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'I Gotta Go to Grad School': How Graduate Preparation Programs Allow Black Women to See Themselves in the Academy

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Title: 'I Gotta Go to Grad School': How Graduate Preparation Programs Allow Black Women to See Themselves in the Academy
Language: English
Authors: Janella D. Benson, Khadejah Ray, LaShawn Faith Washington, Dorian L. McCoy, Rachelle Winkle-Wagner, Bridget Goosby
Source: Teachers College Record. 2026 128(3):46-80.
Availability: SAGE Publications. 2455 Teller Road, Thousand Oaks, CA 91320. Tel: 800-818-7243; Tel: 805-499-9774; Fax: 800-583-2665; e-mail: journals@sagepub.com; Web site: https://sagepub.com
Peer Reviewed: Y
Page Count: 35
Publication Date: 2026
Sponsoring Agency: National Institute on Aging (NIA) (DHHS/NIH)
Eunice Kennedy Shriver National Institute of Child Health and Human Development (NICHD) (DHHS/NIH)
Contract Number: P30AG066614
P2CHD042849
Document Type: Journal Articles
Reports - Research
Education Level: Higher Education
Postsecondary Education
Secondary Education
Descriptors: African American Students, Females, Graduate Students, Women Faculty, College Preparation, Student Experience, Guided Pathways, College Programs, Tenure, Socialization
DOI: 10.1177/01614681261444144
ISSN: 0161-4681
1467-9620
Abstract: Background: Black women remain significantly underrepresented among tenuretrack and tenured faculty in U.S. higher education, despite decades of graduate preparation initiatives. Graduate preparation programs provide invaluable resources and experiences that support historically minoritized students' pathways into the academy. Prior research focused on navigational challenges and barriers, but there is less insight regarding the role of graduate preparation programs in shaping academic pursuits and faculty bidirectional trajectories. The landscape for diversity, equity, and inclusion programs has endured cataclysmic shifts in recent years, so understanding the impact of prefaculty's exposure to academia through undergraduate research preparation and resource opportunities is critical to their long-term success in higher education. Purpose: To better understand the influence of preparation programs, more understanding is needed on how to create academic spaces for Black women academics to flourish and not simply survive. Inquiring how Black women faculty persisted through programs that increased their cultural and social capital needed to navigate higher education into faculty careers is one way to reveal pathways for meaningful inclusion and retention. As such, in this paper, we asked: How do Black women faculty reflect on their graduate preparation program experiences? In what ways, if any, did their experiences in these programs facilitate their pathways into the professoriate? Research Design: We combined Black feminism and a bidirectional socialization model to contemplate the racialized and gendered experiences Black women faculty encounter during their socialization through the academy. This analysis drew data from a larger, explanatory sequential, mixed methods study focused on the ways that racial stress in the academy relates to Black women faculty's health outcomes. We focused on the qualitative component, which consisted of two rounds of interviews with 54 faculty; in this analysis, we focused on the 17 participants who discussed graduate preparation programs and identified participation in these programs on their CVs. Recommendation: This article asserts that through these experiences a "bidirectional possibility" exists where Black women faculty are affirmed in their backgrounds, identities, and research interests through early exposure to be socialized as valuable knowledge producers. We recommend institutions and practitioners review missions and visions to ensure a bidirectional socialization is embedded where the Black women who are matriculating through these programs into the academy are also challenging and changing the program to be more intentional. As the sociopolitical landscape of diversity, equity, and inclusion programming has continued to shift in recent years, it is crucial to understand how the norms and resources needed to thrive in the academy influence Black women who participated many years after initial exposure.
Abstractor: As Provided
Entry Date: 2026
Accession Number: EJ1506098
Database: ERIC
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  Data: <searchLink fieldCode="SO" term="%22Teachers+College+Record%22"><i>Teachers College Record</i></searchLink>. 2026 128(3):46-80.
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  Data: SAGE Publications. 2455 Teller Road, Thousand Oaks, CA 91320. Tel: 800-818-7243; Tel: 805-499-9774; Fax: 800-583-2665; e-mail: journals@sagepub.com; Web site: https://sagepub.com
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  Data: National Institute on Aging (NIA) (DHHS/NIH)<br />Eunice Kennedy Shriver National Institute of Child Health and Human Development (NICHD) (DHHS/NIH)
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  Data: 10.1177/01614681261444144
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– Name: Abstract
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  Data: Background: Black women remain significantly underrepresented among tenuretrack and tenured faculty in U.S. higher education, despite decades of graduate preparation initiatives. Graduate preparation programs provide invaluable resources and experiences that support historically minoritized students' pathways into the academy. Prior research focused on navigational challenges and barriers, but there is less insight regarding the role of graduate preparation programs in shaping academic pursuits and faculty bidirectional trajectories. The landscape for diversity, equity, and inclusion programs has endured cataclysmic shifts in recent years, so understanding the impact of prefaculty's exposure to academia through undergraduate research preparation and resource opportunities is critical to their long-term success in higher education. Purpose: To better understand the influence of preparation programs, more understanding is needed on how to create academic spaces for Black women academics to flourish and not simply survive. Inquiring how Black women faculty persisted through programs that increased their cultural and social capital needed to navigate higher education into faculty careers is one way to reveal pathways for meaningful inclusion and retention. As such, in this paper, we asked: How do Black women faculty reflect on their graduate preparation program experiences? In what ways, if any, did their experiences in these programs facilitate their pathways into the professoriate? Research Design: We combined Black feminism and a bidirectional socialization model to contemplate the racialized and gendered experiences Black women faculty encounter during their socialization through the academy. This analysis drew data from a larger, explanatory sequential, mixed methods study focused on the ways that racial stress in the academy relates to Black women faculty's health outcomes. We focused on the qualitative component, which consisted of two rounds of interviews with 54 faculty; in this analysis, we focused on the 17 participants who discussed graduate preparation programs and identified participation in these programs on their CVs. Recommendation: This article asserts that through these experiences a "bidirectional possibility" exists where Black women faculty are affirmed in their backgrounds, identities, and research interests through early exposure to be socialized as valuable knowledge producers. We recommend institutions and practitioners review missions and visions to ensure a bidirectional socialization is embedded where the Black women who are matriculating through these programs into the academy are also challenging and changing the program to be more intentional. As the sociopolitical landscape of diversity, equity, and inclusion programming has continued to shift in recent years, it is crucial to understand how the norms and resources needed to thrive in the academy influence Black women who participated many years after initial exposure.
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        Value: 10.1177/01614681261444144
    Languages:
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      – SubjectFull: Females
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      – SubjectFull: Graduate Students
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      – SubjectFull: Tenure
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      – SubjectFull: Socialization
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