Skip to main content

Disrupting Whiteness in Introductory Statistics Course Design

Implications for Educational Leadership

  • Living reference work entry
  • Latest version View entry history
  • First Online:
Book cover Handbook of Social Justice Interventions in Education

Abstract

In this chapter, the authors use duoethnography to share a personal account of the first author’s, a Black woman on the tenure track, journey towards disrupting whiteness to develop inclusive, anti-racist ways to teach introductory statistics courses in an education college. The research question was, How can an introductory statistics instructor disrupt whiteness in their course design and pedagogical praxis? The chapter begins with a brief discussion of the racist genealogy that shaped the discipline of statistics. Next, a review of existing literature about how whiteness remains protected in statistics is presented. Inclusive pedagogy is advanced as a framework and duoethnography as the reflexive dialogic process for understanding the authors’ relationship to higher education introductory statistics as Black women from the perspective of quantitative criticalist faculty and graduate students. Following this, they present four themes from the data analysis: (a) the presence of a Black woman teaching statistics is inclusive pedagogy and emancipatory praxis; (b) racial consciousness is a prerequisite to inclusive pedagogy; (c) the co-creation of knowledge and sharing of power are integral characteristics of inclusive pedagogy; and (d) a decision that the benefits of disrupting whiteness outweigh the costs is necessary. The chapter concludes with a discussion of findings that compel faculty and students to critically interrogate how they have been socialized to teach and consume statistics in ways that perpetuate whiteness.

This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.

Access this chapter

Institutional subscriptions

References

  • Anderson, C. (2017). White rage: The unspoken truth of our racial divide. New York: Bloomsbury Adult.

    Google Scholar 

  • Baldwin, J. (2013). The fire next time. New York: Vintage Books.

    Google Scholar 

  • Baldwin, J. (1992). The fire next time. New York: Vintage Books [Kindle book].

    Google Scholar 

  • Baldwin, J. (2017). I am not your Negro. New York: Vintage Books.

    Google Scholar 

  • Bernal, D. (2002). Critical race theory, Latino critical theory, and critical race-gendered epistemologies: Recognizing students of color as holders and creators of knowledge. Qualitative Inquiry, 8(1), 105–126.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Bonilla-Silva, E. (2017). Racism without racists: Color-blind racism and the persistence of racial equality in America (5th ed.). Lanham: Rowman & Littlefield Education.

    Google Scholar 

  • Bowers, A. (2017). Quantitative research methods training in education leadership and administration preparation programs as disciplined inquiry for building school improvement capacity. Journal of Research on Leadership Education, 12(1), 72–96. https://doi.org/10.1177/1942775116659462.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Braun, V., & Clarke, V. (2006). Using thematic analysis in psychology. Qualitative Research in Psychology, 3(2), 77–101.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Chang, H. (2008). Autoethnography as method. Walnut Creek: Left Coast Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Covarrubias, A. (2011). Quantitative intersectionality: A critical race analysis of the Chicana/o educational pipeline. Journal of Latinos and Education, 10(2), 86–105. https://doi.org/10.1080/15348431.2011.556519.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Covarrubias, A., Nava, P. E., Argelia, L., Burciaga, R., Velez, V. N., & Solorzano, D. G. (2018). Critical race quantitative intersections: A testimonio analysis. Race Ethnicity and Education, 21(2), 253–273. https://doi.org/10.1080/13613324.2017.1377412.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Crawford, C. E. (2019). The one-in-ten: Quantitative critical race theory and the education the ‘new (white) oppressed’. Journal of Education Policy, 34(3), 423–444.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Danowitz, M. A., & Tuitt, F. (2011). Enacting inclusivity through engaged pedagogy: A higher education perspective. Equity & Excellence in Education, 44(1), 40–56.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Darder, A. (1997). Creating the conditions for cultural democracy in the classroom. In A. Darder, R. Torres, & H. Gutierrez (Eds.), Latinos and education (pp. 331–350). New York: Routledge.

    Google Scholar 

  • De Sousa Santos, B. (2002). Towards a sociology of absences and a sociology of emergence. Revista Critica De Ciencias Sociais, 63(63), 237–280.

    Google Scholar 

  • del Carmen Salazar, M. (2013). A humanizing pedagogy: Reinventing the principles and practice of education as a journey toward liberation. Review of Research in Education, 37(1), 121–148.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • DiAngelo, R. (2012). Nothing to add: A challenge to white silence in racial discussions. Dismantling Privilege, 2(1), 1–17.

    Google Scholar 

  • DiAngelo, R. (2018). White fragility: Why it’s so hard for White people to talk about racism. Boston: Beacon Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Feagin, J. R. (2006). Systemic racism: A theory of oppression. New York: Routledge.

    Google Scholar 

  • Feagin, J. R. (2009). White racial frame. New York: Routledge.

