Chinese immigrant families’ educational expectations are usually characterized as one of the most important reasons for Chinese students’ educational attainment and achievement. However, the understanding of the nature and formation of Chinese immigrant families’ educational expectations is limited. It is important to examine Chinese immigrant families’ educational expectations to gain a better understanding of their living and schooling experiences in Canada, in light of the fact that Chinese immigrants are one of the fastest growing ethnic minority group in Canada. This research is a qualitative multiple case study of twelve selected Chinese immigrant families’ educational expectations. The research purposes include: to give detailed description and interpretation of Chinese immigrant families’ educational expectations; to identify and analyze the factors affecting the formation of educational expectations in Chinese immigrant families; and to explore and summarize Chinese parents’ and children’s plans and strategies to fulfill their educational expectations. Semi-structured in-depth interviews was the main method to collect the data including the voices both from Chinese immigrant parents and children. I analyzed the data in three phases: refining and open coding, building categories and themes, and cross-case comparison and analytical generalization. The data were presented in six categories covering Chinese immigrant families’ experiences from the general living experiences of immigration to the detailed schooling experiences in Canada and then to their specific thoughts regarding educational expectations. The findings of this study revealed the complexity and variability in how educational expectations were constructed in Chinese immigrant families’ life course of immigration. There were two levels of meanings included in Chinese immigrant families’ educational expectations: the specific expectations regarding children’s academic achievement and the general expectations regarding what kind of people children should become. Chinese immigrant families’ educational expectations were affected by different factors: Chinese cultural values, acculturation gap, parents’ life experiences and perception of Canadian society, family’s social status, age of immigration, length of residence, immigrant status, gender, personalities, and peer influence. Different factors and different combinations of these factors would influence Chinese immigrant families’ educational expectations in different ways. How Chinese immigrant parents transmitted their educational expectations to their children and actualized the expectations through parenting had an enormous impact on children’s eventual school performance and academic achievement. Chinese immigrant families’ cultural identification and acculturation were the most salient elements to explain how they formed their educational expectations and their practices to fulfill the expectations in Canada. Chinese immigrant families tried transplanting instead of uprooting Chinese culture, and acculturating instead of assimilating into Western culture. Chinese immigrant families chose to lean towards Chinese or Western culture according to specific situations and personal perceptions. Folk theory of Chinese immigrant families’ educational expectations was constructed in Chinese cultural model because the way Chinese immigrant parents and children “see” things and “do” things regarding educational issues in Canada were strongly influenced by Chinese cultural model. Implications for policy makers and educators were presented in the following aspects: improve the connections between parents and schools through multiple conversation channels and partnerships; promote a variety of occupation choices in different ethnic populations; pay more attention to Chinese immigrant students’ psychological health and well-being; and provide instructions that are meaningful and affirming to the cultural identities of students with diverse immigrant backgrounds. Future research directions were suggested concerning what might be done to continue improving the understanding of immigrants’ educational expectations in a wider and deeper sense.

Racial inequalities in the education system are an issue that has yet to be adequately addressed. Given how discriminatory experiences adversely impact African American students, it is important to understand how their educational attitudes are impacted and ways that students can be protected from these harmful experiences. The study aims to answer six research questions: 1) How does racial discrimination predict African American college students’ value placed in education? 2) How does racial discrimination predict African American college students’ expectations for success? 3) How do preparation for bias messages predict the value they place in education? 4) How do preparation for bias messages predict African American college students’ expectations for success? 5) Do preparation for bias messages buffer the effect of racial discrimination on value placed in education? 6) Do preparation for bias messages buffer the effect of racial discrimination on expectations for success?

Prior research supports the relationship between education and status attainment, mobility, and occupational attainment. Today, within an increasingly bifurcated labor market, where education is important for occupational attainment and the associated income and benefits, understanding the processes of status attainment is important. Educational expectations shape educational attainment, while educational attainment influences occupational attainment and satisfaction. Utilizing the National Longitudinal Study of Adolescent Health, this study investigated the moderating effects of expectations on the relationship between education and occupational satisfaction. The results of this study partially support the moderating effects of expectations on the relationship between degree earned and career satisfaction, finding that expectations moderate this relationship for individuals who earned a bachelor's degree.

