Thesis advisor: Audrey Friedman / Evidence suggests that college preparation programs successfully support students through college preparation and application process. However, most research into college preparation programs does not attend to students' collegiate experiences once they leave college preparation programs. This dissertation explored the long-term influence of Small College's College Preparation Program (CPP) on students' collegiate academic, cultural, and social experiences, following college preparation program graduation. This research is a multiple-case study that used phenomenologically oriented interviews. The source of participants was students who completed CPP in 2006 and 2007 and who were enrolled in a university. Using purposeful sampling to achieve maximum variation among CPP graduates, I conducted three tape-recorded interviews of seven participants. Interactive interviews followed Seidman's (1998) recommendations for interview content. Positioning theory was used, in conjunction with social and cultural capital, to analyze data throughout data collection. Positioning theory served as a useful lens for examining the first year college experiences of CPP graduates because it allowed the researcher to explore participant experiences with their agency in mind. Much of the literature on university outreach college preparation programs places students at the center of the research. Often, though, within the research, students are positioned as passive recipients of college preparation services. Viewing the college admissions process as a discourse, participants reflexively self-positioned, but they were also engaged in interactive positioning. In either role, participants assumed an active role, rather than the passive role that most research positions assigns to students. This dissertation finds that participants actively self-positioned as they applied both dominant and non-dominant social and cultural capital during their college preparation and after matriculation. The ability to navigate complex and exclusionary contexts speaks to participants' strengths, perseverance, and motivation. Supportive relationships mitigated the impact of stereotype threat, interpersonal and institutional microaggressions. Moreover, participants self-positioned in ways that built on participants' wealth of insights, experiences, relationships, and capital, leading to academic success. / Thesis (PhD) — Boston College, 2011. / Submitted to: Boston College. Lynch School of Education. / Discipline: Teacher Education, Special Education, Curriculum and Instruction.

This research examines socio-cultural change and resilience resulting from holiday tourism and visiting friends and relatives (VFR) travel. The unique cultural attributes of the Pacific region differentiates it from many other generic sea, sand and sun travel destinations worldwide, providing the region with a competitive edge. This research recognises these essential socio-cultural attributes using Samoa as a case study offering various levels of tourist and VFR interactions. The thesis investigated four communities, their culture and the impacts from holiday tourists and VFR travellers. The research methodologies guiding this research offer an innovative and credible mechanism to assess the resilience of the socio-cultural fabric of a Pacific Island nation with growing holiday tourism and a thriving VFR travel sector. A social and cultural capital approach was used to understand communities and their networks in a dynamic and comprehensive way. A combination of participatory action research techniques and critical ethnographic methodologies were used to interact with respondents. Analysis of data used both quantitative and qualitative analysis methods. Results of this research have significantly furthered discussion of the socio-cultural fabric of those communities studied in Samoa and how individual socio-cultural elements are influenced by holiday tourism and VFR travel. Based on the analysis of these holiday tourist and VFR traveller impacts, the results can guide planning and policy oriented benchmarks for improved socio-culturally sustainable tourism.

This research examines socio-cultural change and resilience resulting from holiday tourism and visiting friends and relatives (VFR) travel. The unique cultural attributes of the Pacific region differentiates it from many other generic sea, sand and sun travel destinations worldwide, providing the region with a competitive edge. This research recognises these essential socio-cultural attributes using Samoa as a case study offering various levels of tourist and VFR interactions. The thesis investigated four communities, their culture and the impacts from holiday tourists and VFR travellers. The research methodologies guiding this research offer an innovative and credible mechanism to assess the resilience of the socio-cultural fabric of a Pacific Island nation with growing holiday tourism and a thriving VFR travel sector. A social and cultural capital approach was used to understand communities and their networks in a dynamic and comprehensive way. A combination of participatory action research techniques and critical ethnographic methodologies were used to interact with respondents. Analysis of data used both quantitative and qualitative analysis methods. Results of this research have significantly furthered discussion of the socio-cultural fabric of those communities studied in Samoa and how individual socio-cultural elements are influenced by holiday tourism and VFR travel. Based on the analysis of these holiday tourist and VFR traveller impacts, the results can guide planning and policy oriented benchmarks for improved socio-culturally sustainable tourism.

