Dr. Gloria Brown conducted her research while a Graduate Student pursuing the Ph.D. in  Education  K-12 Leadership, Walden University, Minneapolis, MN . Her study is  titled African American Students Defy the Achievement Gap:
A Phenomenological Study. A copy of her research paper is pending.

Members serving on the 2007 Grant Selection Committee: Chairperson, Dr. Cynthia Wilson, Associate Professor of Special Education at Florida Atlantic University;  Dr. Sandra Thompson, member of AASF's Board of Directors and Associate Provost of Florida Memorial University; Mr. Irvin Minney, Former Founding Board Member of AASF and Contract Manager for Broward County Transportation; and Tracy N. Webster, Esq., AASF Volunteer and Donor, Attorney with Adorno & Yoss, LLP, and Mr. Raymond Kuma III, AASF Volunteer, President and Chief Executive Officer of J. R. & R. Enterprises, Inc.
 

Dr. John Young conducted his study while a Graduate Student pursuing the Doctor of Education, Curriculum and Teaching, Giftedness at Teachers College, Columbia University in New York. His research is titled A Study of Academically High Achieving, Economically Challenged African American Young Men Who Attend An Ivy League University.

Members serving on the 2006 Grant Selection Committee: Chairperson, Dr. Cynthia Wilson, Associate Professor of Special Education at Florida Atlantic University;  Dr. Sandra Thompson, member of AASF's Board of Directors and Associate Provost of Florida Memorial University; Mr. Irvin Minney, Former Founding Board Member of AASF and Contract Manager for Broward County Transportation; and Tracy N. Webster, Esq., Attorney with Fandiño & Lopez, P.A., AASF Volunteer and Donor.

Read about the results Dr. West-Olatunji obtained on Parenting Practices Among Parents/Guardians of Academically Successful Fifth Grade African American Children in High Poverty Communities.

Members serving on the 2005 Grant Selection Committee: Chairperson, Dr. Cynthia Wilson, Associate Professor of Special Education at Florida Atlantic University;  Dr. Sandra Thompson, member of AASF's Board of Directors and Associate Provost of Florida Memorial University; Mr. Irvin Minney, Former Founding Board Member of AASF and Contract Manager for Broward County Transportation, and Tracy Webster, Esq., Attorney with Charouhis, Fandiño, Lopez & Wright, P.A. 

Chronicles of Success: Black College Students Achieving in Mathematics and Engineering

Ms. Ebony McGee is a Ph.D. student in Math Education at the University of Illinois at Chicago. Her dissertation research “is in the area of dissecting the success factors of African American students who pursue math related college majors such as engineering, computer and math science. (Her) particular focus relates to these students’ multidimensional motivations to pursue a success math/math related career in spite of any unusual circumstances they had to overcome.” She will be closely studying individuals who have “taken at least 6 math courses and received at least A or B in at least five of those classes” and who are recipients of the Jackie Robinson Foundation Scholarship, a scholarship for academically gifted students with financial need. The students will be chosen from low-income households where parents/guardians have no college education. Ms. McGee examined the association of variables such as persistence, resilience, self-determination, and community involvement with success in mathematics.

When he was Director of the Institute of African American Research at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, Dr. William "Sandy" Darity conducted research titled Effective Schools, Effective Students that "has identified public schools in North Carolina where black students generally have patterns of high achievement and black students in public schools in North Carolina who have attained academic success regardless of the schools they attend. The purpose of the study was to "identify the conditions that produce academic success among black students with the goal of developing strategies for replicating those conditions in other schools and among other black students".

At AASF's 2004 Success Summit, Dr. Darity and one of his colleagues, Dr. Karolyn Tyson, presented findings on a portion of their research that concludes that "there is no evidence of the specific racialized form of opposition to high achievement -- the burden of acting white -- at the elementary level. This suggests that it is not an attitude that is a cultural import from a widely held outlook in black America" though they do find "..limited evidence of racialized peer pressure against academic ahivement at the high school level. The context in which it is most likely to occur is a school where black students are grossly underrepresented in the most demanding courses, e.g. Advanced Placement (AP) and Honors courses."

Read more about this study: Breeding Animosity: The "Burden of Acting White" and Other Problems of Status Group Hierarchies in Schools

The Relationship Between Future Orientation and Academic Achievement Among African American Adolescents

Dr. Zena Mello presented the results of her research about high achieving adolescents at the AASF 2002 Success Summit on November 9, 2002. Click on our Success Summit Page for details. Dr. Mello is now a Postdoctoral Fellow in Cognition and Development at the University of California, Berkeley, and a study based upon her AASF supported research has been accepted for publication in the Journal of Black Psychology. This study is titled Gender Differences in African American Adolescents' Personal, Educational, and Occupational Expectations and Perceptions of Neighborhood Quality.
Congratulations, Dr. Mello!

African-Americans And Academic Success

Ms. Thomas presented the results of her research titled African-Americans And Academic Success that highlighted her study of former teen mothers who were on welfare and got off the system to go to college, complete graduate school, and obtain professional careers at the AASF 2001 Success Summit on November 3, 2001. Click on our Success Summit Page for details.