Doctor of Philosophy / Department of Special Education, Counseling and Student Affairs / Judith K. Hughey / Many efforts have been directed towards providing equitable access to higher education for youth from low-income, first-generation families. Despite gains, attendance and graduation rates from college are consistently lower for these students (U.S. Department of Education National Center for Education Statistics, 2012). A variety of initiatives have been implemented to support students' entry into college, persistence to graduation, and increased access to professional careers. One such program is Talent Search, which provides middle school students opportunities to achieve academic success and to become knowledgeable about college and career options. KU Talent Search offers a summer career camp as part of its programming. The Career Horizons Summer Program (CHSP) exists to help students between 6th and 7th grades explore career possibilities, build potential for success in academics and careers, and become more comfortable in a college environment (Dukstein, 2012b). This study examined beliefs about college and careers in a group of 52 students, as well as the impact of the CHSP on the intervention group. Educational aspirations and expectations, and career and college-going self-efficacy were assessed. It was predicted that participation in the camp would result in an increase in college-going and career self-efficacy. The study also provided additional insight into the construct of college-going self-efficacy. Using a quantitative comparison group design, data were collected from camp participants and from students who were eligible to participate but did not. Pre and posttest surveys assessed educational aspirations and expectations and included scales to measure career self-efficacy (Fouad & Smith, 1997) and college-going self-efficacy (Gibbons & Borders, 2010a). Educational aspirations and expectations were high in all participants and a bivariate correlation analysis revealed that career self-efficacy and college-going self-efficacy were highly correlated. Comparisons between the intervention and the comparison group suggested that the CHSP did have an impact on career and college self-efficacy. It is important to understand the characteristics of a successful college and career access program, and to identify interventions that are most impactful. The findings of this study add to understanding of one such intervention and may have implications for specific practices that can increase potential for college success.

Pathways to becoming a college student are as numbered and varied as college students themselves. For some people, the pathway to college is marked by barriers, such as negative messages received by the student regarding their abilities to attend college and/or the likelihood that they will get to attend college. On one hand, research suggests that children and adolescents internalize these negative messages, which then have the potential to block achievement in higher education. On the other hand, the general body of resilience research suggests that youth can overcome challenges and defy negative influences, as did the participants of the current study. However, little is known about this process of achievement in the face of negative predictions. Consequently, the current study used qualitative grounded theory methodology to explore the experience of defying negative messages received about becoming a college student. In unstructured interviews, fourteen undergraduate students described their experience of receiving negative messages about their abilities to attend college or the likelihood that they would get to attend college, as well as their subsequent experience of becoming college students in the face of these messages. Based on the literature regarding resilience, negative prediction defiance, and the effects of expectations on academic competence, an ecological model of overcoming negative messages was proposed in which micro, meso, and macrosystemic influences were hypothesized to play a role in encouraging or discouraging college attendance. Although participants came from diverse demographic backgrounds and experienced varied types of negative messages, all of their narratives shared major components, which comprise the theory proposed in the current study. These components are sources of negative messages, perceived underlying influences on sources, reasons to defy the message, facilitators of defiance, and barriers to defiance. This theory was compared to existing theories regarding resilience, negative prediction defiance, and the effects of expectations on academic competence. Additionally, research and policy implications are discussed that highlight the importance of providing youth who may be at-risk to receive negative messages with support in their families, schools, and communities.

Turkey experienced conflict-induced internal displacement due to the political and social unrest, in the late 1980s and during the 1990s, in East and South East Anatolia regions. The unplanned and involuntary nature of migration led internally displaced persons (IDPs), and in particular forced many Kurdish migrants&rsquo / children to poverty. Within this framework, this study aims to explore how internally displaced families&rsquo / high school attending children experience poverty in two cities, Izmir and Diyarbakir. In this thesis, it is argued that the motive behind child poverty among internally displaced children is an overlapping process of forced migration and consequences of neo-liberal economic policies in Turkey. Although high school education is not compulsory in Turkey, these displaced students prefer to attend high schools instead of working (or besides working) to contribute household budget despite the fact that they are from poor families. In particular, the research aims to understand internally displaced children&rsquo / s expectations from high school and the barriers to their education. Based on the assumption that education, in today&rsquo / s economic structure, is the only way for displaced children to achieve upward social mobility, the main research question of this study is that whether high school education would enable these children once caught in poverty in Diyarbakir and Izmir to achieve social upward mobility. All in all, but, it is claimed that although these children seem far from improving their lives through attending high school, social and economic inequalities from the beginning of their lives are barrier to their futher educational achievement and developing their human capital, and hence hinders their social upward mobility.

