The term "achievement gap" has a negative and racialized history, and using the term reinforces a deficit mindset that is ingrained in U.S. educational systems. In this essay, we review the literature that demonstrates why "achievement gap" reflects deficit thinking. We explain why biology education researchers should avoid…

Racially minoritized students in the United States constitute 30% of the U.S. population, but students from these populations represent a smaller proportion of those who earn science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) undergraduate degrees. This disproportionality contributes to race/ethnic income, status, and power inequalities…

This critical literature review investigates how "diversity" and "equity" are employed in top-cited higher education scholarship published between 2000 and 2015. No analysis to date has offered such a comparative exploration relative to well-recognized racial disparities in higher education. Findings reveal a divergence with…

There has been a paucity of research on the educational experiences of young Black women in U.S. K-12 education. Although both Black male and female students experience constrained opportunities to learn, the popular and academic conversation has almost unilaterally focused on the plight of Black boys and men. Drawing on critical race theory, this…

The late Professor Derrick Bell is renowned as the intellectual architect who drafted the blueprints that guided the initial development of critical race theory (CRT). Prior to the advent of CRT, Professor Bell wrote extensively on initiatives designed to improve the lives of African Americans. Among his most influential scholarship, "Serving…

There are 3.2 million Filipinos in the United States, arguably the largest Asian American ethnic group. Although 36.7% of Filipino adults have college degrees, which is much higher than their ethnic and racial counterparts, U.S. Filipino youth have fewer postsecondary opportunities. Filipino immigrant and second-generation youth exhibit high…

In 1996, Californians overwhelmingly approved Proposition 209, which prohibited all state agencies from discriminating on the basis of race, ethnicity, or gender in university admissions, public employment, or competition for a state contract. Opponents of Proposition 209 predicted dire consequences for California's ethnic minorities and women if…

This series of thirteen reports reviewing available information on the causes and dimensions of youth employment is designed to provide an information base for policy formation. (It constitutes the first of a three-volume compendium; other volumes deal with special needs and problems of youth employment policy and with program experience --see…