UTCSW PhD Candidate Kenyette Garrett was recently selected as a recipient of the 2025-2026 Yates Dissertation Fellowship.
The Yates Graduate Fellowship Endowment is a legacy of the generosity of the estate of Arthur E. Yates (1915–1977), former president of Yates Bleachery Company and a dedicated friend of the University of Tennessee. Established in June 2000, it encourages, recognizes, and supports outstanding graduate students. The current use of the endowment from the Yates estate provides awards to be given each academic year to doctoral students completing their dissertations.
This award will provide a total of $10,000 for the 2025–2026 academic year. The recipient must be a UT graduate student in good standing who will have completed admission to candidacy for the doctoral degree and reached the dissertation stage or be admitted to candidacy by fall 2025.
In her dissertation entitled “From Performative Gestures to Transformative Practice: Reimagining Allyship in Orchestral Education Through a Social Work Lens,” Garrett describes how allyship can be used to support meaningful anti-racist and structural practices to create inclusive spaces for Black students in orchestral education. Drawing on critical theories, Bronfenbrenner’s Ecological Systems Theory, and Social Identity Theory, along with social work principles, Garrett reimagines allyship in orchestral music education. Guided by the NASW Code of Ethics and the Grand Challenges of Social Work, this interdisciplinary study offers concrete, actionable practice strategies to elevate superficial gestures into meaningful, anti-racist practices that address systemic inequities. Garrett acknowledges that although white music educators have made efforts to recruit and retain Black students, these initiatives often lack a strong empirical foundation and fail to address the systemic causes of current inequities. As a result, these superficial diversity efforts fall short, leaving Black students underrepresented in orchestral music education.
Garrett’s dissertation includes a scoping review and two qualitative studies. The scoping review examines how allyship is defined and represented in music education literature. It found that while institutional advocacy is frequently discussed, few studies provide concrete strategies for holding institutions accountable for meaningful change. Awareness and reflexivity are less explored, with limited strategies for fostering these practices. Overall, the findings indicate that while discussions on allyship and racial equity are increasing, they often lack a focus on Black student experiences and mechanisms for accountability and self-reflection. Based on the gaps identified in the scoping review, Garrett’s dissertation includes two qualitative studies. The first study, “Is Solidarity Subjective? A Constructivist Grounded Theory Approach to Understanding Perceptions of Racial Allyship,” explores how social identity shapes perceptions and practices of racial allyship within a university setting through semi-structured interviews with faculty, staff, and students.
The second study, “A New Movement: Harnessing Social Work and Allyship to Advance Inclusion in Orchestral Education,” examines how Black orchestral music students experienced allyship among their non-Black music educators during their K-12 music education through in-depth interviews with Black individuals who have experienced the phenomenon. By bridging social work, education, and critical theories, Garrett’s dissertation aims to contribute to the development of long-term practices that foster belonging, increase representation, and affirm the cultural assets of Black students and others who have been marginalized in academic and musical spaces. These studies aim to provide empirical insights into how allyship is understood and experienced by Black students in music education, offering evidence-based recommendations for creating more equitable and inclusive music education spaces.
Garrett has a bachelor’s degree in social work from Methodist University and a master’s degree in social work from the University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill. Garrett’s 14-year career in social work has included working in child welfare and community mental health.