Envisioning Equitable Futures and Resisting Legal Violence: Immigrant Youth and Postsecondary Possibilities

• In Event: AERA Roundtable Session Saturday 11:45 am - Gold 3
  In Roundtable Session: Living Liminality: Navigating Belonging, Resistance, and Care in Immigrant Educational Journeys

Abstract

Designed as a phenomenological study, this qualitative study focuses on the postsecondary experiences of former newcomer youth who had arrived as adolescents and participated in the K-12 schooling system as high school students. Interviews with 10 former newcomer youth sheds light on the material consequences of legal violence and how immigration policies continue to shape their educational trajectories. For some youth, their ability to finance their college education is impacted by their financial and familial responsibilities. Moreover, at a time when the Trump 2.0 administration is moving quickly to redefine who is “illegal”, newcomer youth are susceptible to being deportable. It behooves educational scholars and practitioners to recognize how immigration policies are shaping the everyday lives of immigrant youth.

Author

• Sophia L. Angeles, Pennsylvania State University