Beyond cultural capital: Understanding the strengths of new migrants within higher education

Abstract

This paper explores the experiences of new migrants in Australian higher education, based on interviews conducted across two regional university campuses in 2017. New migrants, particularly from refugee backgrounds, often have limited university access and face specific challenges throughout and beyond their university experiences. Under-representation has led to a focus on what new migrants lack, in particular their putative paucity of cultural capital required to navigate and succeed in higher education. It is institutions, however, which frequently lack the willingness or capacity to recognise various strengths and forms of capital possessed by ethnically diverse students. Adopting a critical race theory lens enables identification of those forms of student capital, along with the barriers that may prevent capital from being widely recognised within the academy and/or being fully realised for students in their navigation of work, study, and life. Specifically, this article examines the value of resistant, familial and linguistic capital. New migrant students face specific challenges when their cultural strengths meet institutional and broader structural barriers. It is critical for institutions that the diverse and complex perspectives of under-represented students be harnessed to increase the quality of learning for all students. Compositional diversity on campus is necessary but insufficient to promote deep learning and a positive student experience.

University Applicants from Refugee Backgrounds and the Intention to Drop Out from Pre‐Study Programs: A Mixed‐Methods Study

“…Studies of the situation of refugee students have often constituted them as a student group of their own by pointing out their specific needs (Lambrechts, 2020). Our results indicate that a deficit perspective on refugees is inappropriate since they bring a specific range of needs and resources (Harvey & Mallman, 2019;Ramsay & Baker, 2019;Shapiro, 2018), whereby resources tend to be overlooked compared to other international students. Considering not only refugees' needs and resources concerning successful study preparation, but also suitable conditions for implementing inclusive concepts and responsive support at the HEI level, a sustainable discourse between the relevant actors is urgently needed.…”

Bridging the Gap Between Secondary and Tertiary Education for Students with Refugee Backgrounds with Bourdieu

“…The results also reveal less recognisable forms of capital that were discussed by Harvey and Mallman (2019). Throughout their time in Malaysia each student has taken purposeful steps to access higher education and reached out through the UNHCR and various higher education institutions to explore options.…”

“…The way in which capital is used by theorists has also been viewed as problematic. Harvey and Mallman (2019) note that dominant notions of cultural and social capital often assume a deficit view of marginalised groups by positioning their forms of capital as subordinate. With reference to students of colour, for example, Yosso identifies several additional forms of capital that are under-represented in research but are important to this group, namely resistant, aspirational, social, navigational, linguistic, and familial (2005, pp.…”

The ethical academy? The university as an ethical system

“…The academe and universities as institutions are not ethically neutral, and they have over the centuries of their existence, and even more recently, provided us with a number of both overt and covert institutional biases. Harvey and Mallman (2019) research explores how new teachers who migrated into Australia experience higher education. They examined the value of resistant, familial and linguistic capital, as new migrant students faced challenges, particularly when their cultural strengths are met with the universities and their apparatus of structural barriers.…”