How STEM Lab Settings Influence Graduate School Socialization and Climate for Students of Color.

In this article, we examine how science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) lab settings influence graduate school socialization and climate for Students of Color. While the literature has highlighted the importance of labs within STEM graduate education and the impediments to success for graduate Students of Color, limited research has explicitly attended to the experiences of graduate Students of Color within their respective labs. Understanding how STEM graduate Students of Color perceive and are affected by their experiences in their labs is imperative if educators are to better support their success. This article demonstrates that these STEM lab settings are often sites of isolation, competition, and dysfunction for graduate Students of Color. And, despite institutional efforts and support structures, graduate Students of Color are forced to create their own structures of support in order to exist within these conditions.