Lara Perez-Felkner

Florida State University | FSU · Department of Educational Leadership and Policy Studies (ELPS)

We outline our evolution as Latina, Asian, and White women sociologists using a social justice lens while studying transitions to college among youth of color. During our graduate training and early academic careers, we felt pushed to center “mainstream” theories, which often failed to account for the power struggles and intersectional oppression o...

To sustain the higher education industry and address U.S. economic downturns, researchers must prioritize research on undergraduates aged 24 or above – contemporary students. This empirical study finds contemporary students have lower chances of attaining degrees—any degrees—than their younger peers. Using nationally representative U.S. data from t...

Purpose of the study Previous literature has examined the relationship between high school students’ postsecondary STEM major choices and their prior interest and perceived ability in mathematics. Yet, we have limited understanding of whether and how perceived ability and interest in science and mathematics jointly affect students’ STEM major choic...

Gender disparities persist in postsecondary computing fields, despite improvements in postsecondary equity overall and STEM fields as an aggregate. The entrenchment of this issue requires a comprehensive, longitudinal lens. Building on expectancy-value theory, the present study examines the relationships among students’ gender-ability stereotypes,...

In this research paper, we contribute to extensive research that suggests hostile racialized and gendered engineering climates can negatively affect students of color and women, as they often experience racial microaggressions, stereotype threat, isolation, exclusion, and feelings of not belonging. Research suggests providing historically marginali...

Research suggests countering compounding societal disadvantages is like trying to walk up an escalator that is going down rather than up. In fact, it may be more like walking up a series of escalators going the wrong direction. This is often the experience of students in Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics (STEM) fields from working-c...

Using the nationally representative High School Longitudinal Study of 2009, we investigate whether and how high school contexts affect students’ STEM major choice. We hypothesize that STEM-intensive high school contexts foster students’ STEM interests and thus influencing their college STEM major choices. Multiple imputation and sample weights were...

Gender inequality persists in certain science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) postsecondary fields. Notably, cross-national evidence suggests the STEM gender gap is smaller, not wider, in less developed nations. This is the first known case study to examine this gap within a developing country: Cambodia. This study investigates the...

Bloomsbury Education and Childhood Studies

Studies of gender gaps in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) higher education have rarely considered 2-year colleges, despite the fact that most enrollees are women. Situated in an interdisciplinary literature on gender and inequality in students’ pathways to STEM higher education, this study used Beginning Postsecondary Stude...

Is there a relationship between mathematics ability beliefs and STEM degrees? Fields such as physics, engineering, mathematics, and computer science (PEMC) are thought to require talent or brilliance. However, the potential effects of difficulty perceptions on students’ participation in STEM have yet to be examined using a gender and race/ethnicity...

In response to disparities in postsecondary access, governments have enacted policies to facilitate the admission of traditionally underrepresented students. Known as affirmative action in the United States, the legal justification of this approach has varied. This article describes the legal and political history of affirmative action, the social...

This chapter leverages STEM‐focused Integrated Postsecondary Data System (IPEDS) data to investigate the consequences of chilly institutional climates across institutional types, with particular attention to implications for institutions and researchers. Further, we synthesize the literature, findings, and recommendations across the volume and offe...

This chapter synthesizes research on women in STEM undergraduate fields and aims to sharpen our empirical and theoretical frameworks for future higher education research. Institutional research implications are discussed here and throughout the volume.

Scholars of sociology, anthropology, psychology, and Education alike are interested in socialization. This phenomenon influences individual and collective development as well as the reproduction of status hierarchies and structural inequalities. Socialization is the multifaceted process through which individuals learn and internalize cultural norms...

This essay aims to enhance our conceptual understanding of students with intersectional identities, specifically gay Latino men in college. We first explain how ethnic, gender, and sexual identities can act as compounding influences. Second, we review two distinct but complementary developmental theories. Conocimiento captures the disruptive, chall...

