Elsa Gonzalez, Ph.D.

I examine higher education leadership and culture in order to contribute to the resilience and success of underrepresented students. My scholarship consists of two lines of research: (1) higher education leadership that supports underrepresented student retention, resilience, and success in STEM fields, and (2) qualitative research methodologies in cross-language and cross-cultural context. Understanding the decisions that higher education leaders in institutions make to further the success of underrepresented students within a cultural context in which gender, race, and academic discipline play a significant role is where these two areas of study intersect.

During the last six years, I have been studying issues that affect students in higher education, such as resilience, gender issues, underrepresented populations (especially in STEM fields), college readiness, and success—particularly in HSIs. Analyses of these issues have given me additional exposure to the reality that society currently faces both in the United States and in the world. The study of these issues are represented in research projects and their publications such as “Women Students in Engineering in Mexico: Exploring Responses to Gender Difference,” “Persistence of HE Latinas in STEM at a R1 Institution in Texas,” and “What Does It Mean to Be a Hispanic-Serving Institution? Listening to the Latino Voices of Students”. Furthering research, my edited QSE Special Issue, “Understanding Latina/o Resilience” and my book currently in press, “An Asset-Based Approach to Advancing Latina Students in STEM: Increasing Resilience”, serves  as a foundation to continue a strong research agenda in which resilience of underrepresented groups in STEM higher education, and cross-cultural perspectives provide responses to current and evolving questions.