Nine of the Pell research participants fit the profile of working class students and a habitus that would not be construed as predisposing them to consider study abroad as a normal part of the college experience. These biographical summaries attempt to capture what the students decided to share about their lives, identities, and exposure to the idea of study abroad. As all participants self-selected into the study, it became evident that the WC population interviewed was represented by highly motivated and intelligent individuals who were very apt at articulating stories and had a desire to share them for the benefit of others with similar backgrounds. Despite the challenges many faced, it was not surprising to discover such a high achieving group. This can be linked to the idea put forth by Bourdieu in regards to social class background and school performance. His research suggested that a strong correlation between social class background and academic performance at the lower levels of schooling may diminish at higher levels in the educational system because the lower-class students that tend to persist represent a highly select subgroup (Bourdieu & Passeron, 1977) – even though they “bear the mark of their initial cultural disadvantage” because of their background (Swartz, 1997, p. 201).
Mariana
Mariana was an in-state Accounting major who spent a semester abroad in Spain during her junior year and was preparing to graduate during the time of her interview with a position at a major multinational professional services firm already in place following her graduation. Academically focused and highly involved in campus
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activities and organizations, she wanted to be sure she took of advantage of the opportunities the university provided, noting that she was “very, very excited to – just like crack the bones and suck it for all it was worth” and excitedly announcing “I
wanted to be sure I did everything.” Relating her personal history, she described herself as “100% lucky” and considering the personal challenges she faced, commented that “You wouldn’t think a story like this would ever make it abroad.”
Identifying herself as Hispanic, Colombian, Colombian-American, Mariana was, like her only sibling, a high achieving first generation college student and U.S. citizen. Neither of her parents completed postsecondary education and were living in the U.S. as undocumented immigrants prior to the birth of their children, after overstaying their visas in an attempt to pursue the greater opportunity they perceived America could provide. Eventually her mother gained citizenship, but the plight of her father led to a “tough family situation.” She shared that from the time she was in preschool until well into high school her father was incarcerated. Upon his release, he was deported back to his country of origin. She added that only a very few close friends are aware of this aspect of her life and that she shortens the story by saying he was deported when she was three: “(I)t’s not to say I’m ashamed of it, it’s just something I don’t share because I think people are judgmental.” She explains that her parents were vulnerable as
undocumented immigrants who could not speak the language, defend themselves, or afford an attorney to fight her father’s charges because they worked minimum wage jobs. Furthermore, she expounded, until this day she would probably say her father is innocent of the charges that sent him to prison. Regardless of his culpability, the details recounted seem to indicate that he was on the harsh, losing end of the “tough on crime”
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policies of the time. Having a fuller understanding of the situation that comes with age and education, Mariana believes that: “If we had $15,000 for a lawyer, my dad probably would have been in jail for one year.” Instead, the years that followed were
significantly different:
We lived in [this state] because that’s where the rent was the cheapest and he was in federal prison in [the neighboring state] so my childhood was two times a month we would go on Saturdays like, um, yeah, so we had family in Queens so we would leave school on Fridays and my mom would get out of work like five and then we would go get the oil changed and then she would drive always to Queens and then wake up at 3 o’clock in the morning on a Saturday morning to drive to a federal prison and to stay there the whole day. It was really cool cause…I guess it wasn’t that cool. They actually… when I was little they told me he was in college. I was like why isn’t he coming home with us? It wasn’t until I was like, I found out when I was like 7 or 8. (My brother) like, knew because he like, read “federal prison” once (on the sign) and (he) put two and two together. I was never like, that fast, so, so yeah my mom decided to stay with him and he would call every single night at 8 o’clock at night. Like, if I wanted to go over a friend’s house at night I would have to wait for dad to call. I’d have to wait for dad to call and then ask him like, “Can I sleep over,” Can I…My mom always made sure he was part of our lives like, she always made sure that he, um, had a say like, so I grew up respecting my father as if he like, had raised me because you know he did raise me and he was present. I mean it was a phone call every night.
