Assistant Professor of Higher Education at Boston College
About
Andrés Castro Samayoa is assistant professor of higher education at the Lynch School of Education at Boston College and senior research associate at the Penn Center for Minority Serving Institutions. Born in El Salvador, Andrés’s work seeks to improve educational experiences for students of color—specifically centering the work of minority serving institutions (MSIs) in the postsecondary sector.
His research projects focus on two interrelated lines of inquiry: one of them draws on sociohistorical perspectives on federal policymaking affecting MSIs. Secondly, he focuses on contemporary approaches to cultivating a more equitable ethoracial representation in K–12 and post-secondary education, with a specific focus in the humanities and social sciences at Hispanic serving institutions. He has co-edited two books on minority serving institutions: A Primer on Minority Serving Institutions (Routledge, in press) and Educational Challenges at Minority Serving Institutions (Routledge, 2017).
His collaborative research has been published in Educational Sciences, Journal of Latinos & Education, American Educational Research Journal and Teachers College Record. His work has been supported by the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation, the W.K. Kellogg Foundation and CLAGS: The Center for LGBTQ Studies in New York City. Andrés received his doctorate from the University of Pennsylvania’s Graduate School of Education (PennGSE). Prior to his time at PennGSE, Castro Samayoa completed an MPhil as a Gates Scholar at Cambridge University and a BA at Harvard University.
Current Work:
Castro Samayoa's research, broadly, focus on how ideas of differences across social identities—such as race and ethnicity—circulate in the social world. Specifically, he focuses on processes affecting postsecondary educational institutions in the United States by investigating minority serving institutions. In his first strand of research, Castro Samayoa investigates culturally responsive practices at minority serving institutions. In a current longitudinal project funded by the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation with colleagues from the Center for Minority Serving Institutions, Castro Samayoa explores how students at three Hispanic serving institutions engage with wrap-around resources to support their pursuit of graduate education as they prepare to ender academic fields in the humanities and social sciences. In a related area of inquiry, Castro Samayoa employs sociohistorical methods to investigate the emergence of minority serving institutions through federal policymaking. Broadly, Castro Samayoa's projects seek to understand how postsecondary institutions strive to enhance educational equity for students of color.
Research Area Keyword(s):
Minority serving institutions, diversity, graduate education, LGBT students
