For Wizard Kim

Quentin R.Alexander and Nancy Bodenhorn

Participants in this phenomenological study were 11 Black women who received an undergraduate degree from a historically Black college or university and were currently attending graduate school at a southern predominantly White university. This study investigated the adjustment experiences of these women to life on a southern predominantly White campus.Through analysis of participant interview transcripts and demographic questionnaires, support systems emerged as a critical factor in each student’s experience, with themes focused on mentors, family and friends, and romantic relationships.

Keywords: Black, adjustment, graduate school

Aresearch participant interviewed for this study, a 4th-year doctoral student in a social sciences eld, commented about her friend, another doctoral student, and her experience at a southern predominantly White

university (PWU):

She has had a dif cult time because she’s in [program name] and she’s the only Black student over there now. And she’s in a master’s-to-PhD program so that’s extra hard. And she’s faced with a lot of adversity . . . she doesn’t have support from her supervisors over there. They’ve made racial comments . . . and with being a minority [Black and female], you’re already still kind of outcast to begin with in a predominantly White, good-old-boys institution.

A lot of the literature discusses how support systems affect Black college students’ adjustment experiences at PWUs (Cabrera, Nora, Terenzini, Pascarella & Hage- dorn, 1999; Guiffrida & Douthit, 2010; Schwartz, Bower, Rice, & Washington, 2003), but most research is limited to undergraduate education. Speci cally, an inadequate amount of research exists on Black women’s experiences attending graduate school, particularly at PWUs.

Researchers have revealed con icting data regarding the impact of support systems on the retention of Black students attending PWUs. Nettles and Mil- lett (2006) stated that there is a direct correlation between the constructive impact of socialization and the performance, contentment, and achievement of Black graduate students who are in doctoral programs where Blacks are under- represented. Furthermore, Nettles and Millett found that the retention rates for Blacks transitioning from undergraduate to graduate studies dropped 50% more than the rates of their Asian peers and 75% more than the rates of their White peers. Tinto (1993) posited that most successful college students become better integrated into the college social and academic environment if they are able to

Quentin R. Alexander and Nancy Bodenhorn, Counselor Education, Virginia Tech, Blacksburg. Quentin R. Alexander is now at Department of Counselor Education, Longwood University. Correspondence concerning this article should be addressed to Quentin R. Alexander, Department of Counselor Education, Longwood University, 201 High Street, Farmville,VA 23909 (e-mail: [email protected]).

© 2015 by the American Counseling Association. All rights reserved.

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detach themselves from support systems such as family and friends. Conversely, Guiffrida (2005) disclosed ndings that suggested that high-achieving Black stu- dents attending PWUs were successful because of the emotional, academic, and nancial support shown to them by their families. Guiffrida (2005) also reported that Black students’ families often encouraged them to concentrate on staying in college, rather than coming home, even if families were in need of the students’ nancial support. Moreover, Guiffrida (2004) asserted that friends from home were an asset for Black students attending PWUs, especially when they were able to relate common experiences and provide needed emotional support.

Seymour and Hewitt (1997) conducted a study in which Black preengineering majors at a PWU were connected with a faculty mentor, who was available for all activities, during their freshman year of college. Not only did these students successfully complete their freshman year, but they continued their enrollment in the college of engineering and graduated with an engineering degree (Seymour & Hewitt, 1997). E. P. Smith and Davidson (1992) asserted that Black master’s and doctoral students with mentors were more likely to succeed than their Black counterparts without mentors. Therefore, the support of mentors has played a pivotal role in the success of Black college students attending PWUs. Other research exists substantiating the position that support systems (e.g., family, friends, mentors, counselors, academic advisers) are important in the retention and success of Black graduate students attending PWUs (e.g., Golde, 2005; Nettles & Millett, 2006).

