Using critical race theory to reframe mentor training: theoretical considerations regarding the ecological systems of mentorship.

This article offers a theoretical and critical analysis of race-dysconscious mentorship involving students of color and white faculty. Inspired by ecological systems theory, critical race theory, and the NIH-funded program, Building Infrastructure Leading to Diversity: Promoting Opportunities for Diversity in Education and Research, our analysis considers the ecosystems that promote student pushout and hinder diversification of the scientific workforce, which call for "critical" alternatives to traditional research mentorship. We first examine the historical, social-political, institutional, interpersonal, and intrapsychic ecosystems of traditional mentor-protégé relationships. Two areas are reviewed: (a) "diversity" as it operates in universities and research laboratories and (b) the discursive properties of a dysconscious dialog that rationalizes modern racism. Next, we connect the five ecosystems of mentorship by integrating literature on critical history, white consciousness, the interpersonal context of mentoring, and mentor-protégé phenomenology. Our analysis demonstrates how the racialized lives of members involved in a mentoring relationship are situated within racist macro-level ecological systems wherein intrapsychic and interpersonal actions and discourses unfold. The development of race-consciousness and anti-racist faculty mentor training programs is also discussed.

Transforming Science Research Through Liberatory Race-conscious Mentorship: The BUILD PODER Professional Development Modules.

BUILD is a NIH initiative designed to retain underrepresented undergraduates in biomedicine. Of the 10 BUILD sites, BUILD PODER is the only space-and-place that approaches this initiative through the framework of critical race theory (CRT). A feature of BUILD PODER's path to student empowerment is liberatory race-conscious mentorship. Researchers developed, implemented, and evaluated a quintipartite CRT-based antiracist-anticolonial online training program for biomedical educators nationwide. We review the social scientific and historical knowledge used to create these novel mentorship training modules. We describe the modular content and activities. We also report evaluation data obtained during beta-testing and outline how this information helped finalize the product. Discussed are the individual- and institutional-level implications of modularizing the developmental process of liberatory race consciousness.

An ethical frame for research with immigrant families.

In this introduction, the editors give an overview of the ways the volume addresses the growing individual and institutional calls for increased clarity and rigor in methodological, ethical, and practical research policies and guidelines for conducting research with immigrant individuals, families, and communities. In addition to summarizing the volume's purpose, background on the U.S. immigrant population is given, followed by delineation of the five major issues contributing to the field of immigrant studies research and entering the "field" and engaging with immigrant families and communities: heterogeneity and history, documentation status, research pragmatics, research lens and bias, and influence on policy.

Doing no harm and getting it right: guidelines for ethical research with immigrant communities.

This chapter provides a guide to research logistics and ethics in studying immigrant families. The authors outline major pragmatic issues in research design and data collection to which all scholars must attend, although current practices often do not respond to the idiosyncratic issues related to vulnerable immigrant populations (e.g., undocumented immigrants). The chapter presents vital procedures to ensure both the protection of research participants from immigrant backgrounds and validity of the data collected from them and seeks to be a source of reference for institutional review boards (IRBs). Specific issues addressed include navigating IRBs, informed consent, recruitment and sampling, and translation of instruments and interviews.

A systematic literature review of breastfeeding interventions among Black populations using the RE-AIM framework.

BACKGROUND: Lactation support resources are less likely to be located in close proximity to where Black families live and there is a systemic racist health care belief that Black women prefer bottle feeding (with infant formula) over breastfeeding. Together, these lead to lower reported breastfeeding rates of Black babies compared to other racial / ethnic groups. It is imperative to have a deeper understanding of the cultural aspects as well as the underlying limitations that prevent Black women / persons from being supported to breastfeed. There is a need to know how effective breastfeeding interventions are in reaching the intended population; how well they work in promoting breastfeeding initiation and continuation; and how successful they are when implemented at the setting and staff level. The purpose of this investigation was to establish the level of internal and external validity that was reported by breastfeeding intervention studies among Black communities. METHODS: Studies on breastfeeding interventions on Black people that were published between the years 1990 and 2019 were carefully examined through PubMed, EBSCOhost, Web of Science, and OneSearch. A total of 31 studies fulfilled the requirements to be included for this evaluation. In order to extract the information from the articles, the reach, effectiveness, adoption, implementation, and maintenance (RE-AIM) framework extraction tool was utilized. RESULTS: On average, the proportion of studies that reported across reach, effectiveness, adoption, implementation, and maintenance indicators was 54, 35, 19, 48, and 9%, respectively. Across core RE-AIM indicators only sample size (100%) and breastfeeding outcomes (90%) were reported consistently. External validity indicators related to representativeness of participants (16%) and sites (3%) were rarely reported. Similarly, adherence to intervention protocol, and indicator of internal validity, was reported in a small proportion of articles (19%). CONCLUSION: This body of literature under-reported on aspects associated to both internal and external validity across all RE-AIM domains. The reporting of the individual level of representativeness; the setting level of representativeness; the intervention's adherence to the protocol; the expenses; and the factors of sustainability would benefit from improvement in future research.

