The Broken Promise of Equal Educational Opportunity: Refugee Youth in American Urban Public Schools

• In Event: 32.083 - Roundtable Session 12
  In Roundtable Session: 32.083-13 - The Many Faces of Educational Aspiration

Abstract

Despite the challenges refugee youth face in their American schools research suggests that they continue to identify education as their ultimate goal. Many refugee youth expressed a desire to make up for lost time, viewing education as a means to improve their financial situation, and as a better way to care for family members. This paper will explore the disjuncture between refugee youth’s pre-migratory educational aspirations, and the everyday realities they faced in their urban schools, which seemed to hollow out the educational opportunities they had hoped to find in America. In particular, I engage with the following questions: “What are refugee youth’s experiences within urban public schools?” and, “How do these experiences act as barriers to their educational aspirations?”

Author

• Sally Wesley Bonet, Colgate University