The primary purpose of this study is to assess the extent to which educational expectations contribute to educational attainment for different subgroups of youth using a model of educational attainment that draws from two theoretical frameworks – status attainment theory and the expectancy-value theory of achievement motivation. This combined model of educational attainment posits that certain factors contribute to attainment, including SES, achievement, self-concept of ability, educational values, and educational expectations. A within-subject fixed-effects approach is used in all of the models tested to address issues of endogeneity. Empirical findings suggest that expectations may not influence attainment for African American youth and youth from low-SES families. In the present study, the relations of expectations for attending college to the amount of education attained are investigated for African American and White youth and for youth from high and low SES backgrounds. Although there is no evidence suggesting that expectations contribute to attainment differently for males and females, research suggests that the link between achievement and self-concept of ability may differ by gender. Overall, the data support the hypotheses that: a) educational expectations predict educational attainment for each subgroup assessed; and b) educational values and self-concept of ability are precursors of this relation. However, the association between achievement and self-concept of ability is not statistically different for males and females. The results of this study suggest that expectations are important for attainment irrespective of race, socio-economic status, and gender differences. Because such similarities have not previously been reported in the literature, this study makes a unique contribution and may serve as a guide for future investigation. / text

abstract: Both theoretical and empirical research has recognized the importance of contextual factors for Mexican-origin youths' educational outcomes. The roles of parents, teachers, and peers have been predictive of Mexican-origin youths' academic achievement, educational expectations, and decision to enroll in postsecondary education. However, few studies have examined the interdependence among sociocultural context characteristics in predicting Mexican-origin youths' educational outcomes. In this dissertation, two studies address this limitation by using a person-centered analytical approach. The first study identified profiles of Mexican-origin youth using culturally relevant family characteristics. The second study identified profiles of Mexican-origin youth using culturally relevant school characteristics. The links between profiles and youths' academic achievement, educational expectations, and postsecondary enrollment were examined in both studies. Overall, this dissertation contributes to the growing body of literature that aims to understand risk and protective processes related to Mexican-origin youths' academic achievement, educational expectations, and postsecondary enrollment. / Dissertation/Thesis / Doctoral Dissertation Family and Human Development 2017

STEM identity, a disciplinary identity that reflects an individual's self-understanding in connection with science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM), impacts students ' integration into and retention within STEM fields. This study aimed to develop a STEM identity model, called the BioCheM-ID, to measure STEM identity across biology, chemistry, and mathematics among students enrolled in an introductory-level biology course at a large post-secondary public institution in Texas, United States. The study explored how student-centered factors, such as gender, race, student major, and pre-college informal STEM learning experiences, influence STEM identity. Additionally, the study investigated the relationships between students' educational aspirations, expectations, and STEM identity, and the connections between STEM identity and how undergraduates process, use, and interpret the slope-intercept concept of a simple linear graph (y = mx + b). The BioCheM-ID model comprised five latent factors: biology perceived competence and interest, chemistry perceived competence and interest, mathematics perceived competence and interest, biology and chemistry beliefs, and mathematics beliefs. Students' major and pre-college informal STEM learning experiences, particularly mentoring and tutoring, were significant factors of STEM identity. Positive correlations were observed between educational aspirations, expectations, and STEM identity. Students with high STEM identities demonstrated proficiency in providing productive responses regarding the slope-intercept concept of a simple linear graph, showcasing high graphical literacy.

