UC Davis

Institutions of higher education have perpetuated and maintained Eurocentric systems, including curriculum, that can negatively impact students. The problem of inequitably graduating students who are minoritized by their racial identity is but one outcome of systemic racism in educational systems. This inequity in degree attainment exists for many reasons, among them curricular practices that fail to validate the cultural relevance of students’ ethnic identities in relation to their academics. Although some institutional practices and policies have changed to address the problem of inequitably graduating racially minoritized students, the problem needs additional strategies to ensure more equitable outcomes for students who are racially minoritized. The State of California has recently mandated that all students in the California State University system take an ethnic studies course as a graduation requirement. Advocates suggest that taking an ethnic studies course will benefit students academically and socially. Although research and advocacy in the past decades have helped ethnic studies to be increasingly seen as a relevant and necessary component of education, there is still much to be learned about the relationship between ethnic studies course taking and degree attainment for students who are racially minoritized in university settings. This study is timely in that there is little information about the relationship between ethnic studies course taking and degree attainment in higher education. This study used a descriptive quantitative design to investigate associations between ethnic studies course taking—both in the first year and anytime during students’ college career—and degree attainment for students who are racially minoritized. A six-year dataset (2013-2019) from a mid-sized university in the California State University system was used. This study contributed to the conversation about impacts of ethnic studies course taking including impacts to GPA in the critical first year and time to degree. The findings add to a growing need to understand how to support students who are racially minoritized in curriculum that continues to be primarily white centered in undergraduate educational settings. Key findings included a slightly higher average time to degree for students who took ethnic studies anytime in college and a slightly higher GPA at the end of the first year for students who took ethnic studies in their first year of college. Using equity frameworks to analyze the data allowed for discussion about why students who take ethnic studies may take approximately one more semester to graduate compared to students who do not take ethnic studies including feeling validated by ethnic studies courses, choosing to add or change a major or minor, and connection to ethnic studies faculty.