Diversity Scholars in Social Media

March 21, 2023

Sponsors

Diversity Scholars Network
Anti-Racism Collaborative
National Center for Institutional Diversity
Rackham Graduate School
Office of the Vice Provost for Research

Scholars are navigating changing spaces embedded in a system that can be slow and resistant to an evolving digital world. They are receiving competing messages about how and when to develop a digital brand and engage on social media. This session will explore how scholars, particularly those conducting diversity or anti-racism scholarship, are leveraging social media to foster scholarly communities, disseminate their research and scholarship for social change, and connect with public audiences. Panelists will also discuss how they have navigated resistance from colleagues in academia, trolling and bullying on social media, and reporting their social media engagement in the tenure, promotion, and faculty review process.

Panelists

Dr. Laila McCloud

Dr. Laila McCloud is an assistant professor of educational leadership and counseling at Grand Valley State University. Prior to pursuing a faculty career, she served as a student affairs educator focused on issues of equity and access at several institutions in the Chicagoland area. Dr. McCloud's research uses critical theories and methods to explore: (1) the professional and academic socialization of Black college students; (2) the professionalization of multicultural student affairs work; and (3) teaching and learning practices in higher education and student affairs graduate preparation programs.

Dr. Aireale Joi Rodgers

Dr. Aireale Joi Rodgers is a postdoctoral fellow at the University of Wisconsin-Madison on the HEAL Project. As a postdoctoral fellow, Dr. Rodgers conducts research using sociocultural learning theories and critical theories of racialization to examine how people and organizations learn. Specifically, she plans to explore how interpersonal and organizational learning can be organized and remediated to facilitate race-conscious, justice-oriented institutional change in higher education.Her research focuses on affecting pedagogical and institutional change at white serving institutions of higher education as it relates to equity, justice, diversity, and inclusion.

Dr. Antar Tichavakunda

Dr. Tichavakunda is an assistant professor of race and higher education at the University of California, Santa Barbara. Using qualitative inquiry, Tichavakunda has engaged in research on college readiness, Black students’ experiences at predominantly White institutions, and more broadly the sociology of race and higher education. His published work can be found in Urban Education, Educational Policy, Race Ethnicity and Education, The Review of Higher Education, and Educational Studies. His first book, Black Campus Life: The Worlds Black Students Make at a Historically White Institution, is published with SUNY Press.

Edmund Graham

Edmund Graham serves as NCID's associate director. In this role, he provides strategic administrative leadership to programmatic, community building, and staff development work. Most recently Edmund served as the inaugural Minority Serving Institutions Initiative program lead within the Rackham Graduate School where he led efforts to support faculty/units in developing strategic, mutually beneficial, fully engaged partnerships with MSIs. Edmund has also worked in research and practice positions at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, Huston-Tillotson University, and Mott Community College. Edmund received his BS from Grambling State University, MA from the University of Minnesota, and is finishing up his PhD in education policy, organization and leadership from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign.