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Preparing for the field of student affairs: White graduate students and the social justice and inclusion competency

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Preparing for the field of student affairs: White graduate students and the social justice and inclusion competency

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Content Running head: WHITE STUDENTS AND THE SJI COMPETENCY 1

Preparing for the Field of Student Affairs: White Graduate Students and the Social Justice and
Inclusion Competency
Emily Bangham

A Thesis Presented to the
Faculty of the USC Rossier School of Education
Postsecondary Administration and Student Affairs
University of Southern California
In Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree
Master of Education

December 2016

WHITE STUDENTS AND THE SJI COMPETENCY 2

Table of Contents
Abstract 3
Chapter One: Overview of the Study 4
Background of the Problem 6

Chapter Two: Literature Review 8
Major Topics 8
ACPA and NASPA Competencies 8
Cultural Humility 11
White Privilege 13
Graduate Students and White Privilege 14
White Privilege and Student Affairs 16
Summary of Literature Review 18

Chapter Three: Research Methods 19
Sampling 20
Instrumentation and Data Collection 21
Data Analysis 23
Positionality 24
Limitations and Delimitations 25

Chapter Four: Results 26
Participants 26
Whiteness and Other Identities 27
Awareness of Privilege and Bias 29
Developing Relationships 33
Talking about Other White People 36

Chapter Five: Summary of Findings 41
Findings and Implications 41
Future Research 44
Conclusion 44

References 46

Appendix A: Facebook Message 53

Appendix B: Certified Information Sheet 54

Appendix C: Interview Questions 56

Appendix D: Code Book 58

Appendix E: Results Charts 61
WHITE STUDENTS AND THE SJI COMPETENCY 3

Abstract
I have conducted a descriptive study on the preparation of White graduate students to
enter the field of student affairs. According to the NASPA and ACPA Professional Competency
Areas for Student Affairs Educators (2015), graduate students in student affairs programs must
be prepared to confront issues of social justice and inclusion. I sought to discover if White
students in a student affairs graduate program feel ready to work with these issues in the field. I
focused on White students because research shows that White privilege can block White people
from exploring their racial identity. According to the Social Justice and Inclusion competency,
student affairs practitioners must accept their own identities in order to accept the diverse
identities of others. I interviewed 5 White graduate students in a higher education Master’s
program and analyzed the data from those interviews through qualitative content analysis.

WHITE STUDENTS AND THE SJI COMPETENCY 4

Chapter One: Overview of the Study
I talk about race with White students and that sort of thing. Sometimes you
get the eye-rolls and a lot of times you get the defensive, you know,
‘White people aren’t bad, we’re not all racist,” and you’re right, you’re not
all racist, but we do contribute to a racist society. If you’re not willing to
have those conversations, you’re not really opened to those things, and
you can’t really say that you’re not racist. So that’s how I feel.
- research participant “Owen”

White people living in the United States possess unearned advantages that they have
access to solely because of the color of their skin (McIntosh, 1990). They hold a disproportionate
amount of power compared to other races, to the point where White culture is prevalent and
popular media is saturated with images of White standards of beauty. Individuals who are
perceived as White profit from their association with the pervasive, dominant culture of the
United States. This system is called White privilege. White privilege is often invisible to many
White people because of their privileged status. This is an important topic in higher education
(HE) because postsecondary institutions in the United States (U.S.) were founded to serve White
people and there are still systems in place on campuses that are directed towards the needs of
White students and which do not recognize the needs of students of color (Rudolph, 2011;
Baumgartner & Johnson-Bailey, 2010). U.S. college students, however, are no longer accepting
the status quo of racial hierarchy in the United States when it manifests in microaggressions and
acts of racism. Microaggressions are daily, suggestive racially-based insults directed towards
people of color, delivered verbally or nonverbally (Sue & Constantine, 2007). Instances of subtle
and blatant racism were exemplified on college campuses in 2015 as there were highly
WHITE STUDENTS AND THE SJI COMPETENCY 5

publicized instances of racial intolerance and student protests, led by students of color (Campus
racial incidents, 2015). The importance of these protests are monumental because some students
are fighting against the structural racism embedded on college campuses, and gaining
recognition that students of color must constantly deal with negative interactions based on their
race. Campus activists are messaging that they will not tolerate racism and they are confronting
intolerance head on.
One such incident at the University of Missouri that occurred in November 2015 showed
the power that students had in confronting administrative indifference to racist language
(Cartwright, 2015). A major student protest resulted in the resignation of the university’s
president who Missouri students felt had not responded strongly against racist acts on the
campus. While this was a victory for many students, there was backlash from others on social
media which included the threat of a school shooting directed at Black students on the social
media site Yik Yak. In the midst of threats against Black students, White Missouri students
posted messages on Yik Yak that revealed their thoughts about race on campus. One user wrote:
“ ‘Dear black people. Sorry I’m white! Just remember though! You get $10,000 diversity
scholarship to come here. I don’t. #minorityprivelage’ ” (Cartwright, 2015, para. 4). Rather than
acknowledging the clear discrimination that Black students were facing on Mizzou’s campus,
this White student instead felt victimized by the fact that Black students were pointing out
discrimination. One of the defining characteristics of White privilege is that it makes many
White people feel that their experiences are the norm (Rowe, Bennett, & Atkinson, 1994). Since
White students do not experience racial discrimination, those who are unaware of their privilege
may not feel like anyone experiences racial discrimination. Often, White students adopt a color-
blind framework, meaning that they believe people should be viewed without consideration of
WHITE STUDENTS AND THE SJI COMPETENCY 6

race and therefore, feel we live in an a raceless society where everyone is treated like equals
(Bonilla-Silva, Eduardo, 2015). When White people do not realize that they have privilege and
they are confronted by the discrimination that others face, they can respond unproductively with
guilt or anger. This is why education that includes White privilege is so important. Providing an
academic space to introduce privilege to White students can make the difference when students
witness racism in real time.
Background of the Problem
The study of White privilege instruction in college classrooms has largely centered on
techniques of teaching White students about their privileges without them rejecting the idea
(Heinze, 2008). White students are often shocked when they learn about their racial privilege and
can initially react in a negative way to the knowledge, including rejecting the notion and moving
towards overt racism (Miller and Harris, 2005). Research typically documents these original
reactions, but then does not go into the long term effects that learning about White privilege can
have on the lives of White students. The purpose of this study is to discover how White graduate
students enrolled in higher education master’s programs relate to the ACPA and NASPA (2015)
Social Justice and Inclusion competency. According to the professional competencies for student
affairs practitioners put forth by higher education organizations NASPA and ACPA,
professionals in higher education must exhibit knowledge of foundational social justice concepts
while working with the growing diverse populations on college campuses. According to these
competencies, part of gaining cultural awareness is to recognize and be able express one’s
identity as it relates to others’ identity (ACPA and NASPA Joint Task Force, 2015). White
graduate students in higher education are expected to recognize and accept their White racial
WHITE STUDENTS AND THE SJI COMPETENCY 7

identities. This study aims to explore if this expectation affects the lives of White graduate
students. The research question that guide the direction of this paper is:
What are the experiences of White graduate students in student affairs in relation to the
ACPA and NASPA Social Justice and Inclusion Competency?
This research will yield a sample of perspectives that White master’s students have of
their racial identities and show their level of preparation for the professional standards of
diversity in the high education field. I will analyze the current research on White privilege
education in postsecondary institutions through a literature review. Next, I will present the
methods that I utilized in order to conduct the study as well as describe my research sample.
Then, I will present and analyze the findings from my research before concluding with
suggestions for future research.

WHITE STUDENTS AND THE SJI COMPETENCY 8

Chapter Two: Literature Review
Major Topics
Literature is available on White privilege as a field of study, but since my research
question is specifically interested in the White identities of students who are in current Master’s
programs, I focused literature written in the last ten years related to student affairs and
postsecondary education. I also consider foundational articles on White privilege. Cultural
understandings of privilege and race have changed because privilege and structural racism are
being publicly discussed through social media (Nakagawa & Arzubiaga, 2014). This widespread
discussion of race is made possible via the Internet, and the graduate students have experienced
the progression of the Internet age and the effect that technology has on the dispersion of
information and opinions on activism. The literature that I will be reviewing will look at the
background of the ACPA and NASPA competencies as well as work done on them. Next, I will
examine literature that delves into how White privilege is often taught to White students. Then, I
will look at the research that exists on the graduate student experience with White privilege.
After that, I will look at the research that discusses White privilege in student affairs.
ACPA and NASPA Competencies
To set competency standards for the field of students affairs, a joint task force assembled
between two higher education organizations in met in 2009 (ACPA and NASPA Joint Task
Force, 2015). Representatives from College Student Educators International (ACPA) and Student
Affairs Administrators in Higher Education (NASPA) analyzed documents and put together 10
competencies for student affairs professionals. The competencies were published in 2010 with
the stipulation that the competencies should come under recurrent review. In 2014, the joint task
force met to read current academic literature on student affairs professional competencies and
WHITE STUDENTS AND THE SJI COMPETENCY 9

examine the 2009 competencies. They received recommendations from outside organizations
and presented their findings to their larger organizations. The task force wrote that they kept
most of the content from the 2009 competencies, but made significant changes to two of the
competencies.
The most considerable changes they made was altering the Equity, Diversity, and
Inclusion competency into its present form, the Social Justice and Inclusion Competency. In their
study of recent literature on student affairs competency standards, the joint task force found that
there was a shift in academic literature from simply understanding diversity to actively pursuing
an inclusive campus environment for all students. The task force wrote that they recognized the
importance of the concept of diversity, but found that the term can be a passive recognition of
“non-dominant groups” (ACPA and NASPA Joint Task Force, 2015, p. 4). They wrote “in
contrast, we aimed to frame inclusiveness in a manner that does not norm dominant cultures, but
recognizes all groups and populations are diverse as related to all other groups and populations”
(ACPA and NASPA Joint Task Force, 2015, p. 4-5). This shift in focus makes it necessary for
student affairs professionals to go beyond appreciating diversity and center social justice in their
practice.
The Joint Task Force (2015) wrote “the 10 professional competency areas... lay out
essential knowledge, skills, and dispositions expected of all student affairs educators, regardless
of functional area or specialization within the field” (p. 7). The competencies are designed to
guide professional development in terms of the present and future state of the field. Each of the
competency areas is split into three sections: foundational outcomes, intermediate outcomes, and
advanced outcomes. The document stresses that people attain outcomes at different rates and can
be advanced in some areas and foundational in others. Additionally, it says that it is necessary to
WHITE STUDENTS AND THE SJI COMPETENCY 10

