Policy efforts to enhance postsecondary access and completion often emphasize the construct of college readiness (CR). While most research has focused on defining and measuring CR, less has examined the perspectives of first generation students and the urban high school contexts in which many prepare for college. This study utilizes data from an ethnography of college preparation in a low-performing urban high school. Drawing on sensemaking theory, I explore how high-achieving college-bound seniors make sense of CR and what factors shape their sensemaking. Findings offer insight into how CR discourses manifest at the local level to shape opportunity for urban youth.

The construct of time influences student learning in and out of school and consequently pervades educational discourse. Yet the integration of information and communication technologies into contemporary society is changing how people perceive and experience time. Traditional theoretical and methodological approaches to time research no longer capture the nuances of digital, temporal realities. This article offers a theoretical analysis of three temporal perspectives: (a) clock time, measured in objective, linear units; (b) socially constructed time, experienced subjectively according to social and cultural context; and (c) virtual time, a new category that synthesizes emergent temporal theory in the digital age. Implications for educational research and practice are discussed. The authors initiate discourse around new theoretical approaches to educational time research in an era characterized by great sociocultural and temporal transformations.

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As workforce participation increasingly requires a college degree, ensuring that more students from traditionally underrepresented populations have the opportunity to enter and complete college is an equity imperative. To that end, high school reforms have promoted “college-going cultures” in low-performing high schools through interventions such as rigorous course offerings and college counseling. College access research has focused on issues specific to academics and college-going processes. Yet this research has tended to ignore broader school climate factors such as school safety and extracurricular programming, which may play a critical role in postsecondary opportunity, especially for historically underserved students. The current study applies hierarchical generalized linear modeling to the Educational Longitudinal Study of 2002 to 2006 to examine the role of college-going culture and high school climate characteristics on college enrollment and persistence. We find that while some components of college-going culture are associated with the likelihood of college enrollment and persistence, that relationship is moderated by school climate factors. We conclude that efforts to implement a college-going culture may struggle if extracurricular opportunities, school safety, and overall school climate issues are ignored.