Kaleb L. Briscoe, Ph.D. is an assistant professor of Adult and Higher Education in the Department of Educational Leadership and Policy Studies at the University of Oklahoma, where she joined the faculty in August 2023. She previously served as an assistant professor of Higher Education Leadership at Mississippi State University.
Her work utilizes critical theories and methods to describe structural inequities within organizations. Her research more broadly speaks to understanding issues of race, racism, and racialized incidents at predominantly white institutions (PWIs). Additionally, her work seeks to understand administrators, explicitly university presidents’ responses to race and racism, by challenging their use of anti-blackness and non- performative rhetoric. She uses qualitative methodological approaches such as narrative inquiry, case study, and critical race methodology to understand these essential issues in postsecondary education spaces. Dr. Veronica Jones Baldwin and Dr. Briscoe received a Spencer Foundation Small Research Grant for their project Resistance or Racism? Unpacking Critical Race Theory Bans in a Sociopolitical Era of Anti-Racism. This two-part project: (1) analyzes the language used in current legislation banning CRT; and (2) captures the narratives of faculty that use CRT in their teaching, research, and service to understand how they navigate the political climate/recent legislative attempts to ban CRT. Ultimately, this work has the potential to shape higher education policy, influencing how institutional actors adapt to the political climate while advancing anti- racist practices.
Her work has also challenged how administrators and students treat staff members in higher education and student affairs, explicitly her project on “Student Affairs Professionals’ Experiences with Campus Racial Climate at PWIs” has garnered national recognition and grants with ACPA-College Student Educators International and NASPA– Student Affairs Administrators in Higher Education. This scholarship advances the argument that without accounting for how hostile campus racial climates negatively affect SAPs, there will be a status quo mentality when addressing racialized incidents. Through this work, Dr. Briscoe has also advanced arguments on how race and politics, including the severity of the political climate faced during the Trump administration, has complicated student affairs professionals’ roles in higher education. She has also taught undergraduate and graduate classes on Higher Education Environments, Diversity, Globalization, and the College Student, Critical Race Theory in Education, Race, Racism, and Racialized Incidents in Higher Education, all of which inform this proposed project. Finally, Dr. Briscoe has previously served as a mid-level student affairs professional overseeing student involvement, diversity, and multicultural affairs.