view these standards in the context of the campus on which they will be applied. The authors
wrote of a few areas where the competency can be put into practice on a campus, one being
graduate program preparation for the field of student affairs. They wrote “...the list of
foundational outcomes should inform minimum expectations for master’s level graduates”
(ACPA and NASPA Joint Task Force, 2015, p. 10).
Since the competency areas were updated in 2015, there has not been significant
scholarly work done on them, but there was some work done on the 2009 revision of the
competencies. Even then, however, Gansemer-Topf, Von Haden, and Peggar (2014) make the
point that “little research has been done to assess the alignment of these competencies with the
actual work of student affairs professionals” (p. 15). In this study, the authors sought to discover
which competencies that entry level admissions counselors needed to be effective in their
positions. Gansemer-Topf et al.’s (2014) research is useful to my study because it focuses on
new professionals who have recently graduated with a Master’s degree. The participants in
Gansemer-Topf et al.’s (2014) study found the competency useful in “...consider[ing] higher
education access and diversity issues within a larger context” as well as recruiting “...targeted
student populations” (p. 17). The results of the study showed that new admissions counselors
needed required five out of the ten competencies early in their career. Of these five
competencies, counselors identified Equity, Diversity, and Inclusion as one of the most
important to their work. Although this competency was altered in the 2015 document, the
reasons for which the counselors chose the Equity, diversity, and Inclusion competency are
applicable to the Social Justice and Inclusion competency area because the two competencies
have foundational similarities. This study is limited in its applicability to my research because it
WHITE STUDENTS AND THE SJI COMPETENCY 11

was published before the updated competencies were released and it focuses on new
professionals in only one branch of student affairs.
In “Professional Competencies for Student Affairs Practice” (2014), Munsch and Cortez
applied the 2010 competencies to excellence standards on community college campuses. In
researching for their study, they found that ethnic diversity among the student body on
community college campuses had raised significantly with no professional development for staff
to address working with this transforming population. The article centered on how to use the
competencies as a tool for staff development and made suggestions on how to put them into
practice to work with “...students, peers, supervisors, and subordinates” in numerous areas on a
campus (Munsch and Cortez, 2014, p. 49). Though this article focuses on how professional staff
in community colleges can utilize the competencies rather than graduate students, it is important
for students to learn about the real life applications of the competencies in both their work as
graduate assistants and as professionals after graduation.
Cultural Humility
The ACPA and NASPA Joint Task Force (2015) created the competencies to
“establish a common set of professional competency areas for student affairs educators” (p.4). It
is useful to set standards for a field that is as varied and expansive as student affairs, but
Tervalon and Murray-Garcia (1998) argue that viewing diversity education in professional fields
through the lens of gaining a competency, as in the Social Justice and Inclusion competency, can
limit learning. In their groundbreaking 1998 article, they argued that competencies are defined as
“easily demonstrable mastery of a finite body of knowledge” and that this produces the idea in a
learner that one can learn everything about other cultures when in reality, education about others
should never end (p. 118). Ortega & Faller (2011), using the work of Tervalon and Murray-
WHITE STUDENTS AND THE SJI COMPETENCY 12

Garcia as a guide, explain the danger of viewing cultural as a conquerable subject in helping
professions. They write:
A cultural competence focus on racial and ethnic differences, for example, may convey
misconceptions that racial and ethnic groups can be understood as a set of observable and
predictable traits, thereby instilling a false sense of confidence in workers about their
knowledge of culturally different individuals or families...The many meanings of culture
in terms of their social constructions, adaptiveness, intergenerational transmission, and
variations across time, generations, and sociopolitical contexts reflect the illusiveness of
the boundedness of culture. Cultural experiences are best explained as an accumulation of
social experiences that are maintained, accommodated or assimilated therefore culture
ought to be viewed as having both stable and ever-changing aspects that may be revised
as a consequence of interaction with others.
In view of the limitations of cultural competence, Tervalon and Murray-Garcia (1998) proposed
the concept of cultural humility. According to the authors, cultural humility is the idea that
learning about the culture of others is a process that lasts a lifetime and that has no achievable
conclusion. The concept encourages learners to continuously self-reflect and challenge their
assumptions about other cultures. Of this aspect of the concept, the authors write that learners of
cultural humility are:
…ideally flexible and humble enough to let go of the false sense of security that
stereotyping brings. They are flexible and humble enough to assess anew the cultural
dimension of the experiences of each [student]. And finally, they are flexible and humble
enough to say they do not know when they truly do not know and to search for and access
resources (p. 119).
WHITE STUDENTS AND THE SJI COMPETENCY 13

Cultural humility can give educators the tools to change their attitude towards learning about
other cultures as well as identities different from their own. Though Tervalon and Murray-Garcia
(1998) came up with cultural humility to specifically address issues in the medical field with
between health practitioners and their patients, this concept has been applied to multiple fields
(Ortega & Faller, 2011; Hook, Watkins, & Davis, 2016; Reynoso-Vallejo, 2009). Cultural
humility is used in this paper as a means to view the Social Justice and Inclusion competency
through a critical lens as it is applied to the participants’ experiences.
White Privilege
Peggy McIntosh’s (1990) work on her experience with White privilege is a foundational
and relatable piece in the study of White privilege. This article is typically used to introduce
students to the idea of White privilege through McIntosh’s statements of daily, unearned
advantages that she experiences due to her whiteness. This article does not reflect the experience
of all White people, particularly those with low socioeconomic status, but is useful as an
initiation to the idea of White privilege. McIntosh’s (1990) seminal article is important to the
research in this study because she describes how White privilege benefits her daily life, whether
through special treatment that she receives from other people based on her race compared to
people of other races or the representation that she sees of White people in the media. The
research in this study will build on McIntosh’s experiences to show how White students grapple
with the recognition that unearned privilege influences their lives beyond the initial awareness
that they have privileges.
In “Teaching Anti-racism: College Student’s Emotional and Cognitive Reactions to
Learning about White Privilege,” the authors study college students’ reactions to White
privilege, noting the differences of response between those who self-identified as White and
WHITE STUDENTS AND THE SJI COMPETENCY 14

those who identified themselves primarily by other factors. White participants had a range of
reactions to learning about White privilege, some finding it difficult to overcome the concept of
meritocracy, which is the idea that people get ahead in the United States based on hard work and
ability, regardless of privilege and identity. Some of the participants indicated feeling that they
were being personally villainized for being White. Overall, the authors found that White students
became defensive when confronted with their racial privilege, so they recommend the best ways
to teach White privilege that would lead to acceptance of the idea (Boatright-Horowitz,
Marraccini, and Harps-Logan, 2012). Heinze (2008) describes how he incorporates the topic of
White privilege into his undergraduate college classes through a series of activities and
discussions. He mentions strategies that other instructors can use to teach White students about
White privilege without them rejecting the concept, including incorporating instructor experience
into lesson plans. Another qualitative study by Miller and Harris (2005) looked at the responses
of different racial groups in a classroom as they learned about White privilege. The authors
utilize the dialogue of students in the classroom as they discuss their thoughts on race and their
experiences with privilege. Importantly, there is a lengthy section on what to do with the
knowledge of White privilege in students’ daily lives. The study that is reported in this essay will
look beyond the reactions that students have in classrooms to the concept of White privilege and
instead focus on what students do with the knowledge of White privilege in their daily lives.
Graduate Students and White Privilege
Most studies focus on the reactions of undergraduates, but rarely focuses solely on
graduate students. In “Resistance to Racial/Ethnic Dialog in Graduation Preparation Programs:
Implications for Developing Multicultural Competencies” the identities of White student affairs
graduate students are studied, however, the focus of the study is the level of preparation that
WHITE STUDENTS AND THE SJI COMPETENCY 15

graduate programs provide for White students in regards to diversity. The lives of students
outside of their program is unaddressed (Kelly and Gayles, 2011). This study on graduate
students will fill that gap.
Puchner and Roseboro (2011) discuss the difficulty that instructors of color have in
teaching White students about White privilege. The authors point out that White students often
view instructors of color as suspicious and may distrust their opinions on race. The authors write
how researchers suggest that “student voice” should be prevalent in classrooms when race is the
subject, but they note the difficulties that professors of color encounter when they employ this
method of teaching if White students question them outright in the class. In their study, they
interviewed 3 teacher education students who had gone through a “sociocultural foundations of
education class” (p. 380). This study was focused on the way that race should be taught to White
people to minimize disbelief and increase buy in. The structure of methodologies in conducting
interviews, especially the use of Helm’s White Identity Model to create protocol, is useful in
informing how interviews with White graduate students should be structured, especially when
students have not come to term with their identities and are uncomfortable with discussing race.
Carter et al.’s study (2007) included interviews with four educational doctoral students
who participated in her Critical Perspectives on Whiteness in Education class. The White
interviewees expressed how the class forced them to face their Whiteness. The interviewees
discussed how the class helped them recognize their denial of privilege and the subconscious use
of their privilege to their advantage. Some important points that came from the interviews were
that the White students acknowledged the complication of recognizing their own Whiteness and
realized that they did not understand their role in education as much as they expected, one
interviewee admitting that they could not properly facilitate difficult discussions about race
WHITE STUDENTS AND THE SJI COMPETENCY 16

because of their discomfort with discussing their own race. This study is useful because it shows
the impact of education about White privilege can have on student seeking advanced degrees.
The issue is that the doctoral students were not necessarily pursuing their degrees in higher
education. Also most professionals working in higher education have Master’s Degrees and
interviewing them about their knowledge of White privilege might be more relevant to the
profession as a whole (Association of College Unions International, 2015). Additionally, the
article only discussed the feelings that the doctoral students had about White privilege in relation
to class discussion, but did not go into how they were applying that knowledge to their work in
education after the fact.
White Privilege and Student Affairs
Accapadi (2007)’s piece “When White Women Cry: How White Women’s Tears
Oppress Women of Color” discusses privilege across multiple identities. The article centers
around a student affairs case study that depicts a White woman reacting negatively to a woman
of color who was critical about the support offered at a campus student services office for a
community of students of color. This occurred in a meeting about how to best support that
community. Though the student affairs professional of color was not talking about the White
student affairs professional, the White woman said that she felt personally attacked by the
woman of color and turned the conversation away from the student population to her own
offense. This case study illustrates a real life scenario that may occur for White student affairs
Master’s students in their assistantships or in their professional careers. It is important that White
student affairs professionals have accepted their White identities so that when the support of
students of color is prioritized, they focus on the needs of students rather than centering
conversations about their outrage if others point out the unfavorable actions of White people in
WHITE STUDENTS AND THE SJI COMPETENCY 17

