Abstract
A significant dropout rate among African American female students and the subsequent reduction in the quality of their life has recently grown out of proportions. Therefore, the specified demographics requires an impressive boost in order to reevaluate their opinion regarding academic progress and the significance of building a career, so that African American women could get an opportunity to become valuable specialists and, therefore, receive better chances for employment.
In order to help African American women reconsider the role of education in their lives, the Breaking Barriers Program has been designed. It is supposed that, by launching a program, which will help change not only the educational, but also the societal stereotypes regarding African American people, not only will the dropout rates among African American female students be reduced to a considerable extent, but also the attitude towards African American women as scholars will be reinvented completely (Hanson, 2007).
Aiming at both changing the current educational principles and eliminating the existing prejudices against women of color in the realm of the U.S. education, the project in question targets the social and the cultural prejudices that the society has created regarding African American women in education, and, thus, create the premises for the specified demographics to excel in their learning process, career and academic endeavors, as well as contribute to science to an impressive extent.
Introduction: Education for African American Women and the Role of the Breaking Barriers Program in It
Promoting education and the significance of science among African Americas has been an issue for an impressive amount of time. According to the official statistics, the lack of qualified specialists among African Americans contributes to the increase in unemployment rates among the specified tier of the U.S. society greatly (African American employment, 2014).
The issue is especially topical for African American women: without proper education, they have an extremely restricted amount of employment options and, thus, are especially vulnerable to a variety of economic factors triggering poverty (Levenstein, 2012). The Breaking Barriers program, which is aimed at promoting education among African American women, as well as enhancing the role of African American women in science, is bound to lead to major improvements in terms of educational opportunities for the specified demographics.
It should also be born in mind that the educational program may also have to address the cultural specifics of the target audience. Indeed, according to the existing evidence, the traditional image of a woman in the African American culture presupposes little to no social activity; as a result, the young women, who may excel in their academic life and career, are discouraged from making significant progress in the specified areas and, instead, are suggested the role of a housewife (Fouquier, 2011). Therefore, the Breaking Barriers Program will also have to develop the approach, which will help reinforce the positive image of an African American woman as an active student and, at the same time, help the participants of the project get rid of the above-mentioned stereotype.
Goals: Breaking Barriers as a Tool for Improving the Wellbeing of African American Women
Because of extremely scarce education options, African American women are prone to not only poverty but also dependence on outside support, primarily the support of the family members and the spouse. Speaking of the former, one must admit that the encouragement of family members is obviously a positive factor. Researches, however, show that in most cases, the family members discourage African American women from continuing their education and, instead, nourish the negative perception of an African American woman of herself as a learner, making her dependable on her spouse or partner (Booth & Myers, 2011).
The goal of the project is, therefore, to prove that the Breaking Barriers program will help African American women get rid of a negative image of themselves as learners and promote education as the key to their personal and professional evolution. In other words, the project is aimed at testing whether it is possible to correct not only the flaws of the current education system but also the societal injustice, particularly race and gender-related stereotypes that are traditionally attributed to education.
On a wider scale, the project is targeted at checking whether the wellbeing of African American women can be improved through the promotion of education and the encouragement of studying endeavors among the aforementioned demographics. Indeed, better education options and the opportunity for attaining academic success open a plethora of chances for African American women in terms of employment.
True, one must take the possible discrimination factor, including both gender and racial profiling in the field of science (Landivar, 2013), into account as the factors that will prevent African American women from building a career; however, it should be kept in mind that today, in the rise of globalization, a lot of modern companies adopt the HR strategies that are quite politically correct. To be more exact, in the modern world of science and especially employment, the emphasis is on the skills of a candidate and not on their ethnicity. Hence, it can be assumed that the success of the Breaking Barriers Project is quite feasible.
Mission: The Paths to Introducing Diversity into the Current Education System
The project in question has several goals to accomplish. First and most obvious, the quality of education for African American women is going to be improved considerably. Seeing that the research was started as a response to the current deplorable economic and financial state of a range of African American women and that poor education options were identified as the key reason for it, the improvement of living standards for African American women in the United States can be seen as another and a much broader goal of the research.
In addition, the project will also address the cultural concerns in general and the diversity issues in particular with regard to the present-day American education system. There is no secret that racial profiling persists in some of the U.S. educational establishments; hence, the method for fighting the inequality and promoting diversity within the U.S. education system must commence (Ford, Scott & Trotman, 2011).
The Breaking Barriers Project will assist in encouraging the principles of equity and diversity within the current American education setting; thus, the existing remnants of racial profiling will finally be eliminated. Naturally, it would be wrong to assume that a single project will defeat ethnic and national discrimination as a phenomenon; hoverer, Breaking Barriers will launch the chain reaction, which will inevitably lead to the elimination of racial profiling in the U.S. education establishments.
