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Black women in higher education navigate intersecting systems of racism and sexism that shape their mental health and professional experiences. While the dual pandemics of COVID-19 and anti-Black racism intensified these conditions, recent retrenchment of Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (DEI) initiatives has further exposed the instability of institutional commitments to equity. This symposium presents findings from a coordinated program of research examining Black women’s mental health across academic contexts. Moving beyond individual coping frameworks, these studies advance a structural reorientation of mental health, positioning institutional conditions, rather than individual behaviors, as the primary site of intervention. Consistent with the conference theme, this symposium demonstrates how social work research can identify institutional harm, inform policy, and advance racial equity for the common good.
Methods:
This symposium integrates four studies employing rigorous qualitative and mixed-method designs. Data sources include dyadic and in-depth semi-structured interviews with Black women faculty (n=12), a shared qualitative interview dataset with Black women faculty and administrators (n=22) analyzed across multiple studies, and qualitative narrative responses from a national survey of Black women (n=2,631). Across studies, data were analyzed using thematic analysis with inductive and iterative coding procedures. Analytic frameworks included intersectionality, Black feminist thought, womanism, and the Superwoman Schema. A cross-study analytic strategy was used to identify convergent patterns and strengthen interpretive validity.
Results:
Findings converge to demonstrate that Black women’s mental health is shaped by institutional conditions and perpetuated by inequitable labor expectations. Key themes include: (1) chronic psychological strain, including anxiety, racial battle fatigue, and burnout; (2) institutional extraction, wherein Black women’s emotional, mentoring, and diversity labor is required yet systematically undervalued; (3) othermothering as both a culturally grounded practice and institutional expectation; (4) research participation as a relational and validating intervention; and (5) the mental health consequences of DEI retrenchment, including institutional betrayal, invisibility, and erosion of belonging. Across studies, participants also articulated culturally grounded strategies of resistance, including community care, spirituality, and boundary-setting.
Conclusions and Implications:
Collectively, these studies advance a paradigm shift from resilience to accountability, reframing Black women’s mental health as a function of institutional responsibility rather than individual endurance. Findings underscore the need for trauma-informed organizational policies, equitable workload structures, and sustained institutional accountability. This symposium contributes to social work research by linking lived experience to institutional and policy transformation, advancing more equitable and democratic academic environments.