The role of institutional, family and peer-based discourses and practices in the construction of students' socio-academic trajectories

Abstract

In this article, we discuss findings from multi-level ethnography conducted in a secondary school located in Madrid (Spain). The study focuses on the variety of institutional, family and peer-based factors that contribute to the construction of students' socio-academic trajectories. In particular, we attempt to understand the role these social fields play in the construction of educational careers that are comparatively less successful in the case of immigrant students. Our findings suggest that these ‘objective outcomes’ are immersed in a web of discourses, practices and representations held by educators, parents and students about the future, the role of schooling in adolescents socio-educational paths and the interconnections between each social field (school, parents and peers) that show significant contradictions and discontinuities. In our analysis, we uncover some of these tensions and examine the role they play in the configuration of adolescent's educational subjectivities.