Braxton, Jones, Hirschy, and Hartley (2008) asserted that college students’ interactions with college personnel (e.g., faculty, administrators) helped to shape the students’ opinions about the colleges’ commitment to student well-being. Furthermore, positive interactions lead to students having greater assurance in their university as an organization and students’ increased perceptions in their abilities and beliefs about personal success (Braxton et al., 2008). However, these interactions can also af rm negative interactions, particularly Black col- lege students’ negative experiences with college counseling centers. Soet and Sevig (2006) reported that only 11.4% of Black college students diagnosed with depression used college counseling centers. One reason for this lack of use might be that Blacks view counseling as a sign of weakness (Dzokoto, Hicks, & Miller, 2007). Although a number of studies exist (Hunt & Eisenberg, 2010; Neville, Heppner, Ji, & Thye, 2004; W. A. Smith, Allen, & Danley, 2007) that reveal the negative experiences of Black clients in counseling, none were identi- ed that directly linked Black college students and negative college counseling experiences on PWU campuses. Therefore, the lack of research in this area can have a profound impact on college counselors’ ability to provide culturally sensitive counseling services to Black college students. Knowledge about the Black college student experience that may cause distress on a PWU campus could serve as vital information for college counselors by providing insight into sociocultural, racial, ethnic, and academic issues that these students may experience that are different from the experiences of their White counterparts.

This qualitative study addresses a gap in the literature about Black gradu- ate student experiences, particularly women’s experiences, and provides an

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in-depth look into the experiences of 11 Black women who completed their undergraduate degrees at historically Black colleges or universities (HBCUs) and chose to attend graduate school at a southern PWU; speci cally, this study examines how support systems affected their experiences. The knowl- edge gained from the analysis of these women’s narratives provides important information about the signi cance of support systems to their experiences and offers critical insight about this population for college counselors and student development personnel.

Method

Data Collection

We used a phenomenological framework for the qualitative interview study. Creswell (2006) stated that the phenomenological approach to research focuses on the exploration of human experiences and how perceptions of these experiences are translated into reality. We designed this study to exam- ine the experiences of female Black graduate students attending a southern PWU, who also had the common experience of attending an HBCU for their undergraduate degree. The following research question guided the inquiry of this study: “What are the experiences of Black women who earned their undergraduate degree at an HBCU and currently attend graduate school at a southern PWU?” The research protocol was piloted in mock interviews with 10 nonparticipants of the study to ensure that the information that might be revealed would be consistent with the intent of the research.

Participants

We recruited and selected participants through purposive and snowball sampling (Berg, 2001), with the intent of choosing those who met a set of predetermined selection criteria. Selected participants were full-time, female Black graduate students who had completed at least one semester of graduate studies at a southern PWU, were in good academic standing, had no more than 5 years between undergraduate graduation from an HBCU and graduate school enrollment, and were between the ages of 22 and 30 years. At the end of each interview, we asked participants to forward our contact information (i.e., e-mail address) to others who met the inclu- sion criteria and might be interested in study participation. A total of 11 students who met the criteria volunteered to participate.

Interviews

Interviews were conducted in a location of each participant’s choosing and lasted an average of 90 minutes. Interviews began with some protocol ques- tions to gain access to the unique experiences of each participant, but allowed for multiple follow-up questions based on information gleaned from each interview. Interviews were audiotaped using a digital minirecording device. Students in the study represented graduates from eight different HBCUs

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between the Northeast and Deep South, with academic majors in a variety of elds, including education, liberal arts, and engineering and sciences.

Veri cation

We used bracketing to minimize any researcher bias that might potentially interfere with data analysis. Creswell (2006) indicated that such a veri cation process is necessary to augment researcher credibility. This is often accom- plished through a narrative about a researcher’s background. For this study, the rst author was a Black man and full-time doctoral student attending a southern PWU. Contrary to the study participants’ experiences, the rst au- thor attained his undergraduate and two previous graduate degrees from two different southern PWUs, and had a former career in public school education and counseling, where he worked speci cally with oppressed Black populations. The use of interview transcripts, eld notes, demographic questionnaires, peer debriefers, member checks, and an audit trail ensured that multiple sources of information were used for triangulation of data to reduce the potential for researcher bias. The transcripts of the interviews were sent to the participants, who had the opportunity to correct or change any information shared and transcribed.