Mariana explained that her mother has “street smarts” and described her as the “strongest and greatest person” she knows who “completely dedicated her life to her two children.” Essentially proceeding as a single parent, she worked low wage manufacturing jobs to support the family, refusing food stamps and public housing assistance, which she “did not want any part of” because of “dignity and pride.” Living in the inner city, the three of them shared a small two-bedroom apartment that she and her mother dreamed of leaving. She described it as not as nice as her university dorm and that many of the students, primarily “out of stater’s” who live in off-campus
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apartments during the academic year, pay more for their temporary college accommodation than they do for the apartment they have called home:
…they pay $600, $700 dollars a month and I don’t even pay that at home, and they live in these beautiful houses. And, I like, so [it’s] almost surreal to me to be surrounded by these types of people. I didn’t think I understood that we were lower middle class because I consider ourselves like lower middle class or higher lower class, if that makes sense. And that never really hit me until I came to college and got to see like, the comparison.
In regards to previous education Mariana explained that unfortunately she did not receive the “utmost high school education” as the institution she attended has a reputation of being an underperforming school with a high dropout rate. At State University (SU) she felt that she had a huge disadvantage because she did not obtain the education that the person right next to her in her classes did. She added that she did not want that for her future children and she wanted “to be in a good school district to make sure that they’re getting top notch.” Speaking only Spanish at home, and not learning English until Kindergarten, a combination of school enrichment programs targeting “disadvantaged” students with academic promise, and high parental expectations guided her to a path of academic success. Her father always demanded good grades and her mother always reiterated that she and her sibling were “destined for greatness.” Commenting on her mother’s mantra, she explains that she heard it so much that she began to believe it. Asked whether her mother’s parenting approach made a difference she stated:
Oh yeah, 100%. I think cause I have friends who also like, their parents are almost the same situation as me, Spanish families. Same culture like, I want to say generally. Latino culture is very similar um, and their parents adored their children but worked all the time, didn’t have many convers[ations]. Their idea of raising a family was to make sure they’re providing for them, that the kids have food on the table, and you know, that, so that meant working 24/7. My mom also worked very hard but it was, she was very um, conscious of the fact that she
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needed to talk to us and that she wasn’t our friend; she was our mother. And there were strict rules for things we had, the values that were instilled. She was just very good in knowing how to raise us where she knew yeah she had to provide and put food on the table but she needed to talk to us and the way to raise us was to talk to us and to be strict; be a mother. Where I don’t think all my friends got that um, I think, yeah absolutely 100%. The way my mother raised us was what has helped to shape me to be as successful as I’ve been, you know, so far.
Her older brother, who she referred to as being “very smart,” also served as a role model for success. Whereas he was identified for his abilities and was enrolled in honors and advanced placement classes, Mariana would need to ask to be enrolled in the same, so she could be like him. Due to his ability he eventually was admitted to a local Ivy League school. She admitted that she “didn’t really understand what ‘ivy’ meant” because she did not understand that one institution was more prestigious than another.
When applying to college she limited her choices to colleges that were geographically close, so she could be close to her mother. She received an offer of admission to her first choice, a private college renowned for its business programs, but declined due to the lack of financial resources. At the same time she was admitted to the College Success Program (CSP) at SU which, provides individuals from
“disadvantaged backgrounds” with student services and scholarship funding aimed at supporting degree completion. Given her personal situation, this opportunity was the most practical and too good to pass up.
Academically successful at SU, Mariana also become very involved in multiple clubs and organizations and took on many leadership positions: she worked as a
Resident Assistant, and she interned each summer for the company that has offered her employment upon graduation. In addition to her family, she also credits her advisor
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and mentor, Professor Surrey who took notice of her motivation and potential and served as her mentor to keep her “on track” by continuously providing guidance and also setting high expectations throughout her four years.
Growing up Mariana had been involved with some domestic travel and made occasional trips to Colombia to spend portions of summer with family, as her mother did not want her children to lose their Spanish or cultural heritage – an identity Mariana rejected with shame as a teen, but now embraces with pride. These visits were viewed as important time with family and not vacations, in the traditional sense, for leisure. Adding that she thought people automatically associate travel with money, for them it signaled setting priorities when resources were limited – time with loved ones versus a larger apartment or more costly automobile. She learned of study abroad in high school from friends who participated in programs for secondary education students and from a family friend who had studied abroad. However, she knew at that time (high school) that her family simply did not have the means to send her to China or London. Elaborating further, she acknowledged that: “[Study abroad] had been on my radar since I was in high school and me and my mom talked about it, and I was like, I have to, I have to do it.”
