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This paper, which is based on two years of ethnographic fieldwork with a young female refugee-background student, attends to the evolution of the student’s math identity shortly after arrival to the U.S. More specifically, it highlights the ways in which the student’s background knowledge and competence with the subject impacted her performance and consequently her confidence and recognition by others as a competent math learner. The data showcase the transition from a pseudo-confident math identity in year one to the loss of confidence and increase of negative emotions in year two. The paper concludes with recommendations for practitioners who work with newly arrived refugee students. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Drawing insights from an ethnographic study with two young refugee-background children, this paper examines the multiple contexts that influence their identity negotiations during their first three years of resettlement to the United States. The analysis aims to expand the growing literature on funds of identity (FOI) with specific attention to structural barriers that defund their FOIs. The findings are categorised in three intersecting themes: 1) transnational and translinguistic funds of identity, which are challenged by xenophobia, monolingualism and social class barriers; 2) funds of intercultural identity, which are jeopardised by racial and religious exclusion; and 3) funds of academic identity in the home which are threatened by social class challenges. The paper concludes with the implications of the analysis for theory and practice. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The aim of this ethnographic study was to trace the English language development of a young boy from Syria (Nate, pseudonym) who relocated to the U.S. at the age of six without any prior exposure to formal schooling. Data were collected over a two-and-a-half-year period and included fieldnotes after weekly tutoring visits and writing samples. Nate had lived in Turkey for three years with his parents and two older sisters and spoke Turkish and Arabic. He entered kindergarten in the U.S. with no English, but two years later his language proficiency improved greatly. While much of his 'success' could be attributed to his teachers, this paper focuses at the level of the family and the individual. Specifically, it attends to the interactional dynamics with his mother and the two sisters, his engagement with popular culture and technology, and his own developing academic and interpersonal skills. The implications of this analysis in (re)framing young refugee children as adaptive, flexible, and creative are presented. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper synthesises recent educational research to explore the integration experiences of newcomer students in the United States of America. The authors examine the barriers and sources of support that are perceived to either hamper or facilitate the social and academic integration and psychological well-being of these students, and in so doing, investigate how academic literature positions newcomers in comparison to the larger societal discourse that perceives them as outsiders. The review concludes with a presentation of the implications of the analysis for both educational theory and practice in K-12 schools. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Through an examination of 13 first-generation college students' views, this paper aims to provide one possible lens to viewing the complex social and academic landscapes that impact on students' academic identity construction. Academic and social experiences within and beyond the safety net of a mentoring program are explored. The paper concludes with recommendations for campus-wide initiatives for the support of the focal students. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Drawing insights from a qualitative study with 15 newcomer immigrant students, this article examines the students’ developing understandings of the meaning of diversity in school. Although contradictory, the students’ collective narratives reveal a keen analysis of a complex social setting, in which race, language, and nationality are seen simultaneously as sources of tension and as opportunities for growth. It is proposed that by identifying and linking similar discourses at multiple levels of schools, we could create webs of resistance to frameworks that tend to categorize and exclude. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Drawing on insights from reflective research accounts in the social sciences, this paper attends to the complexities of conducting cross-boundary educational research. Cross-boundary research is defined as any type of inquiry that is conducted across cultural and/or structural boundaries, including but not limited to race, class, gender, language, religion, age, sexual identity, and national origin. The authors present dilemmas they have faced in conducting educational research and offer three intersecting recommendations for those who wish to conduct research across boundaries. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

Drawing insights from scholarship in social sciences and education and the author's reflective research accounts, this paper aims to illustrate how a critical cosmopolitan framework can provide an alternative way of looking at educational phenomena. More specifically, the goal is to explore the why, where, who, and how of Critical Cosmopolitan Educational Research. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

Based on selective findings from a qualitative study with first generation college students, this article presents the contradictory and complex ways in which the participants perceived sociocultural diversity on campus and their place within it. The students’ narratives both affirmed existing boundaries of social belonging based on the conventional categories of race, ethnicity, and social class and transcended them. Cross-border alliances were being built on campus at the same time that new boundaries were forming in unconscious ways. The discussion focuses on the implications of this study for intercultural capital development. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