Data Analysis

We conducted interviews until data saturation was achieved. We analyzed in- dividual transcripts for initial categorization, and we analyzed them a second time for coding and recoding. During the nal analysis phase, categories were reviewed, combined, and placed into nal categories. Next, we provided peer debriefers (i.e., doctoral students in a diversity course taught in the graduate school) with the categorized information and samples of text used to deter- mine the nal categories. We con rmed the nal categories, and, from these, three major themes emerged.

Results

Analysis of the data resulted in the emergence of three themes surrounding support systems and the experience of Black women in graduate school at a southern PWU. All participants interviewed for this study discussed the im- portance of having or establishing various types of support systems that would persist through the different periods of their graduate school experiences. Three critical support systems emerged from the analysis of participant transcripts: (a) mentors, (b) family and friends, and (c) romantic relationships. Aspects of these support systems were emphasized, with participants giving speci c rationale for the importance of each. Participants reported the signi cance of having someone “familiar,” someone with whom they had a personal connec- tion and could talk to when faced with adversity. Adversity for participants appeared to take place in both the academic and social settings, and directly

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affected them personally and emotionally. Some participants revealed that they needed a “sounding board” to help them process their experiences. They reported feeling uncomfortable with or unaware of campus resources to assist them with their personal and emotional experiences. The value of having a strong support system outside of the PWU setting and establishing a strong support system within the PWU setting played a critical role in the personal and emotional experience for study participants. These support systems are discussed in the following paragraphs.

Theme 1: Mentor Support

Most participants who were connected with a faculty or peer mentor, either on or off campus, reported positive experiences at the southern PWU they attended for graduate school. However, one participant reported a negative on-campus mentor experience, which was curtailed by a positive experience she had with an off-campus mentor from her undergraduate university. Participants with mentors noted that adjustment to the academic and social environment was easier because mentors provided participants with needed support and gave them access to someone whom they could trust in the academic and social environment of the university. Two participants had more positive experi- ences with mentors than did another participant. One participant, a 1st-year graduate student in the social sciences, talked about her positive experience meeting and working with her faculty mentor:

When I came for my interview, they had already arranged for me to meet four possible faculty mentors based on my academic eld of interest. So she [my mentor] was actually the rst person I met and, once again, I got a really good vibe from her. I felt like she would probably be a good mentor. I met other people, and they all had good research, but, like I said, the personality is what drew me to her, and I was happy with my decision. . . . I think this made my entry into research easier, and de nitely I had a better experience with this than some of my other Black friends. They are still trying to get a professor to let them do research with them, and I am well on my way! My mentor is great!

For another participant, a faculty mentor provided signi cant positive rein- forcement and guidance in the academic setting. She shared her experience of positive support from her faculty mentor. This participant, a 2nd-year master’s student in a hard science eld, talked about her positive experience:

As far as other people . . . the other person that’s a good support person for me is my mentor [whom] I work for. She is very understanding. So let’s say if I make a mistake in the lab—so it causes the experiment to not work properly—she doesn’t get upset. And she just kind of says, “OK, well, next time you know that this step is very crucial. You have to add this ingredient or something. So we’ll just do it again.” . . . But then, like I said, someone like [my mentor], she’s just completely supportive and understanding even when you make mistakes because we’re human and I’m still learning. Mistakes are kind of bound to happen sometimes.

Contradicting this positive experience, another participant, a 1st-year mas- ter’s student in another science eld, had a negative experience; she cited a

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lack of faculty mentor support in her academic program. This lack of faculty mentor support created challenges and barriers in the academic environment. She revealed the following story:

Like, this one professor was, like, “I’m really hesitant of working with you.” He, like, outright said that. I’m not going to put him on the spot and say his name, but I was, like, “Wow. He really just said that to my face.” He said, “I’m really hesitant because why do you want to work in [ eld of study]?” I told him, “Because I had an undergraduate senior project that was related to it, and I have an interest in it, and I would like to pursue it.” And he replied sarcastically, “Oh, because most of my students, they have far more experience than you.” And I’m, like, “OK, well I don’t.” And I told him, “I’m willing to work in your lab for free. You don’t have to pay me. I just want to get experience.”