Organizational Structure: Breaking Barriers and the Foundations That It Stands on
When it comes to defining the structure of the program, one must mention that Breaking Barriers represents an entirely new way of looking at the education process and incorporates the latest innovations in teaching. As a result, the program features a unique structure, which was molded in accordance with the needs of the target audience and the goals that the project was going to accomplish. For instance, the class structure has been shaped considerably in order to encourage a better communication process between the teacher and the students.
This change is essential, as it creates the premises for a stronger bond between the educator and the learners and, thus, contributes to enhancing the learners’ motivation. Motivation is a crucial part of a successful education process; researches show that the lack thereof is the key reason for African American female students to drop out of school early and abandon the idea of getting a higher education (Jones, Wilder & Osborn-Lampkin, 2013). Therefore, by raising the students’ motivation, one will be able to make the retention rates among African American female students higher (Jones, Wilder & Osborn-Lampkin, 2013), which an elaborate class structure will facilitate.
As far as the structure of the program is concerned, the organization represents a functional structure, with a combination of the vertical and horizontal responsibilities delegation principle. As one can see, every single element of the program is aimed at perpetuating the idea of educational opportunities as positive among female African American students.
Research Question: The Viability of Breaking Barriers and Its Validity as an Educational Program
As it has been stressed above, the research in question is primarily targeted at the evaluation of the Breaking Barriers system as the method of promoting education and the related values among African American women. Consequently, the key research question can be put in the following way:
In what way can the Breaking Barriers Program reinforce the positive image of a female African American student among the target audience and encourage the specified demographics for excelling in their academic life so that they could have better career opportunities and, therefore, improve their living standards, consequently, altering the living standards for African American women in general?
Apart from the question specified above, the issue concerning the effects of the Breaking Barriers program on the academic success of African American women will be researched. More to the point, the results that the program will supposedly have on the target demographics will be linked to the subsequent changes in the unemployment rates (Loubert, 2012). It is supposed that the project in question is going to lead to a major drop in the rates of unemployment among African American women, as well as a rapid increase in the competitiveness of the latter as professionals in the realm of the global labor market. Hence, the second research question can be put in the following way:
What approaches does the Breaking Barriers Program need to adopt in order to change not only the academic performance of African American female students but also their career prospects, as well as their chances of forgetting promoted?
By answering these questions, one will be able to identify the potential for the project and, thus, evaluate the effort that its implementation will take, comparing it to the expected outcomes and, therefore, analyzing its value as a means to reinforce the education process among African American women.
Cost Analysis: Defining the Feasibility of the Project
Though the project may seem rather costly, it, in fact, must turn out rather profitable, with most of the expenses being covered within a comparatively short amount of time. It should be born in mind, though, that, to cover all the costs fast, one will have to come up with an efficient promotion campaign; thus, the chances for attracting both clients and potential investors will rise instantly.
It is also worth mentioning that the expenses related to renting will make most of the indirect costs, which means that a strategy for reducing them should be designed. In order to bring the renting costs down, the project must incorporate the strategy of split liability (Rejda & McNamara, 2014); in other words, it will be required that a merger with another company should be carried out. Thus, a part of the costs will be covered by the business partners. As far as the cost-benefit analysis is concerned, the table below provides a general overview of the expected costs and the supposed profit:
Table 1. Annual Operating Costs: Cost Analysis
The CBA table above shows that the project is going to be rather costly. However, as it has been stressed above, there are ways to reduce the number of liabilities that the organization is bound to face; once the principle of split liabilities is introduced into the project and the organization finds a partner to team up with, the expenses will be reduced quite a few notches.
In addition, assigning a risk manager for handling the specified issue can be a good idea. Thus, the amount of the deductible, which is traditionally defined as “a provision by which a specified amount is subtracted from the loss payment otherwise payable to the insured” (Rejda & McNamara, 2014, p. 52), can be calculated. The use of excess insurance, i.e., the plan, which does not presuppose the participation of the insurer in the loss up until the costs exceed the sum of money, which the organization was expected to retain (Rejda & McNamara, 2014, p. 52), can also be considered a feasible element of the general financial strategy.
Research Methodology: Combining Two Major Approaches. Interviews and Basic Research
Because of the complexity of the study and the necessity to incorporate the economic, social, and cultural aspects into it, it is necessary to integrate two types of research approaches into its methodology. Combining the qualitative and the quantitative approaches will lead to retrieving not only more accurate and diverse data, but also the opportunity to view the problem from different aspects, addressing both the effects that the program is going to have on the dropout and unemployment rates among female African American students and the current image of an African American woman, updating it so that the idea of the latter being a scholar could sound credible and receive support from the members of the American society.