    Google Scholar 

  • Fendler, L. (2014). Bell curve. In D. C. Phillips (Ed.), Encyclopedia of educational theory and philosophy (Vol. 1, pp. 83–86). New York: Sage.

    Google Scholar 

  • Freire, P. (1970). Pedagogy of the oppressed. [orig. 2008]. New York: Continuum.

    Google Scholar 

  • Galton, F. (1865). Hereditary talent and character. Macmillan’s Magazine, 12, 157–166. Retrieved from http://galton.org/essays/1860-1869/galton-1865-macmillan-hereditary-talent.html.

    Google Scholar 

  • Gay, G. (2002). Preparing for culturally responsive teaching. Journal of Teacher Education, 53(2), 106–116.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Gillborn, D. (2010). The colour of numbers: Surveys, statistics and deficit-thinking about race and class. Journal of Education Policy, 25(2), 253–276. https://doi.org/10.1080/02680930903460740.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Gillborn, D., Warmington, P., & Demack, S. (2018). QuantCrit: Education, policy, ‘big data,’ and principles for a critical race theory of statistics. Race Ethnicity and Education, 21(2), 158–179.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Harley, D. A. (2008). Maids of academe: African American women faculty at predominately White institutions. Journal of African American Studies, 12(1), 19–36.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Harris, C. I. (1993). Whiteness as property. Harvard Law Review, 106(8), 1707–1791. Retrieved from https://sph.umd.edu/sites/default/files/files/Harris_Whiteness%20as%20Property_106HarvLRev-1.pdf.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Haynes, C. (2017). Dismantling the White supremacy embedded in our classrooms: White faculty in pursuit of more equitable educational outcomes. International Journal of Teaching and Learning in Higher Education, 29(1), 87–107.

    Google Scholar 

  • Haynes, C., & Patton, L. D. (2019). From racial resistance to racial consciousness: Engaging White STEM faculty in pedagogical transformation. Journal of Cases in Educational Leadership, 22(2), 85–98.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Hitchcock, J., & Flint, C. (2015). Decentering whiteness. The Center for the Study of White American Culture. Retrieved from www.euroamerican.org/public/DecenteringWhiteness.pdf

  • Hooks, B. (2010). Teaching critical thinking: Practical wisdom. New York: Taylor & Francis.

    Google Scholar 

  • Housel, M. (2016, Nov 17). The difference between a statistic and a fact. [Collaborative Fund]. Retrieved from https://www.collaborativefund.com/blog/the-difference-between-a-stat-and-a-fact

  • Intercultural Development Inventory [IDI]. (n.d.). The roadmap to intercultural competence using the IDI. Retrieved from https://idiinventory.com/generalinformation

  • Jahoda, G. (2015). Quetelet and the emergence of the behavioral sciences. Springerplus, 4(1), 1–10.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Kendi, I. X. (2019). How to be an antiracist. New York: One world.

    Google Scholar 

  • Ladson-Billings, G. (1995). Toward a theory of culturally relevant pedagogy. American Educational Research Journal, 32(3), 465–491.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Ladson-Billings, G. (2006). From the achievement gap to the education debt: Understanding achievement in U.S. schools. Educational Researcher, 35(7), 3–12.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Locke, A. (1935). Values and imperatives. In L. Harris (Ed.), The philosophy of Alain Locke: Harlem renaissance and beyond (pp. 34–50). Philadelphia: Temple University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Lorde, A. (2007). Sister outsider: Essays and speeches by Audre Lorde. New York: Crossing Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Magnello, M. E. (1999). The non-correlation of biometrics and eugenics: Rival forms of laboratory work in Karl Pearson’s career at University College, London, Part 1. History of Science, 37(2), 123–150. https://doi.org/10.1177/007327539903700201.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • McIntosh, P. (1997). White privilege and male privilege: A personal account of coming to see correspondence through work in women’s studies. In R. Delgado & J. Stefancic (Eds.), Critical White studies (pp. 291–300). Philadelphia: Temple University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Mignolo, W. D. (2007). Introduction: Coloniality of power. Cultural Studies, 21(2–3), 155–167.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Milner, H. R. (2007). Race, culture, and researcher positionality: Working through dangers seen, unseen, and unforeseen. Educational Researcher, 36(7), 388–400. https://doi.org/10.3102/0012189X07309471.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Minthorn, R. S., & Nelson, C. A. (2018). Colonized and racist Indigenous campus tour. Journal of Critical Scholarship on Higher Education and Student Affairs, 4(1), 73–88.

    Google Scholar 

  • Nash, A. M., & Peters, A. L. (2020). For us: Towards an intersectional leadership conceptualization by Black women for Black girls. Journal of Educational Administration and History. https://doi.org/10.1080/00220620.2020.1785403.

  • Omi, M., & Winant, H. (2014). Racial formation in the United States (3rd ed.). New York: Routledge.