While the underrepresentation of women in the fast-growing STEM field of computer science (CS) has been much studied, no consensus exists on the key factors influencing this widening gender gap. Possible suspects include gender differences in aptitude, interest, and academic environment. Our study contributes to this literature by applying student...

Do mathematics ability beliefs explain gender gaps in the physical science, engineering, mathematics, and computer science fields (PEMC) and other science fields? We leverage U.S. longitudinal, nationally representative data to estimate gendered differences in girls’ and boys’ perceptions of mathematics ability with the most difficult or challengin...

This research brief examines the gender gap in specific STEM majors among college sophomores and whether this gap varies across institutions of different selectivity. Using national longitudinal data, results show that women’s underrepresentation on STEM is solely driven by the field of physics, mathematics, engineering, and computer science (PEMC)...

Students’ perceptions of their mathematics ability vary by gender and seem to influence science, technology, engineering, and math (STEM) degree choice. Related, students’ perceptions during academic difficulty are increasingly studied in educational psychology, suggesting a link between such perceptions and task persistence. Despite interest in ex...

While increasingly utilized, particularly by women, two-year colleges are rarely considered in studies of participation gaps in undergraduate STEM degrees. This manuscript uses Beginning Postsecondary Students: 2004/09 panel data and a propensity score design to compare women’s degree attainment at two- and four-year colleges, with a focus on under...

This policy brief summarizes the results of a three-year mixed methods study examining variation in students' educational pathways. Investigating college-going among a predominantly low-income, underrepresented minority student population, detailed analysis shows distinctions in how students perceive relationships with school faculty and peers, whi...

Background/Context: Schools have attempted to address stratification in black and Latino students’ access to higher education through extensive reform initiatives, including those focused on social supports. A crucial focus has been missing from these efforts, essential to improving the effectiveness of support mechanisms and understanding why they...

What is the role of parents, peers and teachers in shaping school experiences and informing the career choice of males and females? Does the school context matter, and to what extent do educational experiences influence young people's self-concept, values and their outlook to the future? Do teenage aspirations influence later outcomes regarding edu...

Achievement Differences and GenderIt has been asserted that achievement differences in certain fields – the sciences in particular – can be explained by innate differences in boys’ and girls’ ability, specifically their representation among those with the highest ability in mathematics. Although some research evidence supports this hypothesis, scho...

Although progress has been made in reducing gender inequality in postsecondary education, in the U.S. and in other countries, gender gaps remain in the science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) fields judged so critical to economic competitiveness. Using the Educational Longitudinal Study of 2002, we examine the secondary school expe...

This chapter examines the development and operation of socialization in the lives of children and adolescents, with a focus on the mechanisms and consequences of socialization. Consideration is given to theoretical perspectives on (a) how children and adolescents learn social roles, (b) the role of agency in social development, (c) the social conte...

The past four decades have witnessed considerable changes in both the supply of college-educated adults and the demand for skilled labor. Investing in human capital through education has historically produced high returns. However, those most underrepresented in education (racial minorities in particular) have historically received the lowest retur...

Although important strides toward gender parity have been made in several scientific fields, women remain underrepresented in the physical sciences, engineering, mathematics, and computer sciences (PEMCs). This study examines the effects of adolescents' subjective orientations, course taking, and academic performance on the likelihood of majoring i...

Educational aspirations have been rising in the U.S. over recent years, however it appears that race-ethnicity and gender continue to distinguish students’ expectations of realizing these aspirations. Decades of research shows that aspirations are related to later educational and career attainment (e.g., Schoon & Polek, 2011). It has been thought t...

The social networks of children and youth are formed in the context of their families, peer groups, schools, and neighborhood communities. Researchers studying social networks of children and adolescents have primarily been interested in the formation of friendship relations and the impact of social location on academic achievement and social devel...

Although Mexicans and Puerto Ricans are the largest national-origin groups of U.S. Latinos, academic study of their experiences tends to either focus solely on one group or lump them together into an uncritical pan-Latino category. This collaborative ethnographic text challenges that tradition. Anthropologists De Genova and Ramos-Zayas assert that...