Although improvements have been made in terms of enhancing the number of students that enrol in higher education, the long-term educational pathways of adolescents to university studies are understudied. This calls for further research into the mechanisms that underpin the long-term educational pathways of adolescents who study at university…

We study the relationship between locus of control and both educational attainment and college aspirations in adolescence, focusing on the potential channels through which locus of control may influence these outcomes. Even after controlling for a comprehensive set of socio-demographic factors and cognitive skills, there remains a strong…

Using a mixed-methods approach, this study examines the college expectations of high school students in Hanoi, Vietnam. Findings from a survey of approximately 4,000 students and interviews with 76 students, teachers, and school leaders revealed that the majority of students planned to apply to college. However, rural students had significantly…

The current study suggested and tested a model to investigate the associations between adolescent future expectations of work and education (AFE-WE; adaptive responses) and positive future expectations (PFE; adaptivity) through concern, control, curiosity, and confidence (adaptability resources) as well as the role of the gender. The data were…

This study focuses on the disparities between the educational aspirations and expectations of high school students in the U.S., and explores why students do not expect to earn a bachelor's degree despite their aspirations. Using a national dataset and logistic/multinomial logistic regression analyses, the study identified the factors associated…

Internationally, recent population movements due to conflict, climate change and global inequality have resulted in increased cultural and linguistic diversity in many societies. As a result, education systems are increasingly grappling with how to adapt practice to provide educational access and opportunities with increasingly diverse student…

Given their lower socioeconomic background and achievement, immigrants and their descendants have been shown to make more ambitious decisions regarding educational transitions. While previous research has extensively analysed transitions within and after compulsory education, research on late transitions is scarce. This study focuses on the…

Academic tracking has long been a subject of debate due to its potential impact on educational equity, with students who are tracked highly receiving a higher quality education in comparison to students tracked lowly. These disparities in education quality may be affecting students' outcomes, as it has been demonstrated that the short-term…

Many students who do not complete high school perceive their home and family lives as troublesome (Kearney & Levine, 2014). Academic, interpersonal and intrapersonal challenges threaten the future of these Non-completers (Bowers & Sprott, 2013; Hawkins et al., 2013), however available supports can aid students toward positive educational…

Init2Winit, a gamified mobile application designed to increase students' alignment knowledge between college, career, and salary expectations has been beta-tested in midwestern urban and rural U.S. high schools (age 14-18). Students earn different points in the game when their educational expectations and expected annual income are matched with…

Aside from a student's personal desire to pursue higher education, a culture of high expectations in a school can have important consequences on the individual's achievement. However, the school's 'collective expectation' is affected by many contextual factors like urbanicity. Contributing to the research on urban-rural difference in education and…

Recent research has increasingly been studying the long-lasting effects of secondary education structures and processes on higher education (HE) outcomes. While the influence of socioeconomic composition on higher education enrolment is established, the underlying mechanisms remain unclear. We posit that the composition effect partially runs…

High academic expectation--how far a student expects to get in school--is usually predictive of positive outcomes for a student. Yet less is known about mechanisms behind collective expectation: the proportion of students in a school who expect to pursue further studies. Using urban schools' data from the Education Longitudinal Study 2002, this…

As researchers and school stakeholders determine ways to best support Black and Latino adolescent boys from low-income communities in actualizing their postsecondary future ambitions, more attention is needed on the types of futures these boys imagine and how family members influence this process. Guided by "future orientations" and…

This qualitative case study examines the college choice decisions of rural students enrolled in engineering majors to understand what conditions and experiences led rural students to pursue engineering at their institution. We found four themes that help illuminate rural engineering students' college choice journeys (1) The Inextricable Nature of…