Introduction: Pathways in the College-for-All Era

Abstract

This study provides a close look at the postsecondary pathways of 50 mostly low-income Latino/a students in the San Francisco East Bay Area who were high school seniors in 2007–2008. Their progress was followed over the course of three primary waves of interviews, and follow-ups with select respondents in 2012 and 2015. Though previous research has focused on whether students go to college, these Latino/a students assumed that everyone goes to college, adopting a college-for-all orientation. The study offers an important empirical contribution to our knowledge of college choice processes among a population that, while strongly college-oriented, faces significant constraints due to both resource deficiencies and racialized status.