How I Got Over:
Critical Moments for Women of
Color at a Christian College
2010 International Forum on Christian Higher Education
Rhae-Ann Booker, PhD
Michelle Loyd-Paige, PhD
Calvin College
Grand Rapids, MI
The few women of color who manage to enter
the halls of academe as students, faculty, or
administrators quickly discover an entrenched
and finely tuned system of gendered and raced
privilege, power, and exclusionary practices.
Learning to navigate the multi-tiered academic
systems of oppression and pass survival
strategies along to other women of color is both
a rite of passage and a badge of honor for
academic women of color.
- Pat Washington
Overview
• Women of Color in Higher Ed Administration
• Defining Critical Moments
• Our Story
– Rhae-Ann’s and Michelle’s journey to a Christian College
• Special Stressors Faced By Non-Majority
Faculty, Administrators, and Staff
• Critical Breakthroughs: Coping, Surviving,
and Thriving
• What We Wished We Had Known
Women of Color in Higher Education
“Women of color in academic administration are a recent
phenomenon due to their double oppression as women and
people of color. Their small numbers are intimately tied to
American history, legal restrictions, and traditional customs.
Legislation, court orders, and executive orders have greatly
increased the number of minorities in higher education,
although they are still substantially underrepresented in the
academy.
Women Ph.D.s—and to a lesser extent, administrators—
are growing as a proportion of all Ph.D.s, but there will be
required the continued removal of burdens of sexism, lower
salaries, and career impediments to achieve parity for
women in general, and women of color in particular, in
academic administration.”
Reginald Wilson, American Council on Education, USA
Women of Color in Higher Education
• 28% of Chief Academic Officers are women
(35% are white women and 3% are women of color).
• Among all senior administrators 38% are white women and
7% are women of color.
• 23% of college presidents are women, with 19 % of all
female presidents being women of color.
Statistics from AAC&U Report, A Measure of Equity: Women's Progress in Higher Education ,
January 2009
Defining Critical Moments
• Critical Events are key events in the academic
experiences of nontraditional or historically
underrepresented people on majority campuses
(Students and Employees).
• Critical Moments are those times when such
underrepresented people perceive that their
difference sets them apart and presents challenges
to their future academic success.
• Working through Critical Moments is key to
academic success if one chooses to remain at a
majority campus; however, not everyone chooses
or has the option or has the support to remain.
Our Story …
a Calvin Experience
Rhae-Ann Booker
Michelle Loyd-Paige
Calvin College graduate
PhD from Western Michigan
Director of Pre-College Programs
18 years employee of Calvin
Calvin College graduate
PhD from Purdue
Dean for Multicultural Affairs
25 years employee of Calvin
“With few AfricanAmericans on staff,
having longevity at Calvin
seemed like a
non-sensible expectation.
Longevity was never a
consideration.”
“20 years ago, if someone
would have told me that I
would become a tenured
faculty member at Calvin
and still be at Calvin after
20 years, I would have
laughed and said,
‘impossible!’”
“All new faculty members typically experience, to
some degree, the stressors discussed above.
But if you are a white woman, U.S. minority, or
international minority taking on your first
professional position in a predominantly
European-American and male department or
campus, then you have to cope with one or more
of the following additional stressors. These have
been termed cultural, racial, gender, or class
taxes that are exacted from non-traditional faculty
fulfilling the role of pioneer, outsider, and token.”
Moody, J. 2004. Faculty Diversity: Problems and Solutions
Special Stressors Faced by Non-Majority
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The extra taxes borne by those from colonized groups
Internalizing feelings of inadequacy
Being seen as an “affirmative action” hire
Finding a chilly climate within the department
Being given too little or too much attention
Having scholarship undervalued
Experiencing acute sting of negative incidents
Managing excessive committee assignments
Managing excessive student demands
Handling inappropriate behavior
Overcoming isolation
Critical Breakthroughs
Coping, Surviving, and Thriving
• Do a reality check on your skills; celebrate what you do well
& improve & expand skill set where needed; find your niche.
• Develop a plan to influence transformation.
• Develop & maintain allies on campus; network beyond
campus.
• Develop & maintain safe spaces.
• Set boundaries; value your time, get your work done.
• Some days it’s okay not to be the diversity champion.
Things I Wish I Had Known
Coping, Surviving, and Thriving
(Women at Calvin input)
• Develop your own caretaking and standards of success.
• Pick your battles, know what you will go to the mat for.
• Compromise, with the long-term end-goal in mind while
living individually with integrity, is sometimes a good thing.
• Relationships matter – find ones that keep you sane.
• Life is short and full of pain, but also grace.
• We need opportunities to celebrate and be silly.
• It is okay to show the full range of emotions, including
anger, but not to the point of “loss of agency.”
• You must develop a public demeanor.
• Remind yourself of what it is that truly brings God glory.
Closing Thoughts
As more women of color pursue higher
education, we can only hope that an
increasing number of them will stay on to
build life-long careers in the academy.
If this hope is to be realized, we must do all
we can to eliminate the barriers that confront
aspiring women of color academicians or
cause women of color, in general, to bypass
the academy altogether.
Recommended Reading
Rochelle Garner, CONTESTING THE TERRAIN OF THE IVORY
TOWER: SPIRITUAL LEADERSHIP OF AFRICAN-AMERICAN
WOMEN IN THE ACADEMY. New York: Routledge, 2004.
Conchita Y. Battle & Chontrese M. Doswell, eds., BUILDING BRIDGES
FOR WOMEN OF COLOR IN HIGHER EDUCATION: A
PRACTICAL GUIDE FOR SUCCESS. Lanham, MD: University Press
of America, 2004.
Theodorea Regina Berry & Nathalie D. Mizelle, eds., FROM
OPPRESSION TO GRACE: WOMEN OF COLOR AND THEIR
DILEMMAS WITHIN THE ACADEMY. Sterling, VA: Stylus
Publishing, 2006.