Introduction to the special issue on critical approaches to using ecological models in higher education research

The field of higher education studies draws from a number of disciplines and theories (Renn, 2020). Among these theories, ecological models form an identifiable group of approaches to understanding student experiences in the postsecondary environment (Renn & Arnold, 2003; Strange & Banning 2001, 2015). Their emphasis on understanding persons and processes in layered contexts offers a holistic perspective for understanding a host of individual and system-level factors. While mainly used for studies of students, ecological approaches also inform some studies of postsecondary organizations and policy (e.g., Eaton et al., 2019; Leonard, 2011; Venegas, 2006; Weerts, 2021). Yet for all of their possibilities, most uses of these models have failed to incorporate essential aspects of the social context, specifically power systems including racism, sexism, homophobia, and transphobia (see Cabrera et al., 2016). To address these significant shortcomings, in this NDHE issue authors specifically address gaps related to social context and interrogate various power systems we continue to see in the field of higher education today. While acknowledging the limitations of ecological models, and especially the widely-used Bronfenbrenner (1977, 1979, 1993, 1995) ecological approach, we also see their value in studies of higher education and social systems more broadly. Indeed, colleagues in other fields have for some time been discussing the role of culture, systems of power, and systemic oppression and introducing variations that account for them (e.g., Rogoff, 2003; Vélez-Agosto et al., 2017). We believe ultimately that the value of an ecological lens is worth retaining while higher education scholars address the limitations of the original iterations. To this end, in this New Directions in Higher Education (NDHE) issue we feature elaborations of ecology theory that include critical models that address the seemingly “value-neutral” nature of existing scholarship that inherently privileges whiteness, masculinity, and cisheteronormativity. The foundation of this issue is the need to account for systems of power and oppression that are invisible in most current iterations of ecological systems models based on Bronfenbrenner's model and used in higher education research. The concept for this issue began as a rejected conference paper proposal. That proposal and reviewers’ thoughtful feedback led a year later to a proposal for a symposium at the annual meeting of AERA (American Educational Research Association), bringing together scholars working with ecological models to study different student populations and to extend, expand, revise, reject, and modify existing understandings of the Bronfenbrenner model. This issue includes articles by presenters in that symposium, joined by several other authors representing additional approaches to engaging with, extending, and using critical ecological models. Kristen Renn and Brandon Smith open the issue in the first article with an overview of ecological approaches to studying higher education, emphasizing the Bronfenbrenner model that is the primary one used in higher education studies. They summarize critiques of ecology models, then provide examples of contemporary uses of the model and new, critical iterations of it. They also offer examples of theoretical innovations that demonstrate how ecological models can incorporate systems of power, privilege, and oppression. In the second article Chelsea Noble presents the Critical Campus Ecology Model (CCEM), which she developed to study LGBTQ+ students and their experiences on campus. Noble offers a robust critique of the invisibility of systemic power structures in the original model. The CCEM framework illustrates how oppressive systems permeate macro-, exo-, meso-, and microsystems in relation to the person at the center of the ecology. The third article is Paul Garton, Adam Grimm, and Sehee Kim's elaboration of the Spanning Systems Model they introduced in 2021 (Garton et al., 2021). They designed the Spanning Systems Model to illustrate how international students in US contexts experience dual ecological systems, one foot in each. Garton, Grimm, and Kim describe the two ecologies as interconnected and interdependent, a theoretical advance that allows for multiple systems of power to interact at every level of the ecology. In article four, L. Michelle Vital and Christina Yao continue the theme of internationalization of higher education, focusing on an equity-driven approach to doctoral research training. Drawing from a previous iteration of an ecological model that concentrated mainly on the individual (Vital & Yao, 2018), they offer here a model that attends to the context. They use an ecological lens to point out systemic inequities in doctoral research training and recommend equity-driven solutions. Ronald Hallett, Adrianna Kezar, Joseph Kitchen, Rosemary Perez, and Robert Reason combine ecological systems theory and Rendón's (1994, 2002) validation theory into the new concept of ecological validation in article five. They derived the ecological validation concept from the longitudinal, multi-method Promoting At-promise Student Success (PASS) Project (https://pass.pullias.usc.edu.). Ecological validation calls for institutional response and transformation in the direction of equity for low-income, racially minoritized, and/or first-generation college students. In the