Clarifying Pathways between Ethnic Studies and Student Outcomes: The Mediating Roles of Critical Consciousness and Ethnic-Racial Identity

Andres Pinedo

Students enrolled in ethnic studies earn higher grades, graduate from high school at higher rates, and are more likely to attend college compared to their non-enrolled peers. However, less is known about the changes in the beliefs or competencies of ethnic studies students that lead to these beneficial outcomes. A core competency that ethnic studies aims to equip students with is critical consciousness (CC), a critical analysis of social inequality as well as motivation and action to challenge inequality. In addition to CC, ethnic studies promotes healthy ethnic-racial identity (ERI) development by counteracting deficit views about people of color. However, while ethnic studies is theorized to contribute to CC and ERI, little research has empirically examined its association with these competencies. Opportunely, leaders in California Ethnic Studies are interested in assessing how ethnic studies promotes beneficial outcomes (i.e., mediating processes) and, importantly, how community-level factors strengthen or undermine these relationships. Consequently, this multi-site longitudinal survey study in geographically diverse California school districts aims to elucidate whether youth develop CC and ERI within ethnic studies and whether these factors mediate the link between ethnic studies and student outcomes, while attending to contextual moderators. Overall, this study seeks to clarify the interplay between ethnic studies curricula and community opportunity structures (e.g., youth activist organizations) in shaping the developmental trajectories of youth, thereby providing key stakeholders with insights on how to best support students' healthy development through ethnic studies and its connections to the community.

About Andres Pinedo

Andres (Andy) Pinedo is an assistant professor of human and organizational development at Vanderbilt University's Peabody College. As an interdisciplinary social scientist, Andy studies how structural and psychological processes interact to either perpetuate or disrupt inequality in society. His program of research focuses on whether and how facilitating youths' critical consciousness‚ the structural-historical analysis of inequality, motivation to enact social change, and collective action to promote social justice‚ can support them in navigating inequitable social contexts. Andy's research has underscored the importance of consciousness-raising systems (e.g., youth organizing groups, ethnic studies curricula) for scaffolding the development of youth's critical consciousness. His published work can be found in Child Development, Developmental Psychology, Cultural Diversity and Ethnic Minority Psychology, among other outlets. In addition to communicating his research via academic publications, Andy collaborates with community organizations and school districts to inform practices and policies that uplift youth. Andy earned his BA from the University of California, Santa Cruz, and his PhD from the University of Michigan, where he was a National Science Foundation Graduate Research Fellow and a recipient of the American Educational Research Association Minority Dissertation Fellowship.