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Abstract
The aim of this literature review is to examine research focused on African Americans and their doctoral student socialization experiences toward preparation for the professoriate. We assert that understanding these experiences is critical to addressing the ways African Americans are marginalized during the doctoral process and during their transitions into the academy. Building on existing doctoral student socialization and critical race theory frameworks, we address historic and current challenges that stifle diversification of the pipeline to the professoriate. Findings demonstrate that the growth offaculty of color, specifically Black and Latino faculty, has been marginal at best. As provosts, deans, and department chairs, explore options to best meet the needs of changing student demographics, this paper urges these academic administrators to consider augmenting the doctoral socialization process for students of color. Described by some scholars as dehumanizing and oppressive, the socialization of doctoral students is a key pathway into the academic profession. Currently, doctoral students ofcolor experience marginalization in three key areas of socialization; faculty mentorship, professional involvement, and environmental support. By cultivating an asset-based approach within the socialization process, academic administrators can improve student persistence, widening the gateway into the professoriate for faculty of color.
National demographic data demonstrates that America is becoming a more racially diverse nation. As such, every institution and industry will experience these demographic shifts, including higher education. Some reports estimate that up to half of all postsecondary applications will be come from applicants of color over the next decade (Hoover, 2013). While beginning college enrollees are expected to alter the landscape of undergraduate education, the data does not seem to identify the trajectory for racially diverse applicants into graduate education, and furthermore into the professoriate. Some have argued that the increased enrollments at the undergraduate level may in fact conceal lagging enrollments of graduate students of color. In her chapter titled The Diversity Imperative, Daryl Smith (2011) argues that:
The shifting demographics of undergraduates, in particular, are not synonymous with the deep overall changes that many scholars suggest will be needed in terms of diversity: in leadership, faculty, centrality to the institution's core mission, research contributions, the graduate population, and the reduction of continuing gaps in student achievement (p. 466-467).
See Figure 1 representing projected racial demographics between...