A number of participants spoke about their experiences with their under- graduate mentors, most of whom were their professors. Although most of them had a positive relationship with their PWU mentor, they clari ed that there was a distinction between the two mentoring experiences. One partici- pant, a 1st-year doctoral student in a science eld, noted this difference in favor of her HBCU mentors:

They [HBCU mentors] were more interactive . . . they knew us by face and name; you felt comfortable talking to them. We had a lot of them who had been involved in a lot of different things that gave us a wide perspective on different things like the civil rights movement. . . . I thought I learned a lot from them. That was the difference.

These Black women had different experiences with faculty mentors at this southern PWU. It is apparent that not only are mentors important for these women, but the right mentor is critical. Many of the participants revealed that when they were faced with adversity both inside and outside of the classroom, having a mentor with whom they had a strong relationship gave them an avenue to vent frustrations, brainstorm strategies, and implement resolutions. Mentors appeared to empower these women and give them a voice in situations in which they often felt defeated. Certainly, having the right connection is critical, as was proven with the women who experienced negative interactions with their mentors, which emphasizes the need for appropriate pairings for mentorship. Overall, mentors had a positive impact on the experiences of these Black women attending a southern PWU graduate school by increasing their self-ef cacy, encouraging their efforts, and boosting their self-esteem.

Theme 2: Family and Friendship Support

For each research participant, distant friends and family seemed to be the backbone of their support system. Most talked about feeling encouraged, empowered, and relieved after experiencing the support of family and friends during dif cult periods of adjustment. The importance of family support con- verged on all areas of adjustment for these participants, but resonated highly in the area of personal and emotional adjustment. Participants discussed the signi cance of having this familial connection to vent about unpleasant ex-

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periences and for encouragement. A 3rd-year doctoral student talked about her family and friends as a support system:

My parents, my friends . . . we’re still in touch . . . like once every week or once every other week. And I might visit them . . . so that really helps when I go home. Just to kind of vent. It’s always good to be able to talk to some people that kind of understand.

A second semester master’s student spoke about the importance of family support from her mother at times when she felt discouraged academically. She commented,

I didn’t do as well as I wanted to academically last semester. I didn’t get a 3.0; it was close, but it wasn’t a 3.0. And I was actually, like, really upset about that. So to come from always being at least honor roll and graduating magna cum laude—for me to not have a 3.0 was like a shock to my system. And my mom was like, “Oh, that’s still good; you did your best.” She’s always like that, even if I feel like . . ., “Man, I did really bad on this test.” She still says, “Well, you did your best.” And she’s always very supportive. And I usually get off the phone feeling a lot better after talking to her.

Although the support of family did contribute to positive personal and emo- tional adjustment, one participant reported that a lack of family understanding and empathy about her experience exacerbated her adjustment dif culties. She noted the following experience with her family’s lack of understanding:

But my family—they don’t really understand because they don’t have [a degree]. . . . I know they try to understand, but they don’t REALLY understand because they don’t have a degree. They didn’t go through college. It’s hard for them when I’m explaining to them what I’m going through. They’re like, “You can do it.” I mean I understand that they’re trying to encourage me, but . . . they didn’t go through it, so it’s kind of hard for them to really understand.

Family and friends provided a source of personal and emotional support for these women at times when they felt academic or personal discouragement. After making contact with family members or friends, participants expressed feelings of empowerment and hopefulness about something that prompted feelings of inadequacy, such as doing poorly academically. However, one participant felt that her family was unable to empathize with her experience because they had not had the same experience, although they did try to understand. Such a disconnection may have caused this participant to feel a lack of support from her family.