Enhancing grant-writing expertise in BUILD institutions: Building infrastructure leading to diversity.

BACKGROUND: The lack of race/ethnic and gender diversity in grants funded by the National Institutes of Health (NIH) is a persistent challenge related to career advancement and the quality and relevance of health research. We describe pilot programs at nine institutions supported by the NIH-sponsored Building Infrastructure Leading to Diversity (BUILD) program aimed at increasing diversity in biomedical research. METHODS: We collected data from the 2016-2017 Higher Education Research Institute survey of faculty and NIH progress reports for the first four years of the program (2015-2018). We then conducted descriptive analyses of data from the nine BUILD institutions that had collected data and evaluated which activities were associated with research productivity. We used Poisson regression and rate ratios of the numbers of BUILD pilots funded, students included, abstracts, presentations, publications, and submitted and funded grant proposals. RESULTS: Teaching workshops were associated with more abstracts (RR 4.04, 95% CI 2.21-8.09). Workshops on grant writing were associated with more publications (RR 2.64, 95% CI 1.64-4.34) and marginally with marginally more presentations. Incentives to develop courses were associated with more abstracts published (RR 4.33, 95% CI 2.56-7.75). Workshops on research skills and other incentives were not associated with any positive effects. CONCLUSIONS: Pilot interventions show promise in supporting diversity in NIH-level research. Longitudinal modeling that considers time lags in career development in moving from project development to grants submissions can provide more direction for future diversity pilot interventions.

Faculty writing groups: The impact of protected writing time and group support.

Faculty at teaching institutions carry high teaching loads, leaving little time to write manuscripts or grant applications, let alone getting them published or awarded. This manuscript describes the impact of protected writing time for faculty at a higher education, teaching institution who committed to focused, uninterrupted writing time on a weekly basis and exchanged writing challenges and tips with colleagues. A mixed methods approach was used to assess the impacts of the writing group which found increased productivity (manuscripts and publications, proposals and grants) and sense of a research community with enhanced structural knowledge, camaraderie, and morale.

Pilot Study of an Intervention to Increase Cultural Awareness in Research Mentoring: Implications for Diversifying the Scientific Workforce.

INTRODUCTION: Innovative evidence-based-interventions are needed to equip research mentors with skills to address cultural diversity within research mentoring relationships. A pilot study assessed initial outcomes of a culturally tailored effort to create and disseminate a novel intervention titled Culturally Aware Mentoring (CAM) for research mentors. INTERVENTION: Intervention development resulted in four products: a 6hr CAM training curriculum, a facilitator guide, an online pre-training module, and metrics to evaluate the effectiveness of CAM training. METHOD: Participants were 64 research mentors from three US research-intensive universities. Quantitative pre and post-training evaluation survey data were collected. RESULTS: Participants found high value and satisfaction with the CAM training, reported gains in personal cultural awareness and cultural skills, and increased intentions and confidence to address cultural diversity in their mentoring. CONCLUSIONS: Study findings indicate that the CAM training holds promise to build research mentors' capacity and confidence to engage directly with racial/ethnic topics in research mentoring relationships.

Critical race theory as a bridge in science training: the California State University, Northridge BUILD PODER program.

BACKGROUND AND PURPOSE: Unconscious bias and explicit forms of discrimination continue to pervade academic institutions. Multicultural and diversity training activities have not been sufficient in making structural and social changes leading to equity, therefore, a new form of critical consciousness is needed to train diverse scientists with new research questions, methods, and perspectives. The purpose of this paper is to describe Building Infrastructure Leading to Diversity (BUILD); Promoting Opportunities for Diversity in Education and Research (PODER), which is an undergraduate biomedical research training program based on transformative framework rooted in Critical Race Theory (CRT). KEY HIGHLIGHTS: By employing a CRT-informed curriculum and training in BUILD PODER, students are empowered not only to gain access but also to thrive in graduate programs and beyond. Poder means "power" or "to be able to" in Spanish. Essentially, we are "building power" using students' strengths and empowering them as learners. The new curriculum helps students understand institutional policies and practices that may prevent them from persisting in higher education, learn to become their own advocates, and successfully confront social barriers and instances of inequities and discrimination. To challenge these barriers and sustain campus changes in support of students, BUILD PODER works toward changing campus culture and research mentoring relationships. By joining with ongoing university structures such as the state university Graduation Initiative, we include CRT tenets into the campus dialogue and stimulate campus-wide discussions around institutional change. Strong ties with five community college partners also enrich BUILD PODER's student body and strengthen mentor diversity. Preliminary evaluation data suggest that BUILD PODER's program has enhanced the racial/ethnic consciousness of the campus community, is effective in encouraging more egalitarian and respectful faculty-student relationships, and is a rigorous program of biomedical research training that supports students as they achieve their goals. IMPLICATIONS: Biomedical research programs may benefit from a reanalysis of the fit between current training programs and student strengths. By incorporating the voices of talented youth, drawing upon their native strengths, we will generate a new science that links biomedical research to community health and social justice, generating progress toward health equity through a promising new generation of scholars.