to be solved or
minimize their racialized experiences (Delgado, 1989, 1995; Ladson-Billings, 1998; McGee &
Stovall, 2015). Such expressions challenge dominant narratives about which experiences are valued
and raise the voices of people of Color at PWIs. These counterstories can help institutions identify
missteps in their support for students of Color by progressing toward a culture of inclusion versus
numeric diversity, and expose and debunk deficit discourses about minorized students (DeCuir &
Dixson, 2004; Hiraldo, 2015).
Student activism is a common platform for students to share their lived experience at PWIs
(Rhoads, 2016). Students use social media, sit-ins, and protests to challenge deficit narratives about
students of Color at their universities and have attempted to reclaim spaces in which they feel
marginalized (e.g., the office of the president or buildings that celebrate racist university benefactors)
(Davis, 2015; George Mwangi, Bettencourt, & Malaney, 2018; Son & Madhani, 2015; Vingiano,
2014). SAPs can learn from and collaborate with student activists to create a campus culture where all
students feel valued and heard, and where the campus community is held accountable for creating an
environment of racial equity (Harper & Hurtado, 2007; Patton, 2015). SAPs can use storytelling to
disrupt deficit-based narratives of academic preparation for students of Color with videos of students
sharing how their pre-college experiences within their homes and cultural communities contribute to
their success in college. In all, partnering with students for storytelling equips SAPs with a tangible
method of practice to understand and apply CRT concepts to campus work.
Challenge Dominant White Supremacist and Essentialist Narratives. To serve the next
generation of college students, institutions will need to attend to their intersecting identities
and experiences (Mitchell, Simmons, & Greyerbiehl, 2014). To do this effectively, SAPs must
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challenge essentialist narratives by questioning their foundation for developing programs and
communicating the value of diversity and student success strategies.
Programs supporting the success of students of Color in college often perpetuate essentialist
narratives by framing their racialized experiences as monolithic (Harper, 2013; Harper & Nichols,
2008). SAPs designing programs to meet the needs of students of Color should critically evaluate if
their activities appreciate variations of economic status, gender identities, sexuality, language, and
national heritage present within the group the program is intended to serve. This is most possible
when programs are developed in collaboration with students who represent the diverse backgrounds
present within racial groups. Such collaborative efforts can prevent programs from framing students
of Color as people with cultural deficits who would be improved and welcomed inWhite dominated
academic spaces by assimilating into a university’s cultural norms and distancing themselves from the
cultural artifacts of language, dress, and traditions of communication associated with their home
communities (McCoy, Winkle-Wagner, & Luedke, 2014).
Universities are often charged with informing the campus community about the value of
diversity and how socio-political events impact members of the university. These communications
may take the form of e-mail messages from the office of the president or chancellor, in-person
presentations and consultations, written strategy documents and reports, research papers, and online
webpages and printed guides. Harris et al. (2015) stated, “Jargon-laden diversity statements, policies,
and commitments, which are not explicitly critical of systems of institutionalized privilege, are
destined to fail” (p. 33). It is important for SAPs charged with these communications to describe
and acknowledge institutional racial inequalities as contributors to student-group academic under-
performance and engagement in college rather than their demographic background. Additionally,
professionals must give equal attention to factors contributing to positive outcomes for students of
Color as much as unearthing the factors limiting their success, including visibly celebrating the stories
of minoritized students and their contributions to the university community in ways that do not
exceptionalize their successes (Harper, 2009).
Although dialogic decision-making about programs and communications is essential to a CRT-
informed approach to enhance the experiences and outcomes of racially minoritized students, our
model encourages SAPs to be proactive in challenging racial bias during everyday interactions. Such
individual acts of advocacy are necessary for disrupting racism in education especially when students
are not present to defend themselves or are not empowered to do so safely. For example, sharing
about students’ racialized experiences as a factor contributing to students’ circumstances may be
helpful in disciplinary hearings and on academic reinstatement committees where privacy is required
to protect the individual student. These acts are dialogic when they are not informed by one’s ownexperiences alone, but by a sense of common purpose and shared social justice goals cultivated with
racialized students through reflection and active, meaningful listening to many students across time.
Challenges of Using Tenets of Critical Race Theory in Student Success Practice
Taking a CRT-informed approach means competently and unapologetically exposing
racism and proposing action steps to address it from a place of cultivated critical consciousness.
While universities are concerned with increasing diversity, they tend to choose strategies that
serve the interests of White people in power and do not disrupt the structures that are built on
racism (Yosso, Smith, Ceja, & Solórzano, 2009). As such, CRT is met with resistance because
it threatens White control of resources, opportunities, and narratives about value and reality
(Ladson-Billings, 1998).
