A Critical Reflection on the Use of Theory in Rural College Access Research

• In Event: Making Learning Accessible to Rural Students: Critical Approaches to Access and Pedagogy

Abstract

Despite growing research on the challenges of college access for rural locales, evidence shows that gaps in rural-urban college degree attainment continue to widen - suggesting bold new approaches to studying rural educational inequities are needed. This critical systematic review of rural college access literature from 2000-2020 utilizes Freire’s (2014) Pedagogy of the Oppressed as a conceptual framework to contend that more liberatory approaches to studying rural college access may be necessary to promote rural critical consciousness, or conscientização. The three most commonly-used theoretical models - Bronfenbrenner’s (1979) ecological development theory, Bourdieu’s (1986) symbolic capital, and Lent & Brown’s (1996) social cognitive career theory - are examined as frameworks that could offer more liberatory potential to the field.

Authors

• Andrew Crain, University of Georgia - Athens

• Stephanie Sowl, Iowa State University

• Amy Elizabeth Stich, University of Georgia