Centering Culture in Program Quality: Charting the Associations between Culturally Responsive Practices and Latine Adolescents’ Basic Needs in a U.S. Math After-School Activity

Scholars have increasingly argued that we need to attend to adolescents’ race, ethnicity, and culture in after-school activities to ensure positive effects. Still, little is known about adolescents’ perceptions of culturally responsive practices in after-school activities (i. e., the use of diverse teaching practices, cultural engagement, and affirming diverse language preferences), including whether they are stable over time and beneficial to Latine adolescents, who are minoritized in U.S. society. Theoretically, culturally responsive practices are expected to help after-school activities meet adolescents’ three basic needs as conceptualized by self-determination theory: autonomy, competence, and relatedness. Findings based on 134 Latine adolescents (53% girls, Mage =11.74 years) participating in an afterschool math enrichment activity suggest adolescents’ perceptions of culturally responsive practices in the activity were moderately stable from winter to spring. There were no significant differences in adolescents’ perceptions of culturally responsive practices based on gender or preferred language (i. e., English or Spanish), and significant positive associations emerged between adolescents’ perceptions of diverse teaching practices and their feelings of autonomy, competence, and relatedness. This study offers insights for future theory development in the after-school field, particularly in the context of program quality, culturally responsive practices, and their implications for adolescent development and well-being.