UC San Diego

Aspirations predict students’ trajectories, and knowledge of how youth develop and achieve goals is crucial to supporting success. However, rural students may encounter constraining conditions that can curtail their aspirations, and students of color often face institutional barriers that impact their postsecondary pathways. Guided by theories focused on ecosystems (Bronfenbrenner, 1979), habitus (Bourdieu, 1990), community cultural wealth (Yosso, 2005), and ethical frameworks for studying aspirations (Zipin et al., 2015), as well as novel methods centered on transformation, this study foregrounds students’ identities in understanding their future orientations. Through empowering qualitative case study methods, data were collected over one school year via 50 in-depth interviews with five high school seniors who self-identified as Mexican, low-income, and first-generation college-going students. All participants completed a college preparatory program at a large comprehensive public high school, located in a remote, agricultural, border community in Southern California. This study utilized a motivational interviewing approach, which cultivated dialogue spaces for students to make sense of how salient experiences in their lives affected their future orientations. In analyzing the data, explanation building was used for within-case analysis of interviews conducted with each student, and cross-case analysis explored patterns spanning individual perspectives. Findings reveal how youths’ aspirational beliefs and choices were mediated by academic and personal experiences in their school and community, which included mental health, relationships, college preparatory activities, and growth opportunities during the COVID-19 pandemic. Although their college pathways deviated from those encouraged by adults, as only one of the five students chose to attend a four-year university immediately after high school, students remained committed to their visions for holistic, multidimensional futures. In constructing academic, personal, and social scaffolds to support their success, students made intentional choices about their journeys towards crafting their future lives. Findings also show how student-centered interviews fostered reflective and imaginative spaces for participants to explore possible life pathways. This study expands existing theory on aspirations and has important implications for scholars and practitioners striving to support students’ postsecondary trajectories.