The purpose of this phenomenological study was to explore the lived experiences of adult first-generation students through their college journey. With a conceptual framework based on student involvement and social and cultural capital theories that contribute to student persistence, retention, and graduation, this study was guided by three research questions: (1) What were the expectations and motivations of adult first-generation students when pursuing postsecondary studies after the age of 25? (2) What were the main challenges experienced by this population during their journey through college? and (3) What strategies did these students use to cope with those challenges? Five first-generation participants who started or resumed their college careers when they were 27, 34, 47, and 50 years old were interviewed in-depth. Results indicated that all participants had to search for their inner strength to pursue higher education studies and required the support of their family and social network to succeed. As a result of their rich lived experiences, these adult first-generation students showed how their strong social and cultural capital enabled them to juggle family and work responsibilities and overcome the challenges of their college experiences.

Despite efforts of U.S. education institutions to encourage study abroad participation, Black and low income students are severely underrepresented compared with their White and higher income peers. Literature reveals that a combination of individual and institutional factors influences study abroad involvement; however, they fail to address how these factors work to limit the participation of interested students. Qualitative interviews were conducted with 21 Black and White students to investigate how they navigate the study abroad process. Cultural and social capital theories were used to understand their experiences. My findings demonstrate that for students that did not study abroad, Blacks compared to Whites encountered more difficulties when trying to activate their available resources to navigate the process. Also, non participating White students were more likely to make the conscious decision not to invest their class privileges to study abroad compared with their Black counterparts. Together, these findings suggest that race and class play a role in the activation and usage of cultural and social resources to study abroad.

The practice of parent-initiated school choice in China is characterized by the involvement of substantial amounts of money, various forms of capital, the explicit government policy of banning the practice in words but accommodating it in deeds. This research investigates the school choice situation in three middle schools in Nanning, China. Drawing on Bourdieu’s theory of the forms of capital and cultural and social reproduction and Brown’s Positional Conflict Theory, this thesis argues that the use of cultural, social and economic capital is widespread in the school choice process. With more capital of various types available, middle class families are at a competitive advantage compared to their working class counterparts in the current struggle to gain a place in a good school. The resources of the former families enable their children to gain more cultural capital through extracurricular enrichment activities, exercise more social capital through existing guanxi1 networks and focus more economic capital with which to pay large sums for choice fees, all of which result in the greater chances of entering a desired school. The change of the school admission policy since the mid-1990s from universal entrance examination for junior middle schools to the present school place assignment by proximity has resulted in an unintentional shift from meritocracy to “parentocracy”2. School choice effectively closes out opportunities for quality education for working class families, because they lack the cultural, social and economic capital that is necessary to “work the system”. As a result, school choice tends to insure the intergenerational transmission of existing social classes and to decrease the possibility of upward mobility for the next generation. 1 A network of contacts which an individual may draw upon to secure resources or advantage in the course of social life (see 4.1.2 for detail). 2 See Brown (1990).

Despite efforts of U.S. education institutions to encourage study abroad participation, Black and low income students are severely underrepresented compared with their White and higher income peers. Literature reveals that a combination of individual and institutional factors influences study abroad involvement; however, they fail to address how these factors work to limit the participation of interested students. Qualitative interviews were conducted with 21 Black and White students to investigate how they navigate the study abroad process. Cultural and social capital theories were used to understand their experiences. My findings demonstrate that for students that did not study abroad, Blacks compared to Whites encountered more difficulties when trying to activate their available resources to navigate the process. Also, non participating White students were more likely to make the conscious decision not to invest their class privileges to study abroad compared with their Black counterparts. Together, these findings suggest that race and class play a role in the activation and usage of cultural and social resources to study abroad.

