A Long Road to Travel: Narratives of African American Male Preservice Educators' Journeys through a Graduate Teacher Eduaction Program

• Main Author: Jones, Shawn
• Format: Others
• Published: Digital Archive @ GSU 2011
• Subjects: African American; Males; Narratives; Critical Race Theory; Microaggressions
• Online Access: http://digitalarchive.gsu.edu/msit_diss/78; http://digitalarchive.gsu.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1085&context=msit_diss

The ongoing research concerning African American males enrolled in teacher education programs is essential for a number of reasons. Research specifically addressing preservice teaching, teacher education, and the African American male student is needed to promote the well-being of any school of education. According to McCray, Sindelar, Kilgore, and Neal (2002), colleges of education have addressed the issue of underrepresentation and under population of African American teachers through policy reform and financial support. The narratives of African American male preservice teachers and their perspectives on teacher education may provide a context for other researchers seeking to understand how and why African American males move into the field of education. More importantly, one particular way to enhance and advance the cause of the African American male preservice teacher is to accept a “culturally sensitive practice” (Tillman, 2002, p. 3) and insure epistemological and research practices unfamiliar to many teachers of preservice teachers are approved and embraced. This study is situated in a cultural, racial, and gendered point of view seeking to highlight the individual and shared experiences of three African American male preservice teachers enrolled in a graduate teacher education program. Stabilized through the lens of critical race theory (CRT), the gathering of counter-narratives provided the context to allow the research participants a vehicle to name their own reality.