Current Projects

Directed by James M. Jones, with Jeong Min Lee and Eric Splan, doctoral students in Psychological & Brain Sciences

Diversity Competence (DC)  reflects the individual, institutional, and cultural competence to address and support diversity efforts to the benefit of everyone. Our research has developed a scale to assess individual levels of diversity competence, the psychological characteristics of it, potential experiences that promote it. Ongoing research is determining behavioral patterns associated with greater diversity competence, and ways in which multicultural and other courses can enhance DC.

Directed by Dr. Rosalie Rolon Dow with

2016: Season Cooper and ​Branham Menard, Undergraduate Summer Scholars, and April Davison, Graduate Research Assistant

"Tell it like it is" is a storytelling project that uses qualitative narrative interviewing to document students' experiences on UD's campus related to their socially significant categories (e.g. college generational status, race/ethnicity, international status, gender/sexual orientation, religion, etc.). The project currently focuses on students' experiences of microaggressions and microaffirmations. The storytelling project aims to create an archive of stories that illuminate how diverse individuals perceive and navigate the campus community and the ways their experiences affect UD's campus climate. The long term objective of the project is to inform efforts to create a campus climate that fosters inclusiveness, equity and success for all students. 

In the summer of 2016, we gathered stories with students from racially underrepresented groups.  In the summer and fall of 2017, we are expanding the project to include stories from both undergraduate and graduate students with disabilities, international or immigrant students and Asian American students.

Students’ curricular and co-curricular engagement is an important part of the college experience. The SEED Project, a collaboration between Student Life and CSD, explores students’ self-reported knowledge around diversity, college experiences, and self-concept beginning with the entering 2017 class. The purpose of this 4-year longitudinal survey is to understand how students entering college view and perceive diversity, and how this knowledge of diversity changes over the course of students’ time in college, and affects their academic engagement and success. The results of the survey can inform programming, services, and overall student engagement during students’ college experiences.

Directed by Dr. Maryam Hussain, with Xinhui Jiang and Busra Soylemez, doctoral students in Political Science & International Relations

In discussing campus diversity, the narrative should not exclude the experiences of international students/scholars (F-1 and J-1 visa holders) and their families who come to the US on F-2 and J-2 visas.  While the university administration is committed to campus diversity and provides channels for international students to seek help and resources (e.g., Office for International Students and Scholars), the extent to which these efforts are sufficient for both the students and their dependent is not well understood.

This project aims to explore the domestic and social relations of students and their dependents within the UD community and how these relationships are shaped by the combination of the US and UD visa policies. Specifically: 1) Do F-2 visa policies construct another level of inequality within the household, especially in a gendered way?, 2) To what extent are dependents volunteering to be a “F-2” and what kinds of challenges and vulnerabilities do they face by positioning themselves at that status?, and 3) How successful do international families perceive the campus policies to be? Data collection will consist of surveys and interviews of both the international students and their identified dependent in the Fall 2017 semester.

Two international graduate students are the principal researchers, and will draw upon the assistance of both Center for the Study of Diversity and OISS. The outcomes from this study will shed light onto the experiences and challenges of a population that is necessary to campus diversity.