regards to race. This article informs the research in this thesis because it shows how White
student affairs professional can behave without recognition of their privilege, however, we have
no idea if the White woman in the case study has been introduced to the concept of privilege, so
we do not know if she is ignorant of her privilege or if she is actively rejecting the notion.
Accapadi (2007) also delves into the idea of intersectionality. Though “woman” is not a
privileged identity, the White woman in the case study relied on White privilege to give her
power over her colleague of color, who was reprimanded for upsetting the White student affairs
professional. The notion of intersectionality may inform interviews with the graduate students
that I interview, because I will be looking at other aspects of identity including sexuality,
regional origin, socioeconomic status, and ability. The White woman in the case study cried and
was shown sympathy in a way that is associated with White women, but not necessarily for
women of other races.
Ashe (2012) argues that acceptance of White identity by student affairs professionals is
essential to a college committed to eradicating racism on their own campus. Her research
questions sought to discover if White student affairs professionals recognized how their race
affected their jobs, do they want to be multiculturally competent, and to what extent are they
aware of their privilege, race, and attitudes about race. Ashe (2012) interviewed twelve White
mid-level student affairs professionals and found that many were careful with their words and
fearful of the consequences of saying the wrong thing. Most of the participants showed their
discomfort with being interviewed on the topic of White privilege, whether in their responses or
in their body language. Beyond their fear and discomfort, the author found that the student
affairs professionals felt inadequate in their preparation to deal with difficult conversations about
race with students or conversations about diversity with anyone on campus. The professionals
WHITE STUDENTS AND THE SJI COMPETENCY 18

showed a range of awareness of racial injustice happening on their campus, including
occurrences of racism. The interviewees were able to recall instances of the privilege that their
students and colleagues displayed, as well as their own privileges to varying degrees. The
interviewees mentioned that their graduate school programs highly influenced their feelings
about diversity and helped them understand the history of racism in the United States. This
section of the study was comparatively shorter than the rest and did not delve into specifics about
what they learned about race and multiculturalism in their programs. The student affairs
professionals who participated in the study expressed that their experiences in their graduate
programs shaped their view of their racial identity. In spite of the fact that Master’s programs in
student affairs are designed to prepare professionals for a career in education, none of the
author’s interview protocol is directed to learning about how that education shaped the
participants’ views on race. Instead, the interview questions focused on the extent to which the
participant’s jobs prepared them for working with diverse populations, through trainings or
workshops. Though the participants were able to briefly discuss the diversity preparation that
they received in graduate school, the study missed a significant opportunity to further delve into
their educational history. My study is centered on student affairs professionals’ race and diversity
preparation in graduate school, and will fill that gap.
Summary of Literature Review
In sum, there has been significant literature on White privilege, but not much done on the
experiences of graduate students in student affairs Master’s programs nor much work done on
the ACPA and NASPA standards. The literature clearly demonstrated the importance of
understanding White professionals understanding White racial identity. The next chapter will go
into the methods with which the study will be conducted.
WHITE STUDENTS AND THE SJI COMPETENCY 19

Chapter Three: Research Methods
The research question that guides this study is:
What are the experiences of White graduate students in student affairs in relation to
the ACPA and NASPA Social Justice and Inclusion Competency?
The NASPA and ACPA Professional Competency Areas for Student Affairs Educators
(2015) are designed to set standards for professionals working in the field of student affairs.
There are ten competencies, with each competency having outcomes that are categorized as
foundational, intermediate, or advanced. The authors write in the “implications and applications”
section of the competency document that “graduate preparation programs at the certificate,
master’s, and doctoral level should utilize the competencies as a means of … setting expectations
for cocurricular learning experiences. In particular, the lists of foundational outcomes should
inform minimum expectations for master’s level graduates” (ACPA and NASPA Joint Task
Force, 2015, p. 10).
The study focuses on White participants because according to the SJI competency,
graduate students in student affairs must exhibit understanding of other cultures while working
with the growing diverse populations on college campuses. The ACPA and NASPA task force
(2015) write that part of gaining cultural awareness is to recognize and be able express one’s
identity as it relates to others’ identity. The nature of systemic racism in the United States makes
White identity nearly invisible to White people (Miller and Harris, 2005). Due to the dominance
and prevalence of White culture in the United States, those with White identities can think of
themselves just as Americans and the norm. According to Boatright-Horowitz, Marraccini, and
Harps-Logan (2012), White students often learn about their racial privileges and racial identity in
postsecondary education, either as an undergraduate or in graduate school. By the time, White
WHITE STUDENTS AND THE SJI COMPETENCY 20

students are in graduate school, they do not have many years to process their racial identity, but
it is suggested that they accept their racial identity. The purpose of this study is to determine the
background that White graduate students have with the foundational outcomes of the SJI
competency since they are supposed to leave their program having achieved those outcomes in
particular.
To answer the research question, I will use qualitative methods of gathering data. I plan
on using qualitative methods because the research questions rely on the experiences and thoughts
of the interview participants. Qualitative research is particularly useful for discerning the
connection between socio-political issues and the people who experience them (Gall, Gall, &
Borg, 2010). The study was conducted through individual interviews, as this was cited as the
most successful way to gain insight on the experiences of a population (Creswell, 2013). This
methodology and the reasoning behind it justifies the thought process behind my study’s
methods.
Sampling
Creswell (2013) says “the more diverse the characteristics of the individuals, the more
difficult it will be for the researcher to find common experiences, themes, and the overall essence
of the experience for all participants” (p. 171). In order to find a group of graduate students who
have many of the same traits, I sought my participants from the same master’s program. I will be
utilizing convenience sampling and identified participants based on the overall program list of all
students in their last semester (Emerson, 2015). All students identify as White and are closely
split on gender lines. I interviewed five students, three of the participants identify as men and
two identify as women. The institution that houses the program is a large private university in
California. The Master’s program takes two to three years to complete and has an annual
WHITE STUDENTS AND THE SJI COMPETENCY 21

enrollment of 40-60 students. Ages range from 21-41 in the program, with the average age being
25. The participants that I interviewed were within three years of this average.
The program that I am selecting the sample from requires all of its students to take the
same diversity course. The syllabus states that the purpose of the course is “explor[ing] the
changing nature of student experiences on college campus, and focuses on two related domains:
the diversity of human experiences and the increasing globalization of educational
environments” (Pearson, 2016, p. 1). The syllabus also states the course seeks to answer the
questions, “how do we define our roles relative to issues of diversity: what is our responsibility
to students as they confront issues of difference?” (Pearson, 2016, p. 1). The White students that
I sought to interview come to the program with varied experiences with education on race and
privilege, this course is designed to give them a base knowledge of diversity issues to prepare
them to be competent professionals. By choosing a sample of students who have passed the same
diversity-centered class, I am guaranteed of the fact that the students have received a similar,
foundational education of racial issues and privileges. I can justify this sample because, as
previously mentioned, knowledge of diversity is important and vital to student affairs (ACPA
and NASPA Joint Task Force, 2015). All of the students are required to take the same class that
focuses on diversity, privilege, racism, and identity. The students that I interviewed already took
the class, were in the last semester of their program, and were preparing to enter the field of
student affairs.
Instrumentation and Data Collection
I reached out to potential participants through the use of a Facebook posting on the
program’s Facebook page (Appendix A). According to my research, this is the primary way that
students in the Master’s program communicated. I was able to secure all research participants by
WHITE STUDENTS AND THE SJI COMPETENCY 22

posting that message twice. I received approval to complete this study through the University of
Southern California’s Institutional Review Board. Per the recommendation of the IRB website, I
provided interviewees with a Certified Information Sheet (Appendix B) to explain the study and
how to contact me. For this study, I conducted semi-structured one-on-one interviews with
research participants to collect the data. The interviews last between 45 minutes to an hour and a
half, and the participants were only interviewed once. The interviews were recorded on an
iPhone with the permission of the participants and then transcribed before analyzed. The
interview protocol is derived from the research question and ACPA and NASPA Competencies
(Appendix A), as demonstrated in Table 3.1, which shows how the protocol relates to the
foundational outcomes of the Social Justice and Inclusion competency.
To answer the research question, the study will employ a qualitative description
methodology. Research shows that qualitative studies are ideal when the research question is
focused on individual’s experiences, and is also the precedent when studies examine White racial
identity (Ashe, 2012). Qualitative descriptive studies present information as they are, in the
words of the participants (Sandelowski, 2000). The benefit of using qualitative description as a
form of data analysis is that of the forms of analysis, it minimizes researcher impedance.
Sandelowski (2000) writes that it “entails a kind of interpretation that is low-interference” (p.
335). Interpretation should be minimal as the words of participants should be considered the
primary way that data is communicated to the reader. As the experts of their own stories, the
interviewees’ words should be accepted as a meaningful way to inform of the data. The data was
analyzed using qualitative content analysis, which is the most effective form of analysis for
qualitative descriptive studies (Sandelowski, 2000).

WHITE STUDENTS AND THE SJI COMPETENCY 23

Table 3.1
Social Justice and Inclusion Competency
Area- Foundational Outcomes
Related Interview Questions
F.O.1: Identify systems of socialization that
influence one’s multiple identities and
sociopolitical perspectives and how they
impact one’s lived experiences
1, 2, 4
F.O.2: Understand how one is affected by and
participates in maintaining systems of
oppression, privilege, and power.
10
F.O.3: Engage in critical reflection in order to
identify one’s own prejudices and biases.
11
F.O.4: Participate in activities that assess and
complicate one’s understanding of inclusion,
oppression, privilege, and power.
3, 12

F.O.5: Integrate knowledge of social justice,
inclusion, oppression, privilege, and power
into one’s practice.
13
F.O.6: Connect and build meaningful
relationships with others while recognizing
the multiple, intersecting identities,
perspectives, and developmental differences
people hold.
5
F.O.7: Articulate a foundational
understanding of social justice and inclusion
within the context of higher education.
6,7,8,9
F.O.8: Advocate on issues of social justice,
oppression, privilege, and power that impact
people based on local, national, and global
interconnections
14

Data Analysis
Qualitative content analysis takes information collected from the descriptive interviews
and uses open coding to categorize the data according to themes (Elo & Kyngäs, 2008). Open
WHITE STUDENTS AND THE SJI COMPETENCY 24

coding involves manually coding in the margins of the transcripts, and I utilized open coding for
each participant.
The codes were then recorded in a codebook (Appendix D) to keep the process
organized as codes changed as new data emerged from the participant’s accounts (Saldana,
2008). As Saldana writes, the codebook is “a compilation of the codes, their content descriptions,
and a brief data example for reference” (Saldana, 2008, p. 21). The content analyzed was
manifest content, meaning the substance of the interview itself and not the participant behavior
or interview environment. The code was then turned into categories that directly correlated with
the SJI competency foundational outcomes, demonstrates by a series of tables in Appendix E.
The key to the study was making sure that the research question was relevant and representative
in the analysis process, as Elo & Kyngäs (2008) say “keeping the research question in mind is an
essential aspect of content analysis” (p. 113).
Positionality
I am interested in writing on this topic because I am a White woman in her last semester
of her student affairs Master’s program, and I want to discover how others in similar positions
feel about their readiness to enter the field. I have had the opportunity to talk to those both in and
out of the field about their identities, but I have rarely been able to talk with White people about
being White. A friend, who identifies as a White woman, told me that she feels strange and racist
discussing her White identity. My goal is to have more open dialogue about Whiteness so that it
does not feel like a taboo or racist topic.
I am in the program from which I sought participants and therefore have insider
knowledge of the curriculum that they work through in graduate school, including the diversity
course that I reference throughout this thesis. I am a part-time student so I did not know the
WHITE STUDENTS AND THE SJI COMPETENCY 25

participants well, but had taken a class with all of them at least once. A descriptive study is
therefore ideal for this study to limit my interpretation and bias in presenting the results.
Limitations and Delimitations
This study is limited by the fact that interview participants come from the same graduate
program and school. Although there are a few exceptions, most White students from the program
are between the ages of 21-35, so there will not be a wide age range represented in the sample.
The ACPA and NASPA competencies are nationally recognized as standards for the
profession, so although participant responses are unique, the delimitation in the study is the use
of the standards in the development of protocol and analysis. Additionally, geographically,
students in the program are from a number of states which may give the results a higher level of
relatability to White students in other programs.

