Access to Higher Education at the End of Lower Secondary for “Disadvantaged” Students: The Interplay of Structural, Institutional Frameworks and Student Agency

Abstract

Drawing from quantitative and qualitative data collected by the European research project GOETE in eight European countries, the article focuses on the experiences of so-called "disadvantaged students" at the end of lower secondary and analyzes how access to higher education is negotiated in the interaction of structural/institutional frameworks and student agency. After elaborating an intersectional framework on disadvantage, the article showcases that access to higher education is defined by national schooling regulations, but also by educational professionals' discourses and by students' attitudes. Through professional discourses, representations, and normative expectations, students are differentiated and hierarchized according to class, ethnicity, and gender. In the schools investigated, located in deprived areas, students experience these differentiations through stigmatization or discrimination, and build different types of agency in their life contexts.

The Role of Agency in Shaping the Educational Journeys of Care‐experienced Adults: Insights from a Life Course Study of Education and Care

“…Several studies in the education field have considered the role of agency and structure in shaping educational pathways (Danic, ; Schoon and Lyons‐Amos, , ), with some adopting a life course perspective (Schoon and Lyons‐Amos, ; Schoon and Lyons‐Amos, ). Danic () draws on qualitative and quantitative data collected from eight European countries as part of the Governance of Educational Trajectories in Europe (GOETE) research project and considers how ‘disadvantaged’ students negotiate access to higher education within the context of structural — and institutional — frameworks and individual student agency. The author found that access to higher education was ‘defined’ by student attitudes, professionals' discourse and national schooling regulations.…”