Soon after the political handover in 1997, Hong Kong Special Administrative Region (HKSAR) government had introduced a series of education and curriculum reforms. Such reforms is said to be proceeded in response to teenagers' lack of national identification towards their motherland China, and also to the public discourse addressing the economic challenges and competition in the universal trend of globalization. Although a few studies had unveiled the underlying values of Confucianism, neo-liberalism and market ideology under these objectives, how the new definitions of "ideal citizens" is understood and promoted in the actual school settings, and how those values influence the process of students' identity construction and their vision on their life trajectories, remains unknown. Drawing on the data from an ethnographic research conducted in 2010, this thesis illustrates how the qualities of an "ideal citizen" propagated in the education and curriculum reform would be understood and transformed in two very different schools in Hong Kong. One is a long-established girls' school located in a middle-class district, which has a reputation of providing "all-rounded" education and nurturing future woman-leaders; the other one is being considered as a "academically-low band" school located in remote area, which struggled to survive and started to admit "Non-Chinese speaking" (NCS) students from Pakistan, Nepal and Philippines three years ago in order to solve the problem of insufficient intake of local students. Apart from the halfyear participant-observation in the two campuses, in-depth interviews of the 2 school principals, 13 teachers, 19 students and 2 alumni of the two schools have also been conducted. Other school documents including official school magazines, school reports as well as students’ publications have also been collected as supporting information. Due to the different historical background, the school management strategy and most of all, the composition of students from very different socio-economic and ethnic backgrounds, the two schools had developed very different ideas and definition of an "ideal citizen", and thus led to different directions of school policies and expectations on students. Through the examples of the provision of the “Other learning Experience” (OLE) and students’ participation patterns in Chapter Five, the different language policies and students’ ability in languages in Chapter Six, and the process of the construction of femininities of young girls in Chapter Seven, this study shows how the problematic of class, gender and ethnics domination still exist under the new context of education reform. This study also reveals that while Hong Kong policy-maker claimed that the education reform ‘bears upon the equity and balance of our society', the socio-economic backgrounds, ethnicity and gender which traditionally being viewed as factors that differentiate education outcomes in sociological studies are completely ignored in the reform.

Previous research has shown that in the last 20 years, there has been discrimination againstindividuals with a foreign background in the Swedish labor market. Statistics illustrate thatpeople with a foreign background have weaker representation than Swedish-born inmanagerial positions. The purpose has been to describe how store managers with a foreignbackground experience their working conditions and professional role in Sweden, to presentstore managers 'perceptions of discrimination in retail and to highlight positive leadershipstories where store managers' foreign backgrounds have been an advantage. Throughsemi-structured interviews, the study sheds light on store managers' experiences of theexistence of discrimination and what it is like to be a manager with a foreign background inSweden. An image emerges that a foreign background often becomes a strength in themanagers' work, where their unique habitus enriches their leadership. At the same time, theSwedish labor market is mediated as formally equal but informally unequal. The storemanagers confirm the previous research in many respects; that discrimination occurs, often inthe recruitment process, due to name selection, that individuals have a linguistic break orthrough informal favoritism that occurs when individuals with a foreign background are notgiven access to network. A perspective of discrimination that has not been discussed inprevious discrimination research has been conveyed; that customers act discriminatorytowards store managers. The results of the study indicate that unequal informal structures insociety and in organizations are expressed when low social and cultural capital throughnetworks and language risks becoming a gatekeeper that hinders career development. Thisstudy has shown that despite laws and regulations on discrimination that have been added inthe last 15 years, inequality is still reproduced in organizations which can be understood asinequality regimes. / Tidigare forskning har visat att det under de senaste 20 åren skett diskriminering av individermed utländsk bakgrund på den svenska arbetsmarknaden. Statistik visar att individer medutländsk bakgrund har svagare representation än svenskfödda i chefspositioner. Syftet harvarit att beskriva hur butikschefer med utländsk bakgrund upplever sina arbetsförhållandenoch sin yrkesroll i Sverige, att framställa butikschefers uppfattning om diskriminering inomdetaljhandeln samt att belysa positiva ledarskapsberättelser där butikschefers utländskabakgrund utgjort en fördel. Med semistrukturerade intervjuer belyser studien butikschefernasupplevelser om förekomsten av diskriminering och hur det är att vara chef med utländskbakgrund i Sverige. Genom informanterna framkommer en bild av att utländsk bakgrundmånga gånger blir en styrka i chefernas ledarskap. Samtidigt beskrivs den svenskaarbetsmarknaden som formellt jämlik men informellt ojämlik. Butikscheferna bekräftar imånga avseenden den tidigare forskningen; att diskriminering sker, ofta irekryteringsprocessen, på grund av namnselektion, att individer har en språklig brytning ellergenom informellt favoriserande som sker när individer med utländsk bakgrund inte fårmöjlighet till nätverkande. En bild av diskriminering som inte diskuterats i den tidigareforskningen har förmedlats; att kunder agerar diskriminerande gentemot butikscheferna.Studiens resultat indikerar att ojämlika informella strukturer i samhället och i organisationerkommer till uttryck då lågt socialt och kulturellt kapital genom nätverk och språk riskerar attbli en portvakt som hindrar karriärutvecklingen. Denna studie visar att trots lagar ochreglering om diskriminering som tillkommit de senaste 15 åren, reproduceras fortfarandeojämlikhet i organisationer vilka kan förstås som ojämlikhetsregimer.