WHITE STUDENTS AND THE SJI COMPETENCY 26

Chapter Four: Results
The focus of this study is to discover the background and involvement that White
graduate students in student affairs program have with the Social Justice and Inclusion (SJI)
competency. To achieve this, the study’s protocol had questions that directly address the SJI
competency’s foundational outcomes and the results of the study are laid out in tables that
correspond to the participant’s responses to the interview questions (see charts in Appendix E).
Each chart is labeled as F.O. for “Foundational Outcome” and numbered in accordance with
Table 3.1. The themes correspond to the tables. To keep the participants’ anonymity,
pseudonyms were selected for the interviewees according to each person’s preference.
Participants
John is from Texas and identified himself as “a gay man...White, being male, being
cisgendered… being from a wealthy background or class. My family is Christian and I identify
as Christian...not first generation in college.”
Hannah is from Colorado and said of her identity:
My biggest identity that impacts me, like my whole life and will never stop, is I am a
twin...In terms of racial identity, I am definitely White. Ethnically, my mom's family is
all Italian, my dad's family is mostly Italians. I think I identify myself, if I am going to
discuss it, as an Italian…There's aspects of that culture that I like because I find that they
fit my personality, like it's my excuse for being loud and eating carbs and things like that.
I guess it's the most salient ethnic identity but with that obviously we're pretty White.
Seth is from California and he says of his identity “I am Armenian, male, atheist, heterosexual. I
don’t know what else to say. I guess I’m White.”
Veronica is from California. She described her identity as:
WHITE STUDENTS AND THE SJI COMPETENCY 27

I think the basics are like female. The reason why I am like so weird about this question
is because I think identity is both the way the knowledge is changing. So I know kind of
the answers of like the very basic identifiers labels of like female, straight or
heterosexual all those types of things, but for me as cliché as it is I like to think that I am
more than all of those things. So I will tend to identify myself based on the characteristics
of my personality and the person I want to be as opposed to those labels.
Owen is from Ohio, but moved to California in high school. Of his identity, he said:
I’m White; I’m Caucasian. Male, cisgender, and heterosexual. When looking at
that…again, almost all of the checkmarks of privilege. The only really thing I don’t have
is the religious component. I’m not a practicing Christian or anything like that so when
looking at that score card, I’m really all but one.
Whiteness and Other Identities
Although all participants self-identified as White, only one out of the five chose “White”
as the first label when discussing identity (see Table 4.1). The other participants spoke of the
importance of other identities before being White. In particular, John emphasized his identity as
a gay man throughout the interview. He said, “In terms of my identity there are definitely
particular parts that are more salient, so my identity as a gay man is the most salient and it’s
probably due to minority stress and being more aware of my minority status.”
Seth mentioned the connection that he felt with others who shared the same national and
cultural identity “I always tell people I’m Armenian. I’m pretty proud of that fact. I’ll notice an
Armenian face in a crowd anywhere.” His identity as an Armenian is so pervasive that he did not
think about his racial identity until entering his Master’s program. He said “it’s weird [because]
WHITE STUDENTS AND THE SJI COMPETENCY 28

growing up, I never really thought of myself as a White dude, but coming to this program, I
thought a lot more about my race or whatever. And I was like, ‘Yeah. I am a White dude.’”
In terms of White racial identity, four out of the five participants said that they did not
notice their race until they walked into a room where they became the minority. Hannah said, “I
think I notice it in any situation where you walk into a room and feel like ‘I'm the only one in
here who looks like me.’” Hannah also compared her reaction to other races. She said:
But I don't think I necessarily notice it any more than if the situation were
reversed, because I think it's just natural if I was Latino or African American and
I walked in and I was the only one, I don't think it necessarily is because I am
White.
Hannah believes that the experience of being the only White person in the room is the same as
being the only “Latino or African American” in the room. What she does not account for is the
United States is a society that is culturally built around the needs of White people, so that even if
someone is the only White person in the room, those in the room have experienced positive
images of White folks through the media for their entire lives. Also in this section, all of the
participants who examined their feelings of discussing race mentioned the challenge of bringing
up the topic, particularly when relatives, like in Seth and Owen’s family, are racist. Owen talked
about the normalization of racism in his family. He said:
It’s very challenging talking about [race] with family. I voted for our current president
and when that information came out, my sister told my family that. They were
dumbfounded that I would vote for a Black man. So that’s kind of really the lens that
they’re coming from. My grandparents were at the table, my aunts and uncles and those
sorts of things, and they were really shocked.
WHITE STUDENTS AND THE SJI COMPETENCY 29

Owen finds himself advocating for people of color in conversations with his family. Seth
mentioned a similar sense of responsibility with his family where he must challenge them
regarding their opinions on race. When asked about talking about race, he said, “I have that uncle
that’s super racist, obviously, like everyone else. My dad has done some racist stuff in the past,
and I’ve called him out on it, I knew it was wrong even when I was ten.” Racism is so pervasive
in his family that he assumes that it is a common occurrence in every family.
Seth talks about his father’s distrust of other races and cultures consistently throughout
his interview. In one specific example, he talks about how his father’s suspicion of Seth’s
friends. He said:
I remember a time at home when my African American friend…came over. I’d stolen his
basketball shorts four months earlier and he wanted to come take them back and I was
like, ‘Come in.’ [I said] ‘go up to my room, they’re on my bed.” And my dad just
immediately started flipping out saying, ‘Why are you letting that guy go upstairs?’ in
Armenian ‘don’t let him be alone up there,’ because our safe was up there, like in my
closet, and he was freaking out about that. And I just got really upset with my dad, I
recognized it was wrong.
He talked about caring for his father, but understanding how wrong his opinions are
about those who are different from him.
Awareness of Privilege and Bias
All of the respondents mentioned at some point in their interviews that a key to
successfully breaking down privilege and oppression was an awareness of having privilege in the
first place. Seth said:
WHITE STUDENTS AND THE SJI COMPETENCY 30

Just being aware of what your privileges are and thinking about what others have to go
through, that’ll help to- not maintain- but dismantle, hopefully, the system of oppression,
because you’re thinking about what others are… having to deal with, and maybe putting
things in place to remove those barriers.
Owen talked about how awareness of privilege, race, and other social justice issues relates to
working with students in a higher education environment. He said:
A lot of schools have social injustice and inclusion in their mission statements, or
in their mission for certain departments, or in their cultural affairs offices, but I think
again as our demographic continues to shift and move towards away from whiteness, I
think, in the research that I’ve done, and more towards a community that is diverse...as
demographic continues to shift, it’s something that continues to need to be on the mind of
people, and looking at multicultural awareness and how we put that into practice in our
work is really important, because students in today’s day and age, should come to the
classroom expecting equity and expecting that this be an environment where they’re
going to have an advocate in their corner, or maybe even an ally.
The same cannot be said for question about bias because although every person had a response to
the question, not every person mentioned a bias. John, Hannah, and Seth all mentioned one bias
while Owen mentioned two.
John endorsed the importance of consistently reflecting upon biases. He said:
I have subconscious prejudices and I need to challenge them consciously. If I don’t
challenge them and I’m just like ‘Oh I’m not, I’m not sexist, I’m not racist’ like that’s
not enough, that’s just denial and you’re like ‘Oh I’m a good person, I try my best not to
have these-isms’ but no, you have them, they’re in your head, you’ve been taught them,
WHITE STUDENTS AND THE SJI COMPETENCY 31

you need to actively challenge them.
John went on to say that recognized that biases that he had as an undergraduate were reflected in
his friend group. He acknowledged, “[An] example is my friends back in sophomore year being
all like me… my subconscious prejudices were coming out through that as a representation, I
was probably subconsciously racist in who my friends were, who I was surrounding myself
with.” John then reflected on the biases that he holds today and the reasons why he holds:
I was would say I’m probably a little...heterophobic...I think it’s okay for me to feel
uncomfortable around straight people if that, and in certain spaces that are
heteronormative but maybe kind of like I think that’s okay and I don’t think that’s
heterophobic per say because they are a heteronormative space. But when it comes to
maybe heterosexual sex or talking about heterosexuality or seeing heterosexual couples,
maybe that last one is because of heteronormativity as well and me feeling like I can’t
display my homosexuality per say in public. But you know I probably have a
subconscious prejudice towards heterosexual people and that might be coming from my
being more comfortable with LGBT people.
Seth talked about a bias of religion that came from his youth and education. He said:
The one really strong bias I feel like I have is that, I mean I went to a Christian school
growing up and afterwards I studied philosophy, which is like a totally… everyone’s an
atheist in that field, almost, and I became an atheist. And I started getting bothered by a
lot of what Christianity and religion in general, like the core tenets of the philosophy. So
when I meet someone who’s really, really religious, I can’t help but to be like, ‘Ugh.’
Like John, Owen mentioned the prejudices that he used to hold. He said:
I kind of moved away from the thought of if you’re lower-incomed, or – again – if you
don’t have the privileges that I have, then you haven’t worked hard and that you don’t
WHITE STUDENTS AND THE SJI COMPETENCY 32

deserve that success. I think that that was really my mindset growing up because that was
what I was told and brain-washed, I think.
In terms of his present biases and prejudices, Owen said that he did not feel ready to answer the
question. Owen’s response was to talk about identities that he did not mention throughout the
interview. He said:
I haven’t really had the opportunity to think too much about my biases...I’ve really tried
to suppress those a lot and again not let those bleed into my work just because of the
work that we do, with diversity. I don’t really have a good answer for you there. I felt
pretty prepared for all the other questions. I guess some things that I wouldn’t really
acknowledge, and it took me halfway through this interview to acknowledge, disability
and coming to the table. You’ve been born with full abilities, and then even being born of
such gender, and not having to go through the challenges that some members of the
Trans-community go through. I think those are two of my biases that I don’t really think
about enough... Not that I act on those at all in a negative way, but those I don’t really
think about enough and I think I should think about them more as it
pertains to my work, and how I support students.
While John, Seth, and Owen talked about identities that they have prejudices and biases against,
Hannah chose to talk about an attitude that she was biased against. She said:
I don't have patience for people with that one-track mind of making up an opinion based
on, going back to state example [people stereotyping Hannah based on the state that she
is from] and something like that instead of something I said or something I've
witnessed…[They’re] not basing anything off of experience but just basing it on a
stereotype or whatever.
WHITE STUDENTS AND THE SJI COMPETENCY 33