Alyssa
Alyssa was an in-state student who transplanted from the southern region of the country, where she lived her entire life, until approximately five years prior when she was in her late twenties. An Anthropology major and International Development minor, during her junior year she studied abroad on two short-term programs (Belize; Quebec, Canada) and followed with a semester-long program in India during her senior year. At
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the time of the interview she was finishing the first year of her graduate program at SU and had just completed an intersession program in Mexico. A first generation student who had always been a commuter, she had started her postsecondary education in the community college system in her state of origin. Having settled in her “new” state, she attended SU because it always “bugged” her that she did not earn her degree.
Alyssa’s mother had always worked in retail and her father was a machinist. She explained that she grew up in a mobile home, and despite the fact that the family was not in poverty, her parents never had money. Other than occasional visits to family out of state, she did not travel much but did interact and develop friendships with individuals from around the globe while being employed as a tech support
representative for a company with customers worldwide. When her parents divorced, she moved with her mother into a “nice house” with her stepfather who she described as middle class and an individual who “just made us more worldly” as he had grown up in a major U.S. city, was a first generation citizen, and had traveled.
Alyssa explained that she went to high school in a good school district adding, “those people [in the district] had money” and that it was not uncommon for peer students to receive brand new Camaros and Mustangs as their first car when they turned 16. Noting that she was not as good a student as she could have been because she spent more time with friends and working (“Four months after I turned 16 I got a car and I went to work”), she was in Honors and Advanced Placement classes until she decided to graduate a year early since she had fulfilled her academic requirements and “did not fit” in the high school environment:
Like I had friends that were in Honors classes with me, but predominantly it was the people that, you know, like, you just knew they were better off. And I think
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that maybe—and I have prejudice against it – but it’s like, “If I want to go somewhere, I have to go to work.” Whereas, like, some of them didn’t. Like they were handed things. And it makes it easier to do a lot of things when you, you don’t have these other things going on. Or you have your parents way more involved in the, “You’re going to do this.” Like, “You’re going to play football” or, “You’re going to do well,” or “You’re going to be in Honors.” And it’s like, my parents were there, but they let us kind of do what we wanted to do. Like, they were, they didn’t push us to be in in Honors classes like, we were in Honors classes because we chose to be. Like, even though I went to a, I went to a good school, and I was in, I was in advanced classes, nobody really talked to me about like, “You go to college after high school.” I don’t know how I made it through high school without like really having a counselor. Like, I went, I remember sitting in my counselor’s office and being like, “I want to graduate early.” And they’re like “OK, this is what you do.”
Finishing high school a year early, Alyssa took a semester off before starting at a local community college:
It was one of those things like, the rich kids like, they fill out the college applications and they go to the big universities and like, I’m going to go to community college because that’s what I’ll be able to afford. And like, that’s just the thing that made sense to me. It, it was my worldview.
Although Alyssa completed a few semesters at community college and a semester at one of the state universities, her progress toward a degree ended as work commitments increasingly took precedence. Eventually, after working several years, she decided to move to a new region of the country because she just wanted to go
somewhere new:
I was really tired of [that state] like, I always just kind of never felt like I fit there. It’s like, I was always there, but I never really felt like it was, it kept pace with the way I wanted to live my life…When I was younger and…had
girlfriends…and in [that part of the country] having a girlfriend is – yeah – like, you get stared down in, just in public, it’s like, “Oh” whereas, like, even just in [the northeast] like, that’s, it’s just part of like, “Oh, whatever.”
Knowing she could work for the same company and that the new metropolitan area had an extreme sports team – her hobby – similar to the one in her home state, she knew she
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would have an income and potential social network to make new friends, so she made the move.
Returning to college as a “more mature student,” Alyssa devoted a lot of time and energy to her studies and the learning experience versus just trying to get a degree and moving on. She was now more concerned with figuring out what she wanted to do with her life and gave precedence to being happy with what she was doing. Comparing herself to the much younger students in her classes she added that she noticed a big difference in academic commitment because she was here because “I want to be in college” and “not because somebody told you to be here.” Always having an interest in other cultures and reading about them, her level of maturity and sense of purpose at this stage of her life changed study abroad from something she had never considered to a possibility. The new social networks exposed her to friends who had traveled, including another “older” student who served as a critical role model. She explained these influences and how they would precipitate participation in her first program:
…the biggest one would probably be Lisa like, as far as getting me here because she was an older student already here and she had already started dealing with [the study abroad] office. And jumping through like, “How do I get the
department to give me money to do this?” And “What if I want to do that?” Like, figure, she had already started figuring it out and she was, she was a year ahead of me in the like, in the game…[She] was really the first person that I had talked to about like, “Oh, I could actually like go study and do this.”...I never