Set apart through stories : a narrative Inquiry of black women's persistence in an online doctoral program.

For nearly 60 years, doctoral student attrition has been a cause for concern (Berelson, 1960; Council of Graduate Schools, 2010; 2015). Studies have shown that approximately 40–70% of doctoral students do not finish their degree, and 20% of those who advance to candidacy do not complete the dissertation phase (Lovelace, 2016). Additionally, retention rates for online students are another 10 to 20 % lower than students who attend in-person (Rovai & Wighting, 2005; Patterson, 2009). While previous research exists on the topic of doctoral student retention or doctoral student persistence, those studies have been mostly quantitative in nature, used a deficit mindset when examining the problems rather than potential, or approached the study from the perspective of benefiting the university, not necessarily the student. In addition, those studies were missing the story of an important population of doctoral students, a population whose voice is often left out of the story – Black women. To fill the gap in research, the purpose of this qualitative narrative inquiry was to understand and illuminate the story of persistence of four Black women in an online doctoral program. In this study, four women shared their unique experiences in their early educational endeavors, the motivation to pursue a doctoral degree, and ultimately, how they were able to persist through to graduate with a doctorate. I aligned my interview questions with the three zones of the student motivation and persistence framework (a) self-efficacy, (b) sense of belonging, and (c) the curriculum (Tinto, 2017) and applied the lens of intersectionality (Crenshaw, 1989) as a method of investigation, centering the participants as the storyteller of their own lived experiences (Cho et al., 2013). The narrative analysis of the data highlighted several themes that connected directly to the framework across all four participant's stories including self-efficacy, motivation, sense of belonging, persistence, and intersectionality. In addition, several emerging themes were identified. This study provides the opportunity to not only learn about the motivational influences necessary for student persistence but also to better understand the lived experiences of Black female doctoral students in online doctoral programs.

Name thesis:degree_name

Ph.D.

Level thesis:degree_level

Doctoral

Grantor

Baylor University.

Year dc:date.issued

2024

Author dc:creator

• Lively, Cece L. (Courtney L.), 1981-

Advisor dc:contributor.advisor

• Talbert, Tony L.

• Persistence.
• Black women.
• Doctorate.
• Retention.
• Motivation.
• Intersectionality.

Statement dc:rights

• Baylor University works are protected by copyright. They may be viewed from this source for any purpose, but reproduction or distribution in any format is prohibited without written permission. Contact libraryquestions@baylor.edu for inquiries about permission.

Language dc:language.iso

en

Handle dc:identifier.uri

https://hdl.handle.net/2104/13051

OAI identifier oai:identifier

oai:baylor-ir.tdl.org:2104/13051