Theme 3: Romantic Relationship Support

Equally important for participants in this study was the support of their ro- mantic partners. Those engaged in romantic relationships talked about the signi cance of empathy and understanding shown to them by their partners, many of whom were currently in graduate school as well. Others expressed a lack of support from their romantic partners. One participant, a graduate student in education, commented about depending on her romantic partner for support when she felt her mother might have overreacted to a situation:

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Um, it doesn’t affect me that much emotionally because I do have a boyfriend. Not on campus. Long distance. So we talk every day. So between him and my mom I always have someone to kind of vent to if I have to. Or just talk about something that may have bothered me, so that I don’t have anything really building up on me. Yeah . . . I can’t mention names because then you’ll know who it is. But one of the professors had said something to me that really upset me. Basically, he was like, “Leave if you want to.” Or something like that. And it was over something too trivial, I thought. And so I’m like . . . I am not about to call my parents to drive up from Georgia to pack up my stuff for something that was so stupid. So I talked to [my boyfriend] about it . . . I didn’t tell my mom because she’d be . . ., “Oh, that’s my baby.” So I just told my boyfriend about it, and he was like, “Don’t worry about it; just do your best there.” He just supported me and helped me kind of let go of it.

Likewise, another participant reported that having a romantic partner in a similar situation [graduate school] helped create empathic support. She stated,

But I have a boyfriend that I talk to a lot . . . he’s at [graduate school]. He’s doing a master’s there. Yeah, he understands. My boyfriend—he’s also in the same major as me, so I talk to him a lot. He pushes me: “Don’t give up, keep going.”

Unfortunately, not all participants’ romantic partners were as supportive or understanding as the two previous participants’ partners were. One student, a 3rd-year doctoral student in a male-dominated academic eld, lamented over a lost relationship that she blamed on the constant struggle she and her ancé had regarding her reporting of negative experiences with graduate school. She commented,

One more thing about my support system . . . my relationship with my ancé is dirt now. When I came here [university], we were as tight as can get. And now, we’re not even getting married. It’s the stress of this program. He just didn’t get it . . . there was no understanding for what I was going through at this White place [southern PWU].

The women in this study revealed that their romantic relationships played an essential role in how they experienced graduate school at a southern PWU. The support, understanding, and empathy received from their romantic partners gave them con dence and empowered them to continue moving forward. Romantic partners gave some participants a person with whom they could talk on a daily basis about their experiences. Furthermore, for those with partners also in graduate school, their relationships gave them an alternative form of support, other than family, that allowed for the comparison of similar (graduate school) experiences. For one participant, however, a lack of understanding about her experience created a situation that, she claimed, ended her engagement because her partner was not able to understand or empathize with her experience.

Discussion

This study examined the experiences of 11 Black women who received an undergraduate degree from an HBCU and were attending graduate school at a southern PWU. Three prominent themes surrounding support systems,

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including mentors, family and friends, and romantic relationships, emerged from a qualitative analysis of participants’ personal narratives. The experiences of participants affected them in positive and negative ways and, thus, had an impact on their experiences in graduate school at a southern PWU.

Mentors

Nine of the 11 participants had faculty mentors. Many participants expressed gratitude about having a mentor, whether on or off campus (e.g., faculty, ad- ministrator, former adviser). The university where this study occurred did not have a formal graduate student mentor program as a part of its graduate school program. However, there was evidence on the graduate school website that faculty–graduate student mentor relationships were encouraged. It is not known if the mentors associated with the study participants received any formal training to be a mentor. Of the mentor pairings, six participants had White mentors and three had Black mentors. Of the three participants who had Black mentors, two reported having negative mentor relationship experiences, whereas participants with White mentors only reported positive experiences. This contradicts research that indicates that Black students and White faculty are incapable of cultivating positive relationships at PWUs (Fleming, 1984; Guiffrida & Douthit, 2010; Mayo, Murguia, & Padilla, 1995; Schwitzer, Grif n, Ancis, & Thomas, 1999). The ndings from this study are more consistent with those of Robertson (1995), who asserted that Black students who had positive relationships with White faculty tend to have better experiences at White universities.

Mentors were viewed as people who were able to guide participants through the unfamiliar in the academic environment (e.g., research) and were viewed often as friends. One participant reported, “She’s [the mentor] a good person who I can really have a conversation with . . . she’s a friend, and I do feel connected with her.” However, some expressed disdain with their on-campus mentor relationship and sought mentor guidance off campus. One participant who reported having problematic issues with a Black research mentor in her department expressed how important an off-campus research mentor was to her. She stated, “I had to go to another institution where I had a [disserta- tion] committee member [mentor], and he and I did research studies together. That’s the one thing they [the professors at PWU] won’t take from me.”

