Next Generation First Generation™

Friday, January 25, 2019
Next-Generation First-Generation™ Professionals: Eliminating Tokenism in Higher Education

Raising Our Voices: Reclaiming the Narrative on the Value of Higher
Education occurs when institutions acknowledge and understand that
acknowledging intersecting identities of New Majority, next-generation/
first-generation professionals/graduate students (NXFG) contributes
to student success. NXFG students living/working authentically,
free from Internalized intergenerational trauma (IIT) that stifles our
creativity and our voices, benefit from experiencing first-hand how
professionalism grounded in authenticity generates successful careers.
Understanding effects of IIT on NXFG can generate programs, policies,
and practices positively impacting organizational effectiveness/
professional development. Invisible, damaging effects of attending/
working at institutions built on plantations, sacred grounds of Indigenous
peoples, or land once Mexico must be understood within broad
interpretations of inclusive excellence and evolving, dynamic interventions.

Equity-based strategies and collectivist principles validate traumas
professionals face through IIT, resulting in increasing self-efficacy
and work performance. Creating transformational environments relies
on bold interventions to dissolve cognitive dissonance when histories
are negated, hidden, or eliminated.

Presentation