    Book  Google Scholar 

  • Paris, D. (2019). Naming beyond the white settler colonial gaze in educational research. International Journal of Qualitative Studies in Education, 32(3), 217–214. https://doi.org/10.1080/09518398.2019.1576943.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Perlow, O. N., Bethea, S. L., & Wheeler, D. I. (2014). Dismantling the master’s house: Black women faculty challenging White privilege/supremacy in the college classroom. Understanding and Dismantling Privilege, 4(2), 241–259.

    Google Scholar 

  • Pogrow, S. (2018). Authentic quantitative analysis for education leadership decision-making and EdD dissertations: A practical, intuitive, and intelligible approach (2nd ed.). Ypsilanti: ICPEL Publications.

    Google Scholar 

  • Pogrow, S. (2019). How effect size (practical significance) misleads clinical practice: The case for switching to practical benefit to assess applied research findings. The American Statistician, 73(1), 223–234. https://doi.org/10.1080/00031305.2018.1549101.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Sawyer, R. D., & Liggett, T. (2012). Shifting positionalities: A critical discussion of a duoethnographic inquiry of a personal curriculum of post/colonialism. International Journal of Qualitative Methods, 11(5), 628–651.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Smith, L. T. (2012). Decolonizing methodologies: Research and indigenous peoples. London: Zed Books.

    Google Scholar 

  • Stage, F. K., & Wells, R. S. (2014). Critical quantitative inquiry in context. New Directions for Institutional Research, 2013(158), 1–7. https://doi.org/10.1002/ir.20041.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Tabron, L. A. (2019). I pulled up a seat at the table: My journey engaging in critical quantitative inquiry. In K. Strunk & L. Locke (Eds.), Research methods for social justice and equity in education (pp. 275–282). Cham: Palgrave Macmillan.

    Chapter  Google Scholar 

  • Tuitt, F. A. (2003). Afterword: Realizing a more inclusive pedagogy. In A. Howell & F. A. Tuitt (Eds.), Race in higher education: Rethinking pedagogy in racially diverse college classrooms (pp. 243–268). Cambridge, MA: Harvard Publication Group.

    Google Scholar 

  • Tuitt, F. A. (2016). Inclusive pedagogy 2.0: Implications for race, equity and higher education in a global context. In F. Tuitt, C. Haynes, & S. Stewart (Eds.), Race, equity and the learning environment: The global relevance of critical and inclusive pedagogies in higher education (pp. 205–221). Sterling: Stylus Publishing, LLC.

    Google Scholar 

  • Urban Dictionary. (n.d.) UrbanDictionary.com dictionary. Retrieved from https://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=call%20out

  • U.S. Department of Education. (USDOE). (2019). Digest of education statistics 2019 [Table 315.20, National Center for Education Statistics, Integrated Postsecondary Education Data System, Spring 2019, Human Resources component.] Retrieved from https://nces.ed.gov/programs/digest/d19/tables/dt19_315.20.asp

  • Wasserstein, R. L., Schirm, A. L., & Lazar, N. A. (2019). Moving to a world beyond “p<0.05”. The American Statistician, 73(1), 1–19.

    Google Scholar 

  • Yosso, T. J. (2002). Toward a critical race curriculum. Equity & Excellence in Education, 35(2), 93–107. https://doi.org/10.1080/713845283.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Zuberi, T. (2001). Thicker than blood: How racial statistics lie. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Zuberi, T., & Bonilla-Silva, E. (Eds.). (2008). White logic, white methods: Racism and methodology. New York: Rowman & Littlefield Education.

    Google Scholar 

Download references

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

Authors

Corresponding author

Correspondence to Lolita A. Tabron .

Editor information

Editors and Affiliations

Rights and permissions

Reprints and permissions

Copyright information

© 2021 Springer Nature Switzerland AG

About this entry

Check for updates. Verify currency and authenticity via CrossMark

Cite this entry

Tabron, L.A., Hunt-Khabir, K., Thomas, A.K. (2021). Disrupting Whiteness in Introductory Statistics Course Design. In: Mullen, C.A. (eds) Handbook of Social Justice Interventions in Education. Springer International Handbooks of Education. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-29553-0_82-2

Download citation

  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-29553-0_82-2

  • Received:

  • Accepted:

  • Published:

  • Publisher Name: Springer, Cham

  • Print ISBN: 978-3-030-29553-0

  • Online ISBN: 978-3-030-29553-0

  • eBook Packages: Springer Reference EducationReference Module Humanities and Social SciencesReference Module Education

Publish with us

Policies and ethics

Chapter history

  1. Latest

    Disrupting Whiteness in Introductory Statistics Course Design
    Published:
    29 December 2020

    DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-29553-0_82-2

  2. Original

    Disrupting Whiteness in Introductory Statistic Course Design
    Published:
    14 October 2020

    DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-29553-0_82-1