Hannah avoided focusing on prejudices that she feels towards other and instead talked about
biases that others had vocalized against her. Although Veronica mentioned: “I think the reality is
that everyone has prejudices and vices. I just think that’s impossible for somebody to not,” she
did not mention any specific bias in her response.
Developing Relationships
Throughout the interviews, it was clear that relationships are important to the graduate
students. Across the board, the participants indicated that the best preparation that their graduate
program and the required diversity class gave them helped to develop relationships with their
peers in the program (Table 4.4). Veronica enjoyed the “great peer to peer conversations,” and
Owen liked listening to his colleagues’ stories. He said:
I always say my favorite part about our program is listening to other students’
experiences. Our program has a lot of diversity in it with a lot of different identities from
sexual orientation, to religion, to gender expression and gender identity, and so I love to
listen to their stories and just their…some of them are hurtful and painful to hear – again,
from my level of privilege – but that’s their lived experience. I think that hearing those
experiences, I have kind of a context and a framework of some of the challenges that
people go through, and I just hope that I can serve as a resource to students kind of
moving forward. The program has really helped me put higher education into real life and
I’ve really seen it from a lot of different angles.
Hannah appreciated that her program was the “most diverse environment” that she had ever
been in and that the different experiences of her classmates contributed to her learning beyond
what she learned in books. She said “I think it's that difference of what you learn from reading
and hearing versus actually learning from your peers of like, ‘Oh, this is also my experience’
You know, it's that real world perspective that I think is super valuable.” While Hannah initially
attributes “real world perspective” from her colleagues as essential preparation from her program
WHITE STUDENTS AND THE SJI COMPETENCY 34

to enter into the field of student affairs, she also talked about how discussions revolving around
identity with her classmates in the program’s required diversity course made her uneasy because
of her White identity. She said:
I think one thing that was a struggle for me in [the diversity course] and just in general, I
think is feeling like not knowing what I had to offer. Like we're talking about, going back
to the identity thing, it's not really a salient thing for me, I don't have much to talk about.
I remember one person who was biracial was talking about a time when she was a kid,
people thought that her and her sister had been kidnapped when they were with their dad
because they have more of like they're darker like African American complexion and
their dad is Caucasian. And so when I hear a story like that and I am sitting there and I
am like, "What am I supposed to say?" It makes me feel like where do I have to go from
there?
Hannah provided an example where feeling out of place in discussions about social justice issues
with people of color affected her future as a student affairs professional. She told a story about
how she had applied to another California university for their Master’s in student affairs and
counseling program. This program required a group interview as part of the application process.
She said:
It was a group interview and it was six people. I was the only White, like not first
[generation]-- I guess, what do you call it, second generation college student? And again,
I was like this is very uncomfortable. I immediately felt like, ‘great, what do I have to
bring to this field that's all about this diversity and stuff like that?’ I felt like I was being
judged and they asked a question about ‘what about diversity makes you
uncomfortable?’ And I said something along those lines [not knowing what she brought
to a field focused on diversity]. I didn't get into the program. I don't know what, the
WHITE STUDENTS AND THE SJI COMPETENCY 35

reasons were obviously, if it had anything to do with that or not.
Hannah said that she was more comfortable discussing diversity issues when she perceived that
no one in the class identified with any of the populations being discussed.
There were so many times where I just felt like, ‘what did I have to say?’ versus where if
we were talking about things that nobody really identified with, it was much easier, like
when we were talking about issues with international students, because nobody in my
[diversity] class was an international student. So that's something that none of us had
firsthand experience of, or most people in our class, at least that openly expressed that we
know of or that what we talked about don't have a significant disability. It's in those
conversations where I felt like I am on even playing field with everyone because none of
us have those intersections, I felt okay. But then when it was stuff like going back to
sharing that racial experience, I was like, I don't really know what to say without looking
stupid or looking like my experience is in no way significant to that other experience.
Hannah’s clear discomfort with talking about race is addressed by the SJI competency. To fulfill
the SJI competency all of the foundational outcomes, willingness to discuss race is essential. In
another question (Table 4.6), four of the participants found it essential to have relationships with
people with identities different from their own. Owen said:
We’re all bringing our own idiosyncrasies and strengths to the table. We’re hoping to
make a cohesive unit. I want that in my friend groups, I want that in my staff groups, I
want that with my students. That’s kind of the mantra that I’ve lived by. I want a
well-rounded life and how I’m going to do that is to surround myself with people that
look different than me.
This sentiment was echoed in the other interviewee’s response, with Veronica saying:
Many of my friends and relationships that I have with people I would say none of them
WHITE STUDENTS AND THE SJI COMPETENCY 36

are similar to me. Like none of them... For me it's really important that all relationships
that I build with people are based on an understanding that we don’t have to be the same,
that it's okay for us to disagree, let’s talk about it.
Although Hannah mentioned that she believed in “opposites attract” relationships, she
said: “I can't honestly say that it's something I necessarily seek out like, ‘oh, I really want to be
friends with this person because I feel like they are so different from me’.” She elaborated that:
There are some things where there's always like those very fundamental core values and
beliefs that's like your perspectives, if we don't agree on that, that's- I can respect you, I
can be cordial but that's a fundamentally very important thing to me. We're not going to
be friends.
One interview question asked participants to “characterize your relationships with people whose
identities differ from yours.” Owen endorsed the idea of having relationships with “people that
look different than me” but did not go into depth about why it is so important to have
relationships with those that different from him other than everyone having their own
“idiosyncrasies and strengths” which is not directly or deeply connected to identity. Veronica
emphasized that her friends were different from her, but did not name the differences nor talk
about what those relationships are like, which did not show the critical recognition of identity in
relationships.
Talking about Other White People
In a few of the interviews there was a trend of talking about the behavior of other White
people. Owen, Veronica, and John compared their behavior in the diversity course to that of their
White classmates. They all felt that they had experiences going into their program they made
their diversity course redundant, which differentiated themselves from their classmates. On the
WHITE STUDENTS AND THE SJI COMPETENCY 37

diversity class, Veronica reflected:
I don’t know that it was this life changing class by any means. I think part of that is
because I have been fairly involved in diversity and teaching diversity and understanding
diversity...I think I’ve been so involved and so thoughtful and have been taught to be
thoughtful about those things that I don’t know that [the diversity course] gave me some
new information or made me think in a different way, but I think the class allowed a lot
of conversation that I never really had peer to peer.
Veronica’s past experiences with diversity education made her feel like she had advanced past a
need for the class, though she found value in it. Similarly, Owen felt that his educational
background had given him skills past other White students in his class. He said:
One thing that I’ve heard from students of color, staff of color, is that…it’s a humble
brag, but that I am very socially conscious and aware, again, of my own identity and of
my own privilege, and I do my best to put my biases aside in working with students. So
looking at the [diversity class], I’m not saying that I’m better than any other White
person, but looking at that, I just came in with a different framework coming from an HSI
[Hispanic Serving Institution] With being a White male, coming in I really, in
[the diversity course] sat back and listened. Again, used my active listening and said “it’s
not about me right now, at all. It’s not about me. As much as I’m paying to go to [this
university], as much as I’m paying for this program, I’m in this class to learn about the
experiences of others and figure out how I’m going to help support them. If I’m not
listening, I’m doing them and myself a disservice.
Owen’s insistence that his role in the diversity course was to take a step back and listen to his
classmates because of his identity as a White man. His recognition of the privileged position that
WHITE STUDENTS AND THE SJI COMPETENCY 38

his identity as a White male typically affords in a classroom setting demonstrates his
understanding of his privilege (ACPA and NASPA Joint Task Force, 2015). Owen’s belief that
he should not speak up in class may be a missed opportunity to further explore his feelings about
his identity and give his classmates an idea of what his thoughts are on the topics explored in the
class. Research shows that when White students vocalize their thoughts on their identity and are
able to work process their feelings about White identity with others in a classroom setting is
when they reach a better understanding of their racial identity in relation to a society built on
systemic racism (Boatright-Horowitz et al., 2012). The White students that the authors surveyed
who stayed quiet in class were the least comfortable with discussing race after finishing the class.
He may not have spoken up in class, but Owen observed the behaviors of others in his
class. He acknowledged that White people can get upset when discussions about race mention
White people disparagingly, and mentioned that he noticed his White classmates discomfort in
his diversity course. He stated:
When students of color talk about hurt, or pain that they’ve accrued through White
administrators or just oppression that they faced from the White population, I didn’t take
that personally. I saw some other people do that. They got a little defensive, and when
you do that, you turn off your ears, and you turn on your mouth, and you start to dig
yourself a deeper hole than you should, and you’re really not listening to what the core
root of the issue was. So I really did my best while I was in [the diversity course]. Again,
to listen and to really hear about those things. I almost had this disdain for my race as
well. As in like, ‘Wow, there’s a lot of work that we have to do and we’ve not learnt a
lot.’ Since the abolishment of slavery to now, we’re still at a very similar place that we
were even in the 1960s.
WHITE STUDENTS AND THE SJI COMPETENCY 39