sixth article, Kayla Johnson and Joseph Levitan offer a new way of thinking about ecological models in their oppositionally-intertwined, multi-theory approach. They build from their study of Peruvian urban college students from rural communities (Johnson & Levitan, 2022) to illustrate how the use of multiple theories within a single ecological model addresses the limitations of using a single-model approach (Levitan, 2018). They introduce decolonial theory and indigenous knowledge systems to complicate and enrich ecological systems thinking. Finally, in article seven, Avery Olson, C. Casey Ozaki, and Marc Johnston-Guerrero describe and apply the Phenomenological Variant of Ecological Systems Theory (PVEST; Spencer, 2021; Spencer et al., 1997). PVEST is well suited to studying the complex interactions between minoritized individuals and their environments in ways that capture systems of oppression in the context but also the agency of individuals making their way in that context. Olson, Ozaki, and Johnston-Guerrero offer the example of the postsecondary classroom to illustrate the value of PVEST as a theoretical perspective in higher education studies. In all, the seven articles provide innovative ways to work with an ecological framework, transforming a familiar model in the direction of anti-racist, decolonial, queer, global, and otherwise more inclusive perspectives. They offer examples of explicitly critical ecological models and of applying ecological thinking to situations requiring explicit inclusion of critical theory. We believe they demonstrate the value of retaining ecological thinking in higher education studies and the importance of transforming ecological models if they are to remain useful in the field. Article authors rely on different iterations of Bronfenbrenner's theory, which evolved from 1977 to 2005, the year of his death (see Bronfenbrenner, 1977, 1979, 1993, 1995, 2005). Readers should know in advance that they will encounter slight variations in definitions and interpretations of the model. We view such variation as evidence that higher education scholars make choices in their use of theory, perhaps especially when putting it to innovative use or transforming it. After we began working on this NDHE issue and after the AERA symposium we experienced a disruption that deepened our commitment to this necessary transformation: One of the editors came across a citation to a Bronfenbrenner (1967) publication none of us had previously encountered. The article was based on a speech Bronfenbrenner gave at the Conference on Psychological Factors in Poverty (Madison, Wisconsin, June 1967) and published in Child Development, the flagship publication of the Society for Research in Child Development. It is not an exposition of Bronfenbrenner's ecological model, nor does it mention his model at all; it is not an article one is likely to find in a search for ecological systems theory in human development or education research. In it Bronfenbrenner argued that racial integration of schools carries a substantial risk to white youth by exposing them to Black peers ill-prepared to benefit from educational opportunities. In this speech and the publication from it, Bronfenbrenner's vocabulary and logic are rooted in anti-Black racism that is absent from his writings about the ecological model with which many NDHE readers may be familiar. With this backdrop in mind, it is easy to see how his seemingly race-less ecological model masks racism and other systems of power, privilege, and oppression, just as Cabrera et al. (2016) argued. As scholars who have dedicated a substantial amount of time to thinking through and with Bronfenbrenner's model, we find ourselves at a moment of reckoning: Does the anti-Black racism Bronfenbrenner (1967) so clearly articulated in his published talk negate the value of an ecological systems approach to understanding higher education? Does Bronfenbrenner's own evolution of his ecological model address the liabilities of using it? Can essential concepts from such a model be transformed through critical race, queer, and decolonial theories? As this issue goes to press, we do not have answers to these questions. We are, however, more certain than ever that the study of higher education benefits from innovations in and to theory. The examples offered in this NDHE issue provide a potential way forward in transforming ecological thinking for the study of higher education. Kristen A. Renn, PhD, is professor of Higher, Adult, and Lifelong Education at Michigan State University. Her research takes an ecological approach to understanding college student learning, development, and success. She is widely published on the topics of LGBTQIA2S+ college students, mixed race students, and women's colleges and universities worldwide. Brandon R. G. Smith is a doctoral candidate in Higher, Adult, and Lifelong Education program at Michigan State University, and holds an MEd in higher education from The University of Toronto–OISE. Brandon's research focuses on factors affecting student success, and issues facing administrators working in universities and colleges in Canada and the United States. Chelsea E. Noble, PhD, is a scholar-practitioner committed to creating more equitable and just higher education institutions. Based at Michigan State University, she currently serves as a Fellow for the University Innovation Alliance, leading the Listening Lab for Higher Education Transformation initiative.

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