Το θέμα της εργασίας μας αναφέρεται στο πολιτισμικό κεφάλαιο και στις εκπαιδευτικές προσδοκίες γηγενών μαθητών δημοτικού σχολείου και μαθητών προερχόμενων από οικογένειες μεταναστών. Σκοπός της εργασίας αυτής είναι να διερευνηθούν: α) οι διαφοροποιήσεις και οι ομοιότητες μεταξύ του πολιτισμικού κεφαλαίου των γηγενών μαθητών και των μαθητών προερχόμενων από οικογένειες μεταναστών της ΣΤ’ τάξης δημόσιων δημοτικών σχολείων της περιοχής της Πάτρας, β) κατά πόσο το πολιτισμικό κεφάλαιο των μαθητών αυτών συσχετίζεται με τις προσδοκίες τους για το εκπαιδευτικό τους μέλλον και γ) η συσχέτιση του μορφωτικού επιπέδου και του επαγγέλματος των γονέων των μαθητών (γηγενών και προερχόμενων από οικογένειες μεταναστών) με τις προσδοκίες τους για το εκπαιδευτικό μέλλον των παιδιών τους. Η έρευνά μας, βασισμένη στο θεωρητικό πλαίσιο του Pierre Bourdieu, διεξήχθη με τη χρήση δύο ερευνητικών «εργαλείων»: του ερωτηματολογίου και της ημιδομημένης συνέντευξης. Τα ερευνητικά μας ευρήματα δείχνουν ότι οι διαφοροποιήσεις μεταξύ του πολιτισμικού κεφαλαίου των γηγενών μαθητών και των μαθητών προερχόμενων από οικογένειες μεταναστών είναι περισσότερες σε σχέση με τις ομοιότητες που παρουσιάζουν και εστιάζονται, μεταξύ άλλων, στην ανάγνωση εξωσχολικών βιβλίων και στα πολιτισμικά αγαθά που υπάρχουν στο σπίτι τους. Οι γηγενείς μαθητές φαίνεται να συσσωρεύουν μεγαλύτερο όγκο «εγγενούς» και «αντικειμενοποιημένου» πολιτισμικού κεφαλαίου από την οικογένειά τους σε σύγκριση με τους μαθητές με μεταναστευτικό υπόβαθρο, το οποίο αποτυπώνεται στις επιλογές τους και στις δράσεις τους. Επιπλέον, προκύπτει ότι το πολιτισμικό κεφάλαιο των γηγενών μαθητών και των μαθητών με μεταναστευτικό υπόβαθρο στις περισσότερες εκφάνσεις του συσχετίζεται με τις εκπαιδευτικές τους προσδοκίες. Οι εκπαιδευτικές προσδοκίες των γονέων των μαθητών ανεξαρτήτως της εθνικής τους προέλευσης και του μορφωτικού τους υπόβαθρου φαίνεται ότι είναι πολύ υψηλές. Διαπιστώνεται επίσης ότι το μορφωτικό επίπεδο και το επάγγελμα των γονέων των μαθητών συσχετίζεται με τις προσδοκίες τους για το εκπαιδευτικό μέλλον των παιδιών τους. / The subject of our paper refers to cultural capital and educational expectations of primary school native students as well as students come from immigrant families. This paper aims to investigate: a) differences and similarities between native students and students come from immigrant families who study at the 6th grade of state primary schools in Patras area, b) to what extent their cultural capital is correlated with their expectations concerning their educational future and c) the correlation of educational level and occupation of students’ parents (natives and those come from immigrant families) with their expectations concerning the educational future of their children. Our research, based on the theoretical framework of Pierre Bourdieu, was carried out by means of two research “tools”: questionnaire and semi-structured interview. Our research findings show that there are more differences than similarities between cultural capital of native students and students come from immigrant families and they are focused, among others, on reading extracurricular books and cultural goods which exist into their house. Native students seem to accumulate larger volume of “embodied” and “objectified” cultural capital from their family compared to students with immigrant background, which is imprinted on their choices and their actions. In addition, it is evident that cultural capital of native students and students with immigrant background is correlated in most of its manifestations with their educational expectations. Educational expectations of students’ parents regardless of their national origin and their educational background seem to be very high. It is also revealed that educational level and occupation of students’ parents is correlated with their expectations concerning their children’s educational future.