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Maintaining inequity is not always an act of conscious defiance. People in power are often not
aware of the ways their power is maintained by inequality. Nor are many people in multiple positions
of social power ready to acknowledge how they reinforce systems of inequity in order to maintain
their own power because—unlike people holding marginalized identities—they do not experience
the negative effects of inequity. People in positions of power may avoid embracing racial realism
because doing so may trigger unpleasant feelings and recognition that leveling the playing field may
require them to relinquish their power and privilege (Bergerson, 2003; Delpit, 1995). Even when
conscious of institutional missteps in addressing a racial issue, many staff and faculty of Color and
women are afraid to raise concerns about racism for fear of the consequences for challenging the
dominant order (Harper & Hurtado, 2007; Mitchell et al., 2014).
Interest convergence is another challenge to implementing our model as it simultaneously
serves as a significant barrier and a tool for challenging White supremacist and essentialist
narratives in higher education. Institutions heavily rely on White and wealthy alumni or state
governments to fund its programs and services. This reliance on survival and advancement is
a strategic tool of oppression because it distracts the oppressed from the workings of power and
privilege (Freire & Ramos, 2014). This form of interest convergence prevents persons within the
institution from disrupting inequitable systems preserving privileges for wealthy benefactors and
other people who hold influence on university resources because an institution’s livelihood is
predicated on preserving that privilege. For example, White and wealthy donors may not be as
apt to provide increased funding to supplement aid for students of Color because they feel they
are taking resources away from deserving White students or because they may feel uncomfortable
confronting their own privilege. Understanding the concept of interest convergence challenges
SAPs to identify and articulate how the juxtaposition of addressing inequities and preservation of
White privilege hurts institutional goals (Harper, 2009). A shared understanding of how interest
convergence shapes existing initiatives supporting students of Color at PWIs forces SAPs to
deeply reflect on how their programs ultimately serve the interests of White students and
perpetuates deficit views of this student population while still advancing more conscious means
of progress and investment for students of Color (Harper, 2009).
Finally, CRT is an unwelcome truth-teller, and is often met with resistance in institutions that
tend to be more concerned with appearance and civility rather than with equity (Ladson-Billings,
1998). Despite this resistance, Bell (1992) asserted people must continue to work against oppression
toward a more socially just world. CRT has rich potential to equip SAPs with tools to identify and
work against oppressive forces along minoritized students’ path to graduation. Particularly, the
application of CRT principles byWhite researchers can legitimize attention to racism at universities
where White people’s perspectives are normalized and valued (Bergerson, 2003).
Directions for Future Study
This article proposes a model for SAPs to take a CRT-informed approach to enhancing
experiences and outcomes for racially minoritized students. The first three practices in our
model, validate, reflect, and discern, are not linear or simple processes. Rather, they each
represent developmental processes that require quality internal exploration and external support.
More work is needed to explicate tangible steps for navigating the developmental processes
represented in our model. Additional research is required to fully explore those steps and the
lived experiences of professionals who take a CRT-informed approach to improving student
experiences and outcomes in higher education. This includes examining the effectiveness of our
model in promoting transformative, instructional change.
A CRT-Informed Model to Enhance Experiences
10 doi:https://doi.org/10.1080/19496591.2020.1724546 http://journals.naspa.org/jsarp © NASPA 2020 JSARP
Conclusion
The current social landscape of higher education is multifaceted and complex, representing
decades of progress in racial equity as well as entrenched problems yet to be solved. Such a landscape
and the espoused values of most PWIs necessitate that SAPs clearly understand and effectively
respond specifically and directly to racism on college campuses. Improved student experiences and
outcomesmust be cultivated andmeasured beyond aggregate retention and degree completion rates as
a multi-dimensional idea that includes valuing the lived experience of all students. Processes that are
based on racial equity and dialogic action are informed by intentional dialoguewith students ofColor,
see students’ cultural experiences as strengths, frame pre-college experiences within home cultures as
valuable knowledge rather than deficient in preferential resources, and focus on demonstrations of
academic progress and development within the context of their socialized experiences rather than as
exceptions to racialized social and environmental factors. Professionals involved with student success
efforts have a responsibility to regularly discuss racial equity with colleagues who design and execute
policies and programs. These discussions support critical reflection on strategies to reform practices
toward more equitable decision-making.
Engaging in work for equity in student success requires clear guidelines and models of best
practice. CRT provides a timely and relevant framework for examining and challenging power
and oppression between racialized groups (Harper, 2009; Lynn & Dixson, 2013; Yosso, 2005).
The model presented herein encourages validating, reflecting, discerning, and acting, to identify
and challenge racism. It is offered to enhance the work of student affairs professionals including
faculty, researchers, instructors, academic advisors, student affairs personnel, policy-makers, and
administrators. We remain critically hopeful that sharing ideas about how to engage in these
practices will contribute to the disruption of historical inequity’s persistent grip on higher
education outcomes and widen pathways for equity in student success.
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