In the end, participants who had positive experiences with mentors expressed positive experiences in the southern PWU environment. Those who had negative experiences with a mentor reported initial and ongoing problems adjusting to graduate school at the southern PWU. Such negative experiences caused participants to feel discouraged and eventually to seek out mentors who were more encouraging and supportive.

Mentors were a critical part of these participants’ experiences as Black women attending graduate school at a southern PWU. Although mentors were the main university support system discussed by participants, the most signi cant support system for all study participants was family.

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Family and Friends Support

Participants placed a strong emphasis on family and friends as a means of continual support throughout their adjustment at the southern PWU they were attending for graduate school. During times of distress (e.g., poor test performance, discrimination), participants relied on their family members or friends to reaf rm their self-ef cacy and their ability to overcome problematic issues related to attending graduate school at a southern PWU. A number of study participants indicated that contact with family members often reversed negative emotions and feelings experienced, such as discouragement, discon- tent, and hopelessness.

Some participants reported their experience at a southern PWU to be dif- ferent from their undergraduate experience at an HBCU, because, at their undergraduate HBCU, the faculty, administration, and staff often served as surrogate family members and provided needed support within the university community. One participant stated, “I had so many faculty members [at the HBCU], so many people who kept pushing me . . . there were so many people I looked up to, that kept pushing me—other students. It was like a family where we worked together.” Similarly, a 3rd-year doctoral student reported,

You know your professors and your professors know you. . . . They understand how it is being a student. They wanted us to do well and really helped to alleviate the stress [of school] . . . they knew when something was wrong with a student . . . they knew when you were not in class and were sympathetic if something was going wrong in your life . . . there was just a lot more understanding and support I feel that goes on between the professors and the students [at an HBCU].

Most participants reported that their relationships with southern PWU faculty, administration, and staff were not strong enough to foster the de- velopment of a “surrogate family” for similar support. They also shared that their dependence on their family relationships back home for support while attending their undergraduate HBCU was needed, but not as strongly as it was needed while attending graduate school at their southern PWUs.

In addition to discussing their reliance on family support, a small number of participants shared that, although their families provided important support, they often lacked empathy and understanding because they had not attended a southern PWU or graduate school. This often caused disconnection from and tension between participants and their families because of the families’ inability to identify with and understand participant adjustment issues. How- ever, participants praised their friends for the empathy and understanding that they were able to show when approached for support. Friends offered an empathic system of support because they shared similar experiences that were inherent in attending graduate school whether at a PWU or an HBCU. Participants commented that they depended on Black friends at the PWU for support. They clari ed that having similar adjustment experiences created

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more genuine and meaningful support. Participants also placed a high value on the support they received from friends outside of their PWU community and felt that these friends provided a different type of support. Although less empathic, this support served the purpose of enhancing self-ef cacy to overcome obstacles to success. Both friends and family provided participants with necessary support at various times for different reasons. However, some participants reported that negative emotions about their adjustment experi- ences persisted even after having positive contact with family and friends for support, often because of the environment at the southern PWU.

Romantic Relationships

The majority of the study participants disclosed that they depended on part- ners in their romantic relationships for support during times of psychological distress because of adjustment dif culties at the southern PWU they were attending for graduate studies. Although most romantic partners were in a different location, a number of them were in graduate school and provided a sense of empathic support, understanding, and compassion for participants’ experiences. A number of participants remarked that their romantic partners expressed a realistic sense of their personal adjustment struggles because they, too, were graduate students with similar experiences.