Herein the necessity to carry out both the qualitative and the quantitative study lies. More to the point, the specifics of the research demands that the information concerning the current stage of education among the target demographics, as well as the future changes, should be retrieved directly from the African American women, which calls for conducting several interviews (a research design for a quantitative study) and carrying out general research based on the analysis of the existing literature, recent statistics, other researches related to the topic, etc.).
As a result, the premises for using both research methods are created. More to the point, it is necessary that both African American women, who have reached success in their scholarly career, and those, who have not managed to find their niche in the realm of academic life, must be carried out. Thus, the necessity for the launch of the project will be justified at the earliest stages of the research, and the credible information concerning the current state of education for African American women.
Human Subjects Protection: Personal Data Safety, Participant’s Consent, and the Related Issues
There is no need to stress that the wellbeing of the research participants remains one of the top priorities of the study. In order to make sure that the people partaking in the surveys are fully protected and that their rights are not infringed, it will be required to obtain informed consent from each person who is going to be interviewed. Indeed, according to the existing principles of research ethics, retrieving informed consent from the participants is an essential part of any study and a fundamental tenet of research:
(Quick, 2010). It should be born in mind, though, that in a range of cases, getting informed consent from the survey participants will be quite problematic. Indeed, the study is going to be conducted among both young African American women and those that belong to the older generation. While there seem to be no obvious issues with the latter, in the former, the researcher is most likely to come across a range of women under age, who are incapable of giving their informed consent due to the age restriction.
To be able to sample the data from both sources, it will be required that either the parents or the caregivers of the participants, who are under age, should agree to the experiment and sign the consent form. Speaking of which, in order to make sure that the rule of informed consent has been followed precisely and that all participants are fully aware of the goals of the experiment, their role in it and the consequences of their participation, it will be required that free consent forms should be provided to all those involved into the experiment.
In addition, the results of the interviews will also be provided with the names of the participants replaced by nicknames (e.g., “Mrs. A.”/”Participant A” instead of the woman’s real name, etc.). It could be argued that using first names only can also be considered a reasonable policy; however, with the disclosure of the first names of the participants, who live in comparatively small areas, the leakage of information and the following reveal of the participants’ personal data may be quite a tangible threat. Therefore, nicknames seem to be the best option.
Research Rationale: Addressing the Wellbeing of the Female Members of the African American Community
As it has been stressed above, the necessity for the research to be conducted was predisposed by the recent troubling tendency among the African American population in general and women in particular to dismiss the idea of contributing to science by engaging in their academic life and working on their career as researchers. To be more specific, the study was designed in order to promote science as one of the possible fields of interest for African American women to become a part of. Engaging in scientific projects is an impressive way of contributing to the society, and, therefore, get better chances for fighting the common stereotype of an African American woman being alien to the field of science and business.
Hypothetical Findings: Concerning the Expected Outcomes and the Supposed Results
Judging by the deplorable state of dropout rates among African American female students, and reinforcement of a more responsible approach towards studying will be a major step in the right direction. Therefore, it is expected that the research will help identify the key strategies for promoting education and especially science-related values to female African American students and reinforce the idea of science as one of the most significant areas in which they can excel (Smith, 2000).
On a more global level, it is also anticipated that the study results will suggest the ways for changing the image of an African American woman from an unemployed person, whose dependency on her family and husband is a result of them being her only salvation. The study will help both enhance the idea of exploring science and changing the image of an African American woman among the target audience. More to the point, the entire issue regarding education options for the African American community will be revisited. Thus, both unemployment and dropout rates among the target population are expected to be reduced greatly.
Conclusion: Giving African American Women the Chance to Work in the Realm of Science
Judging by the current statistics regarding African American women in science and education, the situation leaves much to be desired. The unwillingness of African American women to engage in scientific research and receiving the education required for it can be explained in a variety of ways, starting from the cultural viewpoint and up to the financial issues typical for the African American community. However, the existing problems can be handled with the introduction of the Breaking Barriers Program, which will reinforce the image of an African American woman as an active learner and a successful scientist.
Thus, it will be possible to introduce more stability into the African American community and fight with the increasing unemployment rates, as well as promote innovations in science and improve the image of African American women, updating it so that it could incorporate both the traditional values of the African American community and the ones that are associated with the current image of a woman as an active participant of the state political, social and economic life. The promotion of the role of science among African American women, therefore, will signify a new step in the development of the community and the society in general.
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