The Relationship Between Student Growth Mindset Training and College Math Grades: A Case Study of First-Year Stem Majors at a Private Southeastern Historically Black College and University

Adams, Tekyo Wyatt, Clark Atlanta University

2023-05

2020-2029

Prior research has suggested significant gaps in achievement between African American and White students in college mathematics courses. Since mathematics is a foundational discipline necessary for students entering lucrative science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) fields, educators must address the gaps to help advance educational equity. Scholars have proposed that adopting the growth mindset theory aids student academic performance. Growth mindset theory is a belief in individuals realizing that their abilities and skill sets can be advanced and expanded through their efforts. This quantitative study sought to determine the efficacy of a growth mindset intervention and growth mindset on the academic performances of 170 African American first-year undergraduate students' taking a precalculus course at a historically Black college and university (HBCU) in the American southeast during the 2020-2022 academic years. The researcher used a combination of Likert-style surveys, Adaptive Learning scores (ALEKS) assessment data, and BannerWeb data on the semester final grades in mathematics to explore the extent to which students internalized the tenets of growth mindset training, the impact of growth mindset training on student academic performance, and the prevalence of growth mindset practices among mathematics instructors. The data revealed that many students demonstrated substantial degrees of alignment with growth mindset principles. That is, students who attended a growth mindset intervention achieved, on average, higher semester grades than students who did not participate in the intervention. The data also revealed that, while mathematics instructors generally adopted growth mindset practices pertinent to instruction, they often neglected to extend social-emotional support to mathematics students. Overall, the results of this study suggest that growth mindset theory can positively impact African American students' performance in mathematics. Still, instructional professionals in STEM fields must take a critical look at the types of support they can extend to African American students.

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application/pdf

born digital

Atlanta University and Clark Atlanta University Theses and Dissertations

2023-05

dissertation

Doctor of Education (EdD)

Clark Atlanta University

Department of Educational Leadership

Teodorescu, Daniel

Clark Atlanta University

Georgia--Atlanta

http://hdl.handle.net/20.500.12322/cau.td:2023_adams_tekyo_wyatt

http://rightsstatements.org/vocab/InC-EDU/1.0/