Justice for All? Creating an Urban Elite Cohort in a Working-Class Latino School

• In Event: 70.049 - Race and Equity Issues in Schools

Abstract

Using critical race theory as a framework, I construct an autoethnography weaving narrative alongside theory to highlight informal schooling practices in my working-class Los Angeles Latino neighborhood that contribute to the formation of a group I call, ‘The Urban Elite Cohort’ (UEC). The focus on the UEC serves a two-fold purpose: 1) to demonstrate, and help interrupt, the ways in which schools are implicated in producing advantageous habitus for hand-picked students while gatekeeping undesirable students out of academic success and; 2) to understand how the formation of particular Latino student identities merge within a broader sociopolitical context that serve to protect hegemonic interests.

Author

• Minerva S. Chavez, California State University - Fullerton