Russian society has become more stabilized since the tempestuous 1990s. The social and economic space has been entered by a generation that is counting on a successful career. How justified are these expectations? What can it realistically hope for? What are the rules that it will have to play by to build a career? To what extent do these rules depend on the young people themselves? The authors attempt to answer these questions by drawing on a large-scale survey conducted among upper-division Russian college students. Its purpose was to determine the prospects for vertical mobility based on an analysis of the educational strategies of young people as mapped out on the basis of their own life scenarios and the material and social resources at the disposal of their households. (Contains 18 tables and 3 notes.)