3.4 How might students' experiences and meanings be contributing to the puzzling situation?

Students have many experiences and develop related meanings that may influence their performance in school. Some of these experiences and meanings can be viewed as occurring or developing primarily in and around school or classrooms; others develop outside school or in relation to larger societal influences.

In most U.S. public schools there is considerable diversity among students. Some of this diversity is related to characteristics of students: social class, race or ethnicity, primary language, gender, religion, sexual preference, or relationship to school culture. These characteristics are often related to cliques or groups among students. The nature of peer groups in a school, the relationships among peer groups, and the relationships between peer groups and adults in a school can have a significant impact on students' school experiences and the meanings that school has for them.

Sometimes diverse student bodies exist in a positive climate that supports all students (e.g., Peshkin, 1991). Other times there is considerable division and stress among different student groups or among students with different characteristics (e.g., Flores-González, 2002). Such tensions can create a poor climate for learning and cooperation (Henze, Katz, Norte, Sather, & Walker, 2002).

Schools have an important role in assuring support for all students. Studying Latino high school students in Chicago, Flores-González (2002) found that students developed identities either as "school kids" or as "street kids" and that these identities had predictable results. School kids finished school; street kids dropped out. She argued that schools affect which identity students develop by providing or denying experiences that are needed to develop the school-kid identity. "[S]chools deprive many students of the social support, prestige, rewards, meaningful relationships, and alternative routes to achievement that they need [to become school kids]" (p. 13).

Within the critical theory tradition, a body of work points to the importance of "social capital," which can be defined as access to networks that facilitate one's ability to secure benefits. Middle class networks are "social freeways that allow people to move about the complex mainstream landscape quickly and efficiently," and "pathways to privilege and power" within mainstream institutions (Stanton-Salazar, 1997, p. 4). Working class and minority youth typically do not have easy access to such networks, and thus do not have easy access to the knowledge, skills, and power needed to succeed in mainstream institutions. For an example of a study that uses the concept of social capital to analyze the experiences of three middle school African American girls in the Washington, DC, metro area, see Nielsen (2003).

In addition to experiences and meanings that occur primarily in and around school, students' experiences and the meanings they encounter or develop outside school can influence the skills, knowledge and meanings that they bring to the school or classroom. Some of the experiences and meanings relate primarily to individuals; others clearly involve peer groups. The first subquestion below focuses attention on influences on individual students; the second focuses attention on students' peer group responses to particular kinds of influences.

3.4.1 How might influences on students from outside school be contributing to the puzzling situation?

3.4.2 How might imbalances in power or economic opportunities, and peer group response to those imbalances, be contributing to the puzzling situation?

Success Stories & CIP Studies Related to Students' Experiences and Meanings from Outside School

Consider next question: 3.4.1
Gather information on this question:  4.4