Owen’s recognition that racial issues have not improved significantly since the 1960’s is an
indication of the foundational SJI outcome about identifying influential systems of socialization.
John’s response to the interview question about his diversity class (Appendix E) was akin
to Veronica and Owen’s, but he believed that he actively played a role in the class. He said:
My experience in [the diversity course] I think is a little bit different just because, I think
it’s a little bit different compared to my fellow, especially my fellow White colleagues
and peers because of the work that I do, so working in an LGBT Resource Center and,
working with other cultural centers and doing multicultural work. I felt like the class
was more just kind of like a review and it might sound elitist or pompous, but I felt like
maybe my purpose in the class was to not facilitate the discussion, but kind of help add
my perspective of the work that I’d had to the class discussion so that others could learn.
But for myself personally, I just felt like it was almost review in a way.
John’s belief that his role his program’s diversity course was to share his viewpoint on class
topics covered with his colleagues shows that he is willing to develop relationships with others
while being vocal about identity as outlined in Foundational Outcome 6. Although John
explained that he was vocal in class, like Owen, the way that he illustrated his role in the
diversity class could come from a place where he believes that he had nothing left to learn about
his own privilege. In another part of the interview, he talked about race in a way that showed his
White privilege. He said:
So in my program, especially in my cohort, there is a clique that has formed over the past
year that is mostly White and there are maybe two people in it that are half-and-half, half
white and half another race, and, but those two are in my opinion, whitewashed, which to
kinda better define, I mean that they are whitewashed in they don’t really, like they might
WHITE STUDENTS AND THE SJI COMPETENCY 40

be aware of their race and their lived experience as a person of color and in this case,
multiracial people, but I just feel like their other privileged identities as well as their
background and kind of their interest in race- or their lack of an interest- and these
discussions I feel keeps them from really interacting with other people of color,
multiracial people and so they’re kinda part of that group. Just seeing that White group
really makes me really angry and like I talk to my friends who are people of color and
like they aren’t as angry as I am. They were kinda off about it and kinda upset and now
they’re just over it, but I’m still angry. I don’t know if that’s my White guilt showing up
or if I’m angry because they’re being exclusive.
In his frustration with this group of his cohort members, John carries out a microaggression
against his multiracial colleagues. The term “whitewashing,” is a racist term often applied to a
person of color when it is perceived that they have abandoned culture tied to their ethnicity or
race in favor of adopting traits commonly associated with White Americans, like accent,
clothing, and food choices. This term is offensive, but John justified its use because he felt that
the multiracial students who associated with this group did not embrace their race or ethnicity
and this kept “them from really interacting with other people of color.” By using this word in this
context, John indicated that he believed he could judge the level to which people of color were
committed to their racial and ethnic identities. The belief that you have the power to pass
judgment on the commitment that people have to their races comes from a place of privilege and
shows a lack of “understand[ing of] how one is affected by and participates in maintaining
systems of oppression, privilege, and power” as in F.O.2 (ACPA and NASPA Joint Task Force,
2015, p. 30).

WHITE STUDENTS AND THE SJI COMPETENCY 41

Chapter Five: Summary of Findings
This study was initiated to examine the experiences that White graduate students have
accumulated in relation to the foundational outcomes of the Social Justice and Inclusion (SJI)
Competency created by the ACPA and NASPA Joint Task Force (2015). Using the Foundational
Outcomes of the SJI competency as a guide to create protocol, five White graduate students were
interviewed. The respondents were in their twenties and all were in the same higher education
Master’s program at a private university in California. During the interviews, the graduate
students presented four broad themes that I discussed in Chapter Four including their feelings
toward racial identity, their biases, their relationships across identities, and their focus on the
behavior of other White people. Within each theme, subthemes emerged such as discomfort with
White identity, avoidance of biases, racism within families, and disconnect with class
discussions related to diversity. The implications of the findings and suggestions for future
research are outlined below.
Findings and Implications
The research question that guided this study was:
What are the experiences of White graduate students in student affairs in relation to
the ACPA and NASPA Social Justice and Inclusion Competency?
To answer this question, the protocol used in the interviews was derived from the SJI
Competency’s Foundational Outcomes. The participants responded to the questions with
examples from their professional and personal lives that directly related to the SJI Competency.
There was a range of experiences that the students had in response to the competency which are
outlined in Chapter Four and in the charts in Appendix E, but there were common reactions that
surfaced in their responses. For example, they seemed to come to the interview with expectations
WHITE STUDENTS AND THE SJI COMPETENCY 42

of what their responses should be in relation to their White identities, a sense of nervousness
about the topics, and that diversity education within their program was unnecessary. The
interviewees did not hesitate to answer questions about their identities, but seemed as though
participants came into the interview with the idea that certain responses were expected of them; I
observed this behavior when the participants addressed their race. In all of the meetings, the
interviewees spent extra time addressing their White identities without prompting from the
question’s wording or follow-up questions.
There were two notable attitudes that arose from the participants in discussion of their
education on the topics of social justice and inclusion. First, as noted in Chapter Four, most of
the participants were confident when discussing their diversity training before entering graduate
school. Veronica, Owen, and John all felt their program’s diversity class was important for the
other White students in their cohort, but superfluous for them. Although Hannah and Seth did not
feel the same way about the class, both of them admitted that they did not contribute to
discussions on race due to inexperience or, in Hannah’s case, discomfort.
Even though the participants either felt the class was unnecessary for them or felt like
they should not contribute, the second attitude that I noticed was a sense of nervousness in them
when I asked about them to provide definitions of a series of terms, including privilege,
oppression, power, social justice, and inclusion. These terms were noted in the SJI competency
and asked about in questions six through nine of the protocol (Appendix C). I interpreted a sense
of panic and qualification in their responses. John said, “You know it’s so interesting that I do
this work and I should be able to recite these off the top of my head or at least the dictionary
definitions, but I sometimes have trouble with these questions.” Seth apologized for his answers
repeatedly, and Veronica made exclamations like “oh gosh” and “oh jeez” before she told me the
WHITE STUDENTS AND THE SJI COMPETENCY 43

meaning of the terms “privilege” and “oppression.” This discomfort is interesting because most
could not give full definitions of these foundational terms and yet, most of the participants chose
not to be active members of their diversity class. These behaviors indicate that the participants
may have been more concerned that they show their preparedness to be student affairs
professionals through the demonstration of their proficiency related to the SJI competency. The
reality was that none of the graduate students demonstrated competency in all of the SJI
foundational outcomes. Part of that could be because they did not discuss their races vulnerably
due to the concern of appearing that they had achieved competency to their colleagues and
professors.
Considering that multiple participants used microagressions in their responses or spent
little time exploring their prejudices, it appeared that deeper reflection on the foundational
outcomes, particularly in “critical reflection” of subconscious biases and recognition of their
roles in “maintaining systems of oppression, privilege, and power,” is needed (ACPA and
NASPA Joint Task Force, 2015, p. 30). Since the ACPA and NASPA Joint Task Force (2015)
expect that students pursuing degrees in higher education should leave graduate school having
acquired the foundational outcomes, programs should create more directed opportunities for
critical reflection of these topics. I recommend that multiple assignments allow for this reflection
in required diversity courses and other classes. Similarly, if there is a fieldwork or internship
requirement for the graduate program, I would also recommend directed reflective assignments
that specifically ask about biases, oppression, privilege and power to go along with field
experience. An assignment like this would give students the opportunity to practice critical
reflection in relation to professionally-relevant work before they graduate, helping them develop
habitual reflection as a practiced skill.
WHITE STUDENTS AND THE SJI COMPETENCY 44

Future Research
Since there has been little research published about the outcomes, more inquiry should be
done to see how the work that graduate students and student affair professionals have done
corresponds with not only the SJI competency, but all of the other ACPA and NASPA
competency areas. I only asked questions that related to the students’ experiences with the SJI
foundational outcomes, but in further research, the intermediate and advanced outcomes should
also be explored.
Conclusion
The participants clearly were familiar with the concepts outlined in the Social Justice and
Inclusion competency and many of their answers met the foundational outcomes in the
competency. In order to gauge the participants’ experiences relative to the SJI competency
outcomes, I added interpretation to their interview responses to the Results Charts in Appendix
E. In the charts, I determined if participant responses to interview questions aligned to the
Foundational Outcome upon which the question was based (see Table 3.1). My interpretation
concluded that no participant met all SJI Foundational Outcomes. This could be because they
were so concerned about others perceiving that they have the proper acquisition of social justice
knowledge necessary to succeed in student affairs that they did not openly explore their race in
classes. If this is the case, then the idea of “achieving a competency” may not contribute to the
success of graduate students in student affairs. Although the ACPA and NASPA Joint Task
Force (2015) explicitly say that the competencies are guidelines, they do say that the
foundational outcomes are “minimum expectations for master’s level graduates” (p. 10).
Graduate students should understand that they must have an understanding of social justice
topics to successfully work with the diverse student populations on campuses throughout the
WHITE STUDENTS AND THE SJI COMPETENCY 45

United States, but that they should continue to learn about diversity issues beyond graduate
school and throughout their lives. Cultural humility is a concept that recognizes that learning
about the cultures of others is a lifelong learning process and not a standard that can be met
(Tervalonv & Murray-Garcia, 1998). This concept emphasizes the necessity of continuously
increasing knowledge about the cultures and individual needs of others, but takes the pressure off
the learner to become an expert on all races, ethnicities, and cultures by the end of their graduate
program; they will learn about these topics their whole lives. Pairing the foundational outcomes
of the SJI competency with cultural humility will ease the pressure of needing to be an expert in
social justice concepts for White graduate students, which will increase their willingness to be
more transparent when discussing racial identity.

WHITE STUDENTS AND THE SJI COMPETENCY 46

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Appendix A: Facebook Message
Hello Students!
I am conducting research for my thesis and I am seeking white student affairs graduate students
in the last semester of their Master’s programs. Participation would include being interviewed
for approximately two hours, and interviews will be anonymous. Please email me at
bangham@usc.edu or call/text me at [redacted] if you are interested. Thank you!

WHITE STUDENTS AND THE SJI COMPETENCY 54

Appendix B: Certified Information Sheet

University of Southern California
Rossier School of Education
Waite Phillips Hall
3470 Trousdale Parkway
Los Angeles, CA 90089-4033

INFORMATION SHEET FOR NON-MEDICAL RESEARCH

Preparing for the Field of Student Affairs: White Graduate Students and the Social Justice and
Inclusion Competency

You are invited to participate in a research study conducted by Emily Bangham, Master of Education
candidate, with faculty advisor, Kristan Venegas, Ph.D., at the University of Southern California, because
you are a white graduate student in your last semester of the Postsecondary Administration and Student
Affairs program. You must be aged 18 years and up to participate.

Your participation is voluntary. You should read the information below, and ask questions about anything
you do not understand, before deciding whether to participate. Please take as much time as you need to read
the consent form. You may also decide to discuss participation with your family or friends. You will be
given a copy of this form.

PURPOSE OF THE STUDY
The purpose of the study is to learn about the experiences of white graduate students in student affairs in
relation to the ACPA and NASPA Social Justice and Inclusion Competency.

STUDY PROCEDURES
If you volunteer to participate in this study, you will be asked to sit for an interview for approximately two
hours and asked questions that relate to the foundational outcomes of the ACPA and NASPA Social Justice
and Inclusion Competency. These questions will touch on subjects such as race, social justice, privilege,
power, and oppression.

The interviews will take place in a private setting on the USC campus and you will only be interviewed
once. The interviews will be audio-recorded for data purposes and your identity will be kept anonymous.
In order to participate in this study, you must be audio-recorded.

ALTERNATIVES TO PARTICIPATION
Your alternative is to not participate. Your relationship with USC, your graduate program, your professors
or your grades will not be affected whether or not you participate in this study.

POTENTIAL RISKS AND DISCOMFORTS
There are no anticipated risks to participants in this study. You don’t have to answer any question that you
don’t want to and you can end your participation at any time.

