Melanie Castaneda
Pronouns: she/her
Research Mentor(s): Angela Ebreo
Research Mentor School/College/Department: Diversity Research & Policy Program / Education
Program: UROPF
Session: Session 1 (9:00am – 9:50am)
Authors:
Abstract
In higher education, some racial minorities such as African Americans, Latinxs, American Indians, and Native Hawaiians/Pacific Islanders are underrepresented in academia, particularly in STEM majors (NCSES, 2023). The National Science Foundation implemented the Louis Stokes Alliances for Minority Participation (LSAMP) as one initiative to address this issue. The Michigan LSAMP (MI-LSAMP) seeks to mitigate this discrepancy by providing students with supports such as tutoring, career exploration activities, and peer mentoring. Guided by the Bowman Strengths-Based Model (2011), the overall MI-LSAMP research program bestows insights into the multilevel strengths (i.e., personal, program, campus) that can clear the way for underrepresented students’ success in college. From one point of view, peer mentoring can be viewed as a program-level strength as previous research (e.g. Reio 2013) suggests that peer mentoring facilitates positive outcomes for mentees. Using a subset of questions in baseline surveys administered to the 2022-2023 cohort of the MI-LSAMP participants, I conducted t-test and chi-square tests to examine baseline gender differences in students’ experiences and perceptions of peer mentoring. T-tests revealed that, compared to males, females discussed more topics with their peer mentors. In addition, females engaged in discussion of some topics more frequently than males. Interestingly, both genders infrequently discussed family support with their mentors. The findings will be discussed in terms of the limitations of the study, the implications for educational practice or policy, and my future research plans.
