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Adaptation without retreat how senior leaders at public research universities navigated equity and belonging in a post-affirmative action era Robert T Stephens
- Format:
- Book
- Thesis/Dissertation
- Author/Creator:
- Stephens, Robert T., author.
- Language:
- English
- Subjects (All):
- Higher education administration.
- Higher education.
- Education history.
- Educational psychology.
- Educational leadership.
- 0446.
- 0745.
- 0520.
- 0525.
- 0449.
- Local Subjects:
- Higher education administration.
- Higher education.
- Education history.
- Educational psychology.
- Educational leadership.
- 0446.
- 0745.
- 0520.
- 0525.
- 0449.
- Genre:
- Academic theses
- Physical Description:
- 1 online resource (151 pages)
- Contained In:
- Dissertations Abstracts International 87-12A
- Place of Publication:
- Ann Arbor : ProQuest Dissertations and Theses, 2026
- Language Note:
- English
- Summary:
- The Supreme Court's elimination of affirmative action and dismantling of diversity, equity, and inclusion initiatives shifted the legal and political landscape facing public research universities. Missing from the emerging scholarship is an examination of how senior leaders, across roles and institutional contexts, responded to the elimination and adapted practices to preserve equity commitments despite legal and political constraints. This qualitative case study examined senior leaders at three public research universities through semi-structured interviews. Leaders adapted not because their values changed, but because state and federal pressures reshaped what was permissible and what could be publicly defended. In response, admissions and recruitment practices were reframed, scholarships were reconstituted, and equity-related initiatives were eliminated. Adaptations were seen as necessary to limit institutional risk, but they came at the cost of narrowing, and sometimes eliminating, supports designed for historically marginalized students. These findings suggest that senior leaders recognized the constraints of race-neutral framing and realized that reducing or eliminating targeted supports could deepen inequities
- Notes:
- Source: Dissertations Abstracts International, Volume: 87-12, Section: A.
- Advisors: Moneta, Larry Committee members: Pierce, Melody; Daché, Amalia Z.
- Ed.D. University of Pennsylvania 2026
- Vendor supplied data
- Local Notes:
- School code: 0175
- ISBN:
- 9798252431208
- Access Restriction:
- Restricted for use by site license
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