This article adopts the perspective of Sen's capability approach to examine elite athletes' environment and their capability to plan and prepare a career transition out of sport. Interviews were conducted with 14 elite athletes in Canada and results from the thematic analysis reveal that discrepancies exist in the athletes' environment. Three…

This article examines the relevance of different institutional levels in higher education for the educational strategies of upper milieu students in a case study conducted in Germany. Based on our analysis of 95 qualitative interviews with Masters students from different social backgrounds, we show how upper milieu students take advantage of the…

Research on scientific careers finds a mover's advantage. International migration correlates with increased visibility and productivity. However, if scientists who move internationally, on average, enter into more prestigious employments than they came from, extant research may overestimate the direct performance gains associated with…

Based on 20 semi-structured interviews with high school students in elite schools in Israel, this article examines two key research questions: How do students in elite high schools define and experience their identity? Do these identities contribute to the production and maintenance of privilege, and if so, how? To examine these questions, we…

Elite schools, long tasked with creating a future national elite, often now find themselves competing in a global education market. This article explores how one such school, in Switzerland, articulates with the global imaginary of its local geography -- in particular, with images of luxury tourism and safety -- to appeal to a globally wealthy…

Elite private institutions, renowned for their exceptional academic offerings and rigorous selection processes, attract top-tier students and faculty; