Family You Can Come Home To: How Bonding Social Capital Works to Facilitate the Development of Bridging Social Capital

• In Event: Social Capital Theory and Research

Abstract

Many programs that place low-income students of color in high-achieving college preparatory high schools seek to nurture bridging social capital, connections across class lines to those who can provide assistance in the process of “getting ahead.” Bonding social capital, which focuses more on emotional support and “getting by,” is frequently characterized as less useful. Drawing upon 37 interviews with alumni from one such program we find that bonding social capital was fostered among peers, which assisted students as they navigated their elite college preparatory high schools in the face of racism and classism. We argue that this bonding social capital facilitated the development of bridging social capital by encouraging student retention and persistence in sometimes unfriendly elite high school environments.

Authors

• Megan Holland Iantosca, University at Buffalo - SUNY

• Shelley Kimelberg, University at Buffalo - SUNY

• Danielle V. Lewis, University at Buffalo - SUNY

• Ryan Taughrin, University at Buffalo - SUNY