A tecnologia digital cria espaços diferenciados para a informação e coloca a Ciência da Informação frente a novas questões. O objetivo deste estudo exploratório e descritivo é abordar questões sobre o papel dos blogs, a influência da blogosfera na conformação das trocas de informações, relacionando novos formatos culturais e o estatuto do autor na blogosfera, assim como as questões de visibilidade e legitimidade que permeiam as relações mediadas pelas tecnologias de informação e comunicação. Toma-se como ponto de partida o estudo de caso da campanha Usura não!, criada em 2007, que incentivava o uso do link como uma netiqueta para blogs. Buscou-se acompanhar os desdobramentos da campanha e as proposições de seus participantes, formulando questões e elencando referenciais teóricos capazes de explicar tais manifestações e as possibilidades de encontro com os interesses da Ciência da Informação. Estabelece-se uma relação entre as dinâmicas presentes na blogosfera e as teorias de campo e habitus de Pierre Bourdieu, indicando as correlações da campanha na incorporação do habitus para mudar a situação dos agentes dentro do campo da blogosfera de entretenimento brasileira. Estas reflexões remetem a questões como a legitimação e a apropriação da informação por parte dos atores (navegadores/usuários), trazendo subsídios para se refletir acerca dos processos de circulação da informação na internet. / Digital technology creates differentiated spaces for information, and puts the \"Information Science\" in the face of new issues. The aim of this exploratory and descriptive study is to address questions about the role of blogs and the blogosphere\'s influence in the configuration of information exchange, linking new formats and cultural status of the author in the blogosphere, as well as issues of visibility and legitimacy that permeate the relations mediated by information technology and communication. Take as a starting point of this case study the campaign \"Usura não!\", created in 2007, which encouraged the use of the link as a blogging netiquette. We tried to follow the developments of the campaign and the propositions of the participants, asking questions and selecting theoretical references able to explain these events and the possibilities of meeting the interests of the Information Science. Is established a link between dynamics present in blogosphere, and theories of field and habitus of Pierre Bourdieu, indicating the correlation of the campaign in the incorporation of habitus to change the situation of workers in the field of entertainment Brazilian blogosphere. These considerations refer issues such as legitimacy and appropriation of information by the actors (browsers/users), providing subsidies to reflect upon the process of circulating information in the Internet.