While most like to consider college and university campuses safe from discrimination, research demonstrates this is unfortunately not true. We know students with minority group status experience discrimination on campus at an alarming rate. Years of research has demonstrated the negative effects of experiencing discrimination on students’ well-being, sense of belonging, and future aspirations. However, research has also shown positive impacts that faculty relationships can have on students’ motivation, academic achievement, persistence, and aspirations. Faculty serve as institutional agents within the university, so they have considerable influence over students’ satisfaction with their university experience and overall wellness. Thus, this study investigates the extent to which college students’ trust in faculty acts as a buffer against the negative impacts of discrimination. Results of this research indicate a strong relationship between experiencing discrimination and feelings of stress and decreased sense of belonging, and that increased stress and decreased belonging negatively affect students’ future aspirations. However, our findings demonstrate that trust in faculty mitigates the negative effects of discrimination and can reduce feelings of stress and increase feelings of belonging, thereby increasing students’ future aspirations. Our findings demonstrate the important role faculty play in creating an affirming climate for students on college campuses.
According to this poll, when asked to compare the prevalence of the stereotypical view that scientists are most likely to be white males to 10 years ago, 60% of science educators said that more students are aware that scientists can come from any demographic group. In the same poll, 55% of science educators said their students still see scientists as most likely to be males. [...]25% said that although more students (compared to 10 years ago) are aware that science can be a diverse field, they do not connect those opportunities with their own demographic group. Teachers can promote the idea that science provides a useful foundation for a variety of careers either in science or that build on science (ASPIRES 2013). [...]teachers can demonstrate the importance of learning science, regardless of career aspirations, by empowering students to weigh in, in an informed manner, on scientific questions important to their lives, such as those that appear in the news or government debates. [...]teachers might help their students better understand climate science by engaging them in the Smithsonian Environmental Research Center's Invader ID citizen science project where they would help identify invasive marine invertebrates in order to track changes in coastal environments.