This support was similar to that of participants’ Black friends at the PWU they were attending for graduate school. Although participants’ partners expe- rienced different stressors related to graduate school, they could conceptualize and understand how being a Black graduate student from an HBCU on a PWU campus introduced additional layers of stress. Most participants stated that their romantic partners were enrolled as full-time graduate students at an HBCU; hence, participants commented that their partners’ stressors were different and more related to the general graduate school experience. Partici- pants whose romantic partners were not enrolled in graduate school at the time of the study commented that their partners expressed less empathy and understanding about their personal and emotional adjustment experiences. This lack of understanding created dissonance and stress in the relationship, sometimes resulting in the termination of the relationship and, thus, a needed support system. A 3rd-year doctoral student remarked, “My boyfriend just doesn’t get it. He’s in grad school at [an HBCU], and things are the same as undergrad. I complain to him for support, and he just gets angry.” Many times, participants felt misunderstood by their romantic partners who were in graduate school elsewhere. Although they needed the support of their roman- tic partners, this support sometimes caused relationship dif culties because their partners often lacked empathy. None of the participants felt comfortable enough with university resources (e.g., counseling center, advisers) to seek support about relationship problems, which compounded the loss of needed support even more. A participant commented about her experience with the university counseling center:

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I did know about the counseling center. I did go to the counseling center. It was OK, but it was hard to get them to understand. I tried to join in some of their things. I would go there, and there was nothing they could do with my situation . . . they just didn’t get it [what it was like to be a Black woman on a predominantly White campus].

Participants expressed a monolithic view of White university employees (e.g., counselors, professors, deans) and found them to be untrustworthy resources. All in all, participants relied on support from mentors, family, friends, and their romantic partners throughout their adjustment to life at a southern PWU. Many participants, however, expressed that this support had been more stable while both partners were attending an HBCU, where they shared similar experiences with adjustment.

Implications for College Counseling and Support Services

This study represents one of the initial examinations of the adjustment experiences of Black graduates of HBCUs who are attending graduate school at a southern PWU. Although access to and opportunities at PWU graduate schools are avail- able for Blacks, attrition rates are high, and personal and emotional adjustment are problematic. Because Blacks typically access mental health services as a last resort after exhausting community resources, such as family, friends, and religious leaders (Whitaker, 2000), college counselors, to provide services to this popula- tion, should explore creative and nontraditional methods that offer alternatives to the traditional models of individual or group counseling. Counselors can be of assistance in the area of retention through exploring the roles of counseling that take them outside of the traditional counseling center setting and into the environment experienced by Black students on a PWU campus. By implementing strategic service-delivery models that include collaboration, outreach, graduate school of ce, and consultation, college counselors and counseling personnel might better assist the Black college student with adjustment to life at a PWU.

Collaboration

Through collaboration with of ces on the PWU campus (e.g., admissions, graduate school, Of ce of Diversity and Inclusion), counselors can provide valuable knowledge about diversity and inclusion, multicultural and advocacy competencies, and information about Blacks on a PWU campus. This is es- pecially helpful for serving students transitioning to a PWU from an HBCU setting. Emphasizing a multicultural approach to programs that provide ser- vices to Black students (e.g., academic support programs, minority student orientations, mentor programs) and direct involvement in the planning and implementation of these services could be an avenue for creating awareness about the necessity of diversity and multicultural perspectives in program service delivery for these Black students.

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Collaboration between counseling centers on PWU and HBCU campuses about student transition and adjustment could be bene cial in helping Black graduates of HBCUs transition more smoothly into the PWU campus envi- ronment. By providing collaborative services (e.g., preorientation programs, resource fairs, mentor training) while these students are still on the HBCU campus, counselors could model effective collaboration to demonstrate a sense of cohesive effort that might encourage Black students to access counseling services at a PWU to address adjustment dif culties.

Furthermore, because study participants emphasized the importance of family support during this adjustment period, HBCU and PWU college counselors and graduate school personnel could offer orientation programs for the families of incoming Black students as a means to educate them about what the students might experience in a PWU campus environment. Such preventive programming might serve to provide strategies for adjustment in which family connections and expectations could be implemented to provide needed support. Other forms of collaboration might include working with local Black churches, Black Greek organizations, and Black student organiza- tions to develop and deliver programming related to adjustment dif culties of Black students attending a PWU.

Outreach

Outreach programming is another way in which college counselors and per- sonnel might provide nontraditional services to the Black community on a PWU campus. Sponsoring and/or attending already established events (e.g., forum discussions, brown-bag lunch sessions, diversity celebrations) at locations where Black students feel safe and comfortable (e.g., a back-to-school picnic for Black students, Black Greek organization meetings) to discuss adjustment issues and other topics related to being a minority at a PWU would be valu- able. This type of interaction might serve to break down barriers of distrust and alienation between Black students on PWU campuses and services that would be bene cial to their adjustment.

