“We Can Redefine Ourselves”: Enhancing Black College Men’s Persistence Through Counterspaces

Abstract

Black college men are constantly repositioned in higher education discourse as problems and in crises. However, there is much to be learned from Black men’s engagement in college and the meanings they make from those experiences. In this qualitative study, we use the engagement experiences of 25 Black men at an historically white campus in the U.S. in order to reveal the value of counterspaces on campus. Our findings suggest that the Sankofa Scholars program created important opportunities for these Black men to get acclimated to college, enhance their awareness and development, and resist deficit framings about them. These findings demonstrate that male success initiatives can serve as a counterspace on campus and can play a critical role in empowering Black men’s persistence in college and strengthening their resilience.