ABSTRACT
Similar to the students in Fries-Britt’s (2000) and Harper’s (2005) studies, Rob was a high-achieving Black student with loy aspirations-one being his desire to build various community centers nationwide to support the needs of low-income youth. He achieved academically at Occidental; yet he struggled to nd and maintain a sense of
belongingness and condence. “Sometimes, I don’t feel like going to class,” Rob verbalized, “because I’m always under the microscope. I’m always thinking: Where do I sit? How am I going to position myself? What does this professor think of me? A consciousness of who’s in the class is always there.” Given the underrepresentation of racial/ethnic minority students in predominantly White classroom contexts, it comes as no surprise that these students are acutely aware of their peers’ races/ethnicities in their courses. As Rob shared, the low numbers of racial/ethnic minority students led him to question his t in the classroom. “No matter how much I like the subject, or how condent I am, there’s always an aspect of me that feels on edge.”
