Breaking the Mold: How College Preparatory School Programs Sculpt the Worlds of Upwardly Mobile Youth

Abstract

Elite educational spaces are often hailed as pathways to upward mobility for disadvantaged students. Within the landscape of nonprofits for educational access, there exists a subset of organizations, College Preparatory School Programs (CPSPs), founded on such beliefs. They aim to equip racially and economically marginalized students with the human, social, and cultural capital deemed necessary for success in elite secondary schools. Despite their outsized presence, there remains a dearth of research on CPSPs that captures the experiential aspects of these students’ mobility journeys at this middle to high school juncture. Drawing from 150 interviews and over 500 hours of observational data, I explore how one CPSP, Uplift Academy, prepares students for elite high schools, students’ experiences once there, and the ethical contours of CPSPs as mobility boosters. I unearth an arc of ethical sculpting that Uplift students undergo as their identities and worldviews are shaped by and renegotiated in response to their mobility journey. Chapter 1, “Molding: The Cultivation of ‘Twice As’ at Uplift Academy,” introduces molding, the first phase of the arc and process during which Uplift deliberately instills human, social, and cultural capital through an intensive academic and cultural preparation process. In this chapter I explore how molding ultimately shapes both students’ identities and worldviews. I also put forth polychromy, an enhanced understanding of both individual and collective identity, shaped by the activation and intersection of students’ individual identities and values, and further developed through shared aspirations, experiences, and intersections throughout the molding process. In Chapter 2, “Monumentation: The Display, Discipline, and Mental Health of Uplift Students,” I delve into monumentation, the second phase of the arc, which captures how students work to convert their newly acquired capital into the social and cultural currency of their new academic homes. This chapter highlights the core of the sacrifices students experience, educational institutions’ role in perpetuating these, and the ways that these losses shape students’ identities and values. Chapter 3, “Recasting: The Unveiling and Refashioning of Identity,” covers the final phase of the arc and analyzes the ways in which Uplift students and alumni exert agency through the recasting of their identities and perspectives. Through this process, students agentically reflect on their experiences in ways that both reclaim and develop their sense of self and worldviews. Their reflection spurs action as they find ways to negotiate their identities perspectives such that constitute an integrous, aligned understanding of self and values. This project not only offers a glimpse into the role that CPSPs play in sculpting our educational landscape, but so too their role in sculpting the worlds of upwardly mobile, marginalized students. By surfacing the costs associated with this journey, I challenge our existing understanding of “mobility as equity” particularly within the realm of elite education.