The primary context for this qualitative investigation was an upper elementary literacy methods course in a preservice teacher education program. Sixteen White monolingual women were enrolled in the course. The researchers explored how 6 key informants from the first author's literacy methods course perceived their social and academic relationships in the course. Results revealed that the informants had different perceptions of their course experiences based on their roles in the course. Six of the students were members of a clique that engaged in relational bullying. Using multimodality and multicultural literature as conceptual lenses, the researchers examine the nature of student interactions in the course and theorize the processes by which the clique's bullying behaviors might be explained and mitigated. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Relocation across national borders poses unique challenges and possibilities to newcomer immigrant students who enter diverse urban high schools. Based on focus group data with 27 newcomer students, in this article the author attends to the ways in which these students begin to counteract the challenges that relocation poses for them by recognizing the benefits of their new lives and envisioning routes to future academic/professional lives that transcend cultural, structural, and spatial boundaries. The author concludes with the implications of the analysis for educational theory and practice. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Drawing from a qualitative study with 13 female international students from Japan to the United States, this article examines ways in which studying abroad has impacted the students' social and ethnic identities. Findings indicate that while the students did experience social marginalization, they did actively resist it and individually and collectively tried to find ways to integrate in their new social context. Furthermore, and while the students' discussions expressed a strong ethnic identity upon relocation, they did not plan to go back to their native country upon graduation. The discussion centres on the theoretical contributions of this work and attempts to identify directions for institutions of higher education that enroll international students. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Drawing insights from the imaginary journey of an international education student, this essay aims to sensitise multicultural educators to attend to three dimensions that could be considered critical for the reinvention of aspects of the field under the pressures of globalisation. These dimensions include: (1) the promotion of multicultural education’s informed spatial flexibility; (2) the utilisation of dialectic critical views as navigation tools; and (3) the endorsement of cosmonaut identities for teachers, at the educational and cultural levels. The essay concludes with practical implications of the proposed framework for multicultural education classes and with questions for further debate. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article explores the experiences of immigrant and refugee students in schools with implication of two primary frameworks employed. The first framework was attended by a sociologist to the macro-level adaptation of students in schools and in the host country, whereas the second framework was attended by linguistics to one micro-aspect of the students' adaptation in school. It analyzes data using insights from critical discourse analysis which revealed three major categories of students.

Drawing from the findings of a qualitative study with female refugee high school students from Somalia in the US, this paper attempts to provide a window to understanding the multilayered character of newcomer students' academic identity construction. The students' micro-level processes of creating spaces for belonging at school are linked to their macro-level extra-educational connections at the societal and global levels. The framework presented attempts to sensitise educators to increase their attention to the global-socio-cultural contexts of education and strive to create spaces within schools for the recognition and facilitation of students' complex identities. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

How do refugee students construct their lives in school in their host country? What are some difficulties that they face and how do they respond to those? Findings of a qualitative study conducted with female refugee students from Somalia indicate that students are to varying degrees active agents in the construction of their lives in a US urban school. Although they do experience religious discrimination, they find creative ways to respond to it and, despite the fact that learning English is an initial obstacle in their lives in their host country, they tend to be successful in acquiring the new language. These findings problematize the perception of students as passive victims of the structural forces that inform their lives. At the same time, they challenge educators to seek ways that could make schools positive contexts of reception of refugee and immigrant students. Although the study focuses on the experiences of refugee students with distinct cultural characteristics in the US, the issues raised may provide a window to understanding the experiences of newcomer students in other parts of the world. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this article, the authors discuss the elements of an effective classroom teaching and learning with newcomer refugee students. It emphasizes the importance of gathering information about the background of the students. It recommends the utilization of multiple teaching methods to address diversity in student learning. They suggest a comparative analysis among geographic regions which can build mathematical skills while reinforcing global understandings.

Allport’s intergroup contact theory has been used to explain how contact between members of different groups influences the level of acceptance that members of those groups hold towards members of other groups, and to guide the design of programs to increase tolerance. In this study, we examined intergroup contact and social distance data provided by ethnic Hungarians and ethnic Romanians in Romania with respect to each other and the Roma (Gypsy) minority. Hungarians and Romanians reported more contact with members of each other’s groups than with Roma. Hungarians and Romanians also reported greater social distance from Roma than from each other’s groups. These results are interpreted in terms of intergroup contact theory, with recommendations for increasing tolerance towards the Roma. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Participants in this study were ethnic Hungarian secondary students attending high schools in Romania in which Hungarian was the primary language of instruction. Attitudes of participants toward ethnic and cultural groups were measured using a variation of the Bogardus (1933) Scale of Social Distance. Results were consistent with predictions based on Allport's intergroup contact theory. Students reported a wide range of tolerance levels for majority and minority ethnic groups with which they were likely to have contact in Romania. However, the students reported little difference in tolerance levels for groups that are not a recognized part of the Romanian cultural landscape, such as people of Hispanic origin, and Native Americans. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]