Guidance or Gatekeeping: An Audit Examination of Racial Discrimination in Leading STEM High Schools

Abstract

Racial discrimination remains a mechanism by which ethnic–racial minorities are restricted from power. We examined whether racial discrimination restricts ethnic–racial minority access to high‐achieving STEM schools. We conducted an audit correspondence experiment to investigate racial discrimination in guidance counselor responsiveness to 976 emails from fictitious Asian, Black, Latina, and White mothers inquiring about school enrollment. Moderation analyses revealed that guidance counselors restricted access from Asian mothers at schools characterized as rural, lower socioeconomic status, and higher STEM prestige—evidence of gatekeeping points to the restriction of Asian students from advanced STEM opportunities. Results are situated within educational audit experiments to objectively document how racism from multiple facets of the education system intersect to inhibit ethnic–racial minority youth.

Dismantling Systems and Improving Contexts to Support the Development of BIPOC Youth

“…In conclusion, we emphasize that research on the contexts of BIPOC youth development cannot be neutral with regard to racism, xenophobia, and other forms of oppression. Whether studying school contexts and processes (e.g., Davis et al., 2022; Janssen et al., 2022) or neighborhood contexts (e.g., Chancy et al., 2022; White et al., 2022), it is unacceptable to study BIPOC youth without recognizing context and forces of oppression they regularly encounter. Recognizing oppression, as this special issue and the one before it shows, does not mean simply studying a minoritized racial or ethnic group, or examining race as a variable, but rather directly theorizing about, measuring, and analyzing the role of systems of oppression at work.…”

“…Several papers in this special issue point to the pernicious role of whiteness in society, including attention on White teachers' racial attitudes (Davis et al., 2022), White counselors who act as gatekeepers to STEM opportunities for Asian families (Janssen et al., 2022), White neighborhoods and the toxicity of whiteness that have negative impacts on BIPOC adolescents (White et al., 2022), cultural mistrust of White authority figures (O'Donnell et al., 2022), and the role of settler colonialism for Indigenous populations and how this plays out in research designs (Uink et al., 2022). We cannot emphasize enough the importance for researchers to consider whiteness as a root cause of systemic racism in our society.…”

“…Daily diary designs are one way to make racism's effects more visible in the day-to-day life and functioning of BIPOC youth. Audit experiments are rarely seen in the field of developmental science, but Janssen et al (2022) show how these experimental methods can put the focus squarely on systems and uncover where, how, and for whom systematic biases occur.…”

“…Audit experiments are rarely seen in the field of developmental science, but Janssen et al. (2022) show how these experimental methods can put the focus squarely on systems and uncover where, how, and for whom systematic biases occur. Their study shed light on how counselors act as gatekeepers to exclude Asian families from STEM‐focused and low‐income schools, which are the kinds of oppressions that are often hidden from view, denied, or explained away.…”

Every Day Matters: Using Daily Methods to Understand Oppression and BIPOC Youth Development in Context

“…Finally, more research is needed to understand the more stable individual and contextual factors that either buffer or exacerbate the everyday influences of OREs, essentially identifying for whom and in what contexts these experiences may be most challenging, as well as which factors can be targeted to lessen the daily challenges of OREs. For example, research has documented how schools and neighborhoods are important contexts for adolescents’ experiences of discrimination (e.g., Davis et al., 2022; Janssen et al., 2022; White et al., 2022 in this special issue). Structural‐level oppression and racism are also critical, broader context that should be considered (Williams et al., 2019).…”