POTENTIAL BENEFITS TO PARTICIPANTS AND/OR TO SOCIETY
WHITE STUDENTS AND THE SJI COMPETENCY 55

You may not directly benefit from your participation in this study. Some participants may benefit from
reflection on professional competencies within the field of student affairs. The potential benefits of this
study to society are a better understanding of the experiences that white student affairs graduate students
have with the ACPA and NASPA Social Justice and Inclusion Competency.

CONFIDENTIALITY
We will keep your records for this study confidential as far as permitted by law. However, if we are required
to do so by law, we will disclose confidential information about you. The members of the research team
and the University of Southern California’s Human Subjects Protection Program (HSPP) may access the
data. The HSPP reviews and monitors research studies to protect the rights and welfare of research subjects.

Identifiers will only be collected for purposes of setting up the interviews, will not be linked to your
responses, and will be destroyed at the completion of the study. The data will be stored on the principle
investigator, Emily’s, personal computer and hard drive under password protection. You have the right to
review your audio recording and transcripts. Only pseudonyms and no personal identifying information
will be listed on the transcripts. The audio recordings will be kept for three years per USC requirements
and then will be erased. The anonymous data will be retained at the discretion of the investigator and may
be used in future research. If you do not want your data used in future research, you should not participate.

The results of this research may be made public, shared with participating sites and quoted in professional
journals and meetings, but results from this study will only be reported as a group such that no individual
respondents can be identified. No identifiable information will be included.

PARTICIPATION AND WITHDRAWAL
Your participation is voluntary. Your decision whether or not to participate will involve no penalty or loss
of benefits to which you are otherwise entitled. You may withdraw your consent at any time and discontinue
participation without penalty. You are not waiving any legal claims, rights or remedies because of your
participation in this research study.

INVESTIGATOR’S CONTACT INFORMATION
If you have any questions or concerns about the research, please feel free to contact

Principal Investigator:
Emily Bangham
Cell Phone Number: (408) 568-2067
Email Address: Bangham@usc.edu
Work Address: Pasadena City College, 1570 E. Colorado Blvd., Room: V-102, Pasadena, CA 91106

RIGHTS OF RESEARCH PARTICIPANT – IRB CONTACT INFORMATION
If you have questions, concerns, or complaints about your rights as a research participant or the research in
general and are unable to contact the research team, or if you want to talk to someone independent of the
research team, please contact the University Park Institutional Review Board (UPIRB), 3720 South Flower
Street #301, Los Angeles, CA 90089-0702, (213) 821-5272 or upirb@usc.edu.

WHITE STUDENTS AND THE SJI COMPETENCY 56

Appendix C: Interview Questions
1. Tell me about yourself. What influenced you to go into higher education?
2. Describe your identity.
a. How does your identity impact your lived experiences?
b. How do you discuss your racial identity with other people?
3. How have your experiences in your program prepared you for your career in
higher education?
a. What kind of experience did you have in [the program’s diversity course]?
How did it affect your perspective on race, multiculturalism, and/or your
racial identity?
b. Can you describe any “A-ha” moments that you had in the class?
c. How did the course influence the way you will approach your career?
d. How prepared do you feel to address issues of multiculturalism and
diversity in your workplace (current or future)?
e. How prepared do you feel to discuss race, racism, and privilege with
students?
4. Describe times that you notice your race
1
.
a. What has been your experience discussing race or racial issues with your
family or friends?
b. Describe how you feel when you discuss race.
c. Describe any situations when you have discussed race outside of the
classroom.

1
question from Ashe (2012, p. 195)
WHITE STUDENTS AND THE SJI COMPETENCY 57

5. Characterize your relationships with people whose identities differ from yours.
a. How important is it for you to have relationships with people whose
experiences and perspectives differ from yours?
6. What is privilege?
7. What is oppression?
8. What is power as it relates to oppression?
9. What is social justice? What does inclusion mean?
a. Where do you see social justice and inclusion in the context of higher
education?
10. If you feel that you have privileges, how do these affect you?
a. Explain how these privileges relate to maintaining systems of oppression
and power.
11. People often have prejudices or biases towards others, whether conscious or
subconscious. Please take a moment to think about your own, and then when
you’re ready, please talk about them with me.
12. Detail any activities in which you have participated that assess and complicate
your understanding of inclusion, oppression, privilege, and/or power.
13. How have you integrated knowledge of social justice, inclusion, oppression,
privilege, and/or power into your practice
14. Illustrate any instances when you have advocated on the issues of social justice,
oppression, privilege, and/or power.
15. Is there something about race that I didn’t ask you but you would like to share?

WHITE STUDENTS AND THE SJI COMPETENCY 58

Appendix D: Code Book

Code Content Description Examples from Text
Support and advocacy of college students -developing social
justice knowledge and
skills
-desire to help students
through their
postsecondary
institution
-equity
-help students develop
ideas and events
-listening to students
-champion the needs of
students from
marginalized groups
-need to be treated
equally but
differently based on
where they are
coming from
-critical question of
how I impact
students
-how can I help my
students learn?
-programs need to
have a broader lens
in order to make
[students] feel
welcome
Noticing Whiteness, especially when around
people of color
-recognize White
identity strongly when
surrounded by a
majority of people of
color
-shopping for clothes

-[notice whiteness]
biggest one is when
I’m with a group of
students that I don’t
share a racial
identity with at all
Difficulty discussing race with family -family doesn’t have
the same diversity
education
-family doesn’t see the
larger picture of the
osse
-family is racist
-conversation stalls
out
-sister shocked that
I voted for a Black
president
Easier talking about race with friends who are
people of color
-less judgment than
family
-in organizations in
undergrad
In assistantships

Intersectional identity -homestate
-multiple identities

Identity as a gay
man is most salient
Factors that contributed to getting a Master’s -difficulty in undergrad -change
WHITE STUDENTS AND THE SJI COMPETENCY 59

in Student Affairs -involvement in student
organizations in
college
-enact change
environment that the
LGBT people
currently live in
-helping students
Careful in speech when talking about race -worried about making
mistakes when
discussing race
-worried about
perception of White
person talking about
race
-don’t want to say
anything that will
upset people
without realizing
-being very careful
with my words
Disagreements and confrontations with White
colleagues and students about social justice
issues
-calling out racism
-noticing racial non-
inclusive behavior
-calling out genderism
and ableism
-seeing that White
group really makes
me angry… because
they’re being
exclusive
Defining foundational concepts of social
justice
-understanding of
essential social justices
terms and their
definitions
Social Justice: An
act, not really an
end goal
Admitting bias and acknowledging privilege -feelings about
privileges
-guilt
-I was thinking
“everyone can do
this”
-I’m a little
heterophobic
Graduate classes source of learning about
fundamental social justice issues through class
discussions and games
-introduction to social
justice issues in higher
education for some
-activities, games, and
discussion that further
understanding of
multiculturalism and
diversity
-talk about race in
our classrooms
-facilitated group
discussion on race
-BAFA BAFA
Conscious of outsider perception of racial
identity
-awareness of white
identity when working
students of color
-job search?
“I’m very, very
aware of my
identity to the eye
and I try to bring
out more of my
identity, like non-
physical identity, to
WHITE STUDENTS AND THE SJI COMPETENCY 60

relate to students”
Ambiguity of ability to address
multiculturalism and diversity as a
professional
-ability to handle issues
relating to
multiculturalism in
workplace and/or with
students themselves
-workplace easier than
students
-I think it’s just
intimidating
-don’t consider
myself an expert
-anxiety
-could use a little
more preparation
Lens or awareness of social justice issues as
integrated into work
-to dismantle systems
of oppression,
awareness of issues is
the first step
-getting better at
this using my
multicultural,
intersectional lens
-du
Race and Job Search -with knowledge of
diverse hiring
practices, participants
are concerned about
getting a job
-transparent about
White identity and
privilege in interviews
-so people in my
field are mostly
White and
disproportionately
White

WHITE STUDENTS AND THE SJI COMPETENCY 61

Appendix E: Results Charts
Table 4.1 F.O. 1

John Hannah Seth Veronica Owen Interpretation
Q1

-Involved in
LGBT
organization and
worked at GLBT
Resource Center
as an
undergraduate, -
Resource Center
advisor
encouraged him
to go into student
affairs
-Felt lost as an
undergraduate
-Did not like job
post-graduation
-Drawn to student
affairs to help
students who “fell
through the cracks”
like her
-Wanted to be a
philosophy professor, but
decided on student affairs;
PhD was too difficult to
get
-Wants to work on a
college campus for his
whole life
-Learned more outside
of the class as an
undergraduate
-Worked in housing
-Wanted to get into
student affairs to help
students figure out
who they are
-Moved to California;
dad lost his job
-SES status lowered in
high school
-Was involved in
orientation, Fraternity,
and student affairs;
inspired him to go into
student affairs
Decision to go into
Student Affairs
motivated by personal
reasons
Q2 Most salient: gay
man
-White
-male
-cisgendered
-wealthy
background
-Christian
-Biggest identity:
twin
-White
-Italian
-woman
-Armenian
-male
-Atheist
-heterosexual
-White
-Armenian identity impacts
daily life
-female
-straight
-White
- personality first
-aware of perception
of appearance
-White
-male sex/gender
-heterosexual
-Acknowledge
privileges and work to
build equity

The participants spend
little time discussing
their privileges and
their White identities.
They also could not
describe how their
privileges affect every
day experiences
Q4 n.d. -notices race when
only person who
looks like her in the
room
-doesn’t talk about
race with family or
friends
-frustrated with
generalizations
about her race
-only Armenian in program
so notices his nationality
every day
-calls out his father on
racist ideas
-hard to talk about race
-talks about race in the
workplace
-notice Whiteness with
a group of students
-doesn’t talk whiteness
-feels anxious
discussing race, then
feels passion
-Notices race most
when he is highly
privileged in room
-Difficult to talk with
friends from Ohio about
race
-Challenging talking to
family about race
Participants generally
do not think about their
own race unless they
are the only White
person in the room or
when other people are
being blatantly racist.
This shows a lack of
understanding about
how identity affects
their lived experiences.
WHITE STUDENTS AND THE SJI COMPETENCY 62