Graduate School Of ce

Although there is a continued effort on the behalf of college counseling cen- ters to implement multiculturally sensitive counseling and programming, a great deal of support will be needed by personnel in the graduate school and related of ces (e.g., student affairs, student services, college cultural centers) for implementation. Multiculturally sensitive programming for graduate school administration, faculty, and staff is vital for the successful integration and ad- justment of Black students at a PWU. College administrators might consider active and ongoing multicultural programming/training that emphasizes earnest and open dialogue between colleagues and current and past Black students about their graduate school experiences. Roundtable discussions, community

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meetings, and multicultural sensitivity workshops are a few suggestions of how this can be accomplished. Using their mediation and group counseling skills, college counselors could assist with such efforts by facilitating and processing the information discussed. Such collaboration would give shared responsibility to the existing issues surrounding on-campus support systems for Black graduate students attending a PWU. Creating such a community effort around issues of support for Black graduate students could lead to more positive adjustment experiences and academic success.

Consultation

Finally, college counselors can serve as consultants (e.g., multicultural/diversity educators) to faculty, staff, and administration on PWU campuses and provide information (e.g., research, best practices for diversity and inclusion, mentoring advice) about ways to help Black students, especially those transitioning from the HBCU college experience, adjust to and be successful on a PWU campus. Often, it is assumed that personnel holding advanced degrees and working at institutions of higher learning are multiculturally competent and sensitive. Many college educators and administrators assume that they are as well. The lived experiences of the participants in this study challenge this notion, as evidenced by the experience of the study participant whose view of the college counseling center was that “they just didn’t get it [what it was like to be a Black woman on a predominantly White campus].” Because counselors have been trained through a multicultural lens, they should be in a position to work with both PWU and HBCU personnel to remedy some of the ills experienced by Black students who are adjusting to life at a PWU.

Limitations

This study included only female graduate students; therefore, some experi- ences revealed may be gender speci c, although racial and cultural issues were evident. In addition, all of the students included in this study were experienc- ing success in their PWU graduate program, as evidenced by their continuing academic status. Different information might be gleaned from students who began graduate school at a PWU but did not continue or transferred to a different setting.

Because interviews relied on the responses of each participant, it is noted that results are directly correlated to participants’ self-reporting of experi- ences. Some participants may have been reluctant to report detailed informa- tion because of the possibility of identi cation disclosure. Participants were selected from one particular university located in the rural, southern region of Appalachia. Thus, without further replication, the generalizability of our ndings are limited and cannot be applied to other southern geographic regions or to other regions of the United States where Black graduates of HBCUs attend graduate school.

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Although the first author used bracketing exercises during the inter- pretation of results, his Black graduate student identity was similar to that of the study participants in that he also attended a southern PWU for graduate school. This similarity might lend itself to some forms of unintentional bias and interpretation of results, although, unlike the study participants, both his undergraduate and graduate student experiences were all at southern PWUs, and his personal experiences were filtered through a male lens.

Conclusion

This study investigated the personal/emotional adjustment experiences of graduates of HBCUs who were currently attending graduate school at a southern PWU. Participant experiences revealed important information about the value and importance that these students placed on establishing support systems and knowing previous acquaintances during the transition from an HBCU to a PWU for graduate school. In addition, participants disclosed their experiences with having negative emotions and feelings resulting from racial microaggressions and other unconstructive incidents experienced during their transition and adjustment to life at a PWU. Future studies might be conducted with a larger group of participants and with other racial/ethnic minority groups and might include male graduate students. Replicating this study for the same population across the various geographic regions of the United States may reveal a pattern in the experiences of HBCU graduates attending PWUs for graduate school. Although both qualitative and quantitative stud- ies have been conducted about the adjustment experiences of undergraduate Black students attending PWUs, a mixed-methods study combining the two research strategies may reveal more detailed and correlated evidence about these experiences for the population of this study.

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