Table 4.2 F.O. 2

John Hannah Seth Veronica Owen Interpretation
Q10 -Maintains awareness of
privilege
-Friends jokingly remind him
to check his privilege
-John notices that people treat
him differently than his friend,
who is a person of color, when
they go out
-Job searching; John wants to
work in an LGBT center after
graduation, but recognizes that
most LGBT Resource Center
are already overwhelmingly
staffed by White people over
people of color
-Feels that people
may not relate to
her if they don’t
have the same
privileges
-Wants to
embrace all
opportunities and
not feel like she
squandered
privilege
-Believes in using
position and
privilege to
educate and
advocate
-Can’t change
privileges, but
would like to
-Acknowledges
privileges and
cites example that
he went to a
liberal
undergraduate
institution, but
“never had to
think of social
justice or power
or identity”
-Mentions the
privilege of not
having to
commute
-Awareness of
privileges will
hopefully help
dismantle
systemic
oppression
-Understands that
it is good that she
has privilege
-Feels guilt about
having privilege
-Aware of her
White privilege
-Assumed other
people had access
to all of the
privileges she had
in college
-Feels that
recognition of
privilege will
interrupt cycle of
oppression
n.d. Though all
participants
acknowledged
their privileges,
they did not go
into depth about
how these
privileges
maintained
oppression. All of
the participants
mentioned that
awareness of
privileges is key
to dismantling
oppression, but
had no actionable
plans of affecting
others beyond
their own
awareness.
WHITE STUDENTS AND THE SJI COMPETENCY 63

Table 4.3 F.O. 3

John Hannah Seth Veronica Owen Interpretation
Q11 -Heterophobic
-Specifically:
heterosexual sex,
talking about
heterosexuality,
seeing heterosexual
couples
-Prejudice comes
from being more
comfortable with
LGBT people
-Does not
have
patience for
people who
make up an
opinion
based on
stereotypes
-Went to a
Christian school
and then became
an Atheist in
college
-Bothered by the
philosophy of
Christianity and
religion in
general
-Everyone has
biases and
prejudices
-Everyone must
identify biases,
understand where
they comes from,
see if it impacts
the way they treat
or think about
people
-Hasn’t really had the
time to think of his
own biases
-Does not think about
people with disabilities
and people who are
Trans*; considers this
a bias
-Does not act on these
biases
All of the participants showed restraint when
discussing biases and prejudices. Veronica
and Hannah in particular avoided the
question. Rather than explore his prejudices,
Owen talked about those he left out of
conversation. While John mentioned a
prejudice against heterosexual couples and
Seth had bias against religious people, both
did not go farther than that; both answered
the question quickly. Critical reflection of
biases implies a deeper
WHITE STUDENTS AND THE SJI COMPETENCY 64

Table 4.4 F.O. 4

John Hannah Seth Veronica Owen Interpretation
Q3 -Necessary to have
part-time work in
addition to degree
program
-Diversity class was
review
-Inspiring to see the
effect that the diversity
class had on
colleagues
-Strategies for
teaching students
about diversity issues
-Improving in
addressing
multiculturalism in
work
-Ready, but could use
more preparation
-Most diverse
environment I’ve ever
been in
-Did not know what to
say in the diversity class
and didn’t feel like they
could contribute
-Felt disturbed by lack of
White panelists on the
topic of bridging gaps
between counselor and
student
-Empathy with those
different

-Can network, find
internships, grow
skillset; eyes opened to
the plight of others
-Realized that he
identified as a White
man
-Learned about
equality vs. equity
-Sensitive to the
struggles of others
-Ready to address
issues of
multiculturalism/diver
sity, but it’s a learning
process

-Will always be
issues in high ed that
need to be fixed
-Great peer to peer
conversations
-Class reaction to
Veronica’s thoughts
on White identity
surprising
-The class was a
good reminder
-Feels like she can
have discussions
about race, but it is
intimidating
-More prepared to
have a discussion on
race with colleagues
-Fieldwork and
connecting theory
to practice
-Sat back, listened,
and learned about
people’s stories
-USC calendar is
based off Christian
holidays and other
religious holidays
are often not
represented
-Framework
-Working on being
able to talk about
multiculturalism in
the workplace
Experience in
program did lead to
a greater
understanding of
social justice
topics.
Q12 -Facilitates activities
constantly through
work
-Conversation about
consequences of
Academic Probation
-Presenting articles
with a discussion in
class that brought up
social justice issues
-Any activity that on
social justice
complicates
understanding
Monopoly that shed
light on
socioeconomic
differences
Any activities that
that the participants
mentioned were
beyond the
participants’
control, whether in
class or mandated
by work. They did
not mention
activities that they
had gone out of
their way to
participate in that
complicated their
understanding.
WHITE STUDENTS AND THE SJI COMPETENCY 65

Table 4.5 F.O. 5

John Hannah Seth Veronica Owen Interpretation
Q13 -I must have those
qualities in my field,
that is just part of my
work and everything I
do
-Story about
advocating on behalf
of Trans* members of
the community
-More aware of social
capital
-University that she
works at gives most
degrees to Latinos in
the nation
-Many of her students
come from
disadvantaged
backgrounds and some
things that seem
obvious to Hannah,
they don’t know
because they didn’t
grow up that way
-Came up with
a safety
procedure at
workplace
-Spends extra
time working
with students
with learning
disabilities or
ADHD on
homework
-Being aware
-Checking herself
-Being thoughtful
-Having a social justice
lens
-Thinking of those who
are left out in programs
or practices
-Not talking for other
people, particularly
those with disabilities
Each participant
mentioned specific
ways that they
integrated knowledge
of social justice into
their work in student
affairs.
WHITE STUDENTS AND THE SJI COMPETENCY 66

Table 4.6 F.O. 6

John Hannah Seth Veronica Owen Interpretation
Q5 -As an undergraduate,
had friends that were just
like him- male, white,
gay, from a wealthy
background- they looked
alike
-After joining the LGBT
organization, started
hanging out with those
that were different from
him
-Now hangs out with a
diverse group and it is
very important
-Can be an opposites
attract situation
-People in
relationships should
have similar core
values and beliefs
-Does not purposely
seek relationships
with people based on
difference
-Hugely important
to have
relationships with
different people
-Has been hanging
out with a diverse
group of friends
since he was young
-Wants perspectives
different from his
own
-Seeks out
relationships
with people who
are different
from her
-It’s okay to
disagree in her
friendships
-Wants relationships
with people who
have different
experiences
-Everyone should
bring something to
the team to make it a
cohesive unit
-Likes to talk, but
likes to hear from
people as well
Except for Hannah,
most of the
participants felt it
was important to
have relationships
with those who were
different from them,
but not pinpointing
any specific
examples of
importance of
recognizing
differences in
identity
WHITE STUDENTS AND THE SJI COMPETENCY 67

Table 4.7 F.O. 7

John Hannah Seth Veronica Owen Interpretation
Q6 Privilege: Can mean
different things to
people; everyone who
has privilege was born
into it
Privilege: Something
that positions you at
an advantage based
on society’s
predetermined status
quo
Privilege: Is like
having invisible
benefits just
because of your
identity
Privilege: Having more
or access to more of
something that’s not
necessarily earned
Privilege: The benefits and
rights that are given to you
by society and what
society really accepts.
Bestowed on you whether
you like it or not
Except for John, the
participants were able to
define elements of privilege.
Not all privileges are inborn.
Q7 Oppression: is
reinforcing the system
on someone who lacks
the privilege in that
system
Oppression: Groups
being marginalized or
held to disadvantages
based on people in
power
Oppression: That’s
just like keeping a
minority down,
keeping them
away from power
Oppression: Like
mistreatment of people
Oppression: The cycle
where discrimination is
actually the prejudice

None of the participants
could define oppression
accurately
Q8 Power: Power is in the
hands of the oppressor,
the oppressed is the one
without power
Power: those who are
in that position
Power: Your
ability to bring
about the things
that you desire;
dominant group
stopping the
minority people.
Power: The perceived
power of the oppressor;
factual based on
numbers/ privilege
Power: That power comes
in the agent, who is the
oppressor.
Seth was the only person
who produced a definition of
power
Q9 Social Justice: An act,
not really an end goal
Social Justice:
creating an effort
toward equality
Social Justice:
Operating in life in
a way that corrects
the power split
Social Justice: The
difference between
equality and equity
Social Justice: Framework
to make sure there is
equity across the board
Seth, Veronica, and Owen
began solid definitions of
social justice. Hannah and
John could not define social
justice.
WHITE STUDENTS AND THE SJI COMPETENCY 68

Table 4.8 F.O. 8

John Hannah Seth Veronica Owen Interpretation
Q14 n.d. -Has not done a
lot outside of the
classroom
-Holds student
resumes to the
same high
standard, no
matter the
circumstance
-Taught chess to
elementary students
of color
-Defended African-
American friend from
Seth’s father’s racism
-Helped a student
through an unfounded
harassment
accusation from a
professor
-Silent advocacy in
workplace
-Supervisors do not
want social justice
programming
-She continues to
implore program
managers to include
this programming in
spite of rejection

-Asks White
students to listen to
students of color
-Tries to convince
family to give
people different
from them a chance
-Introduces new
people to his family
-Does not tolerate
microaggressions
Seth had a specific
instance when he
had advocated for a
student. Seth and
Owen talked about
specific times when
they call out racism
and
microaggressions.
Other than that,
there were no
specific instances of
advocacy.

Abstract (if available)

Abstract I have conducted a descriptive study on the preparation of White graduate students to enter the field of student affairs. According to the NASPA and ACPA Professional Competency Areas for Student Affairs Educators (2015), graduate students in student affairs programs must be prepared to confront issues of social justice and inclusion. I sought to discover if White students in a student affairs graduate program feel ready to work with these issues in the field. I focused on White students because research shows that White privilege can block White people from exploring their racial identity. According to the Social Justice and Inclusion competency, student affairs practitioners must accept their own identities in order to accept the diverse identities of others. I interviewed 5 White graduate students in a higher education Master’s program and analyzed the data from those interviews through qualitative content analysis.

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Asset Metadata

Creator Bangham, Emily (author)

Core Title Preparing for the field of student affairs: White graduate students and the social justice and inclusion competency

School Rossier School of Education

Degree Master of Education

Degree Program Postsecondary Administration and Student Affairs

Publication Date 10/11/2016

Defense Date 07/11/2016

Publisher University of Southern California (original), University of Southern California. Libraries (digital)

Tag ACPA and NASPA Professional Competency Areas for Student Affairs Educators,OAI-PMH Harvest,social justice and inclusion competency,student affairs,White graduate students,white privilege

Format application/pdf (imt)

Language English

Contributor Electronically uploaded by the author (provenance)

Advisor Venegas, Kristan (committee chair), Ahmadi, Shafiqa (committee member), Corwin, Zoe (committee member)

Creator Email bangham@usc.edu,emilybangham@gmail.com

Permanent Link (DOI) https://doi.org/10.25549/usctheses-c40-312725

Unique identifier UC11214765

Identifier etd-BanghamEmi-4872.pdf (filename),usctheses-c40-312725 (legacy record id)

Legacy Identifier etd-BanghamEmi-4872.pdf

Dmrecord 312725

Document Type Thesis

Format application/pdf (imt)

Rights Bangham, Emily

Type texts

Source University of Southern California (contributing entity), University of Southern California Dissertations and Theses (collection)

Access Conditions The author retains rights to his/her dissertation, thesis or other graduate work according to U.S. copyright law. Electronic access is being provided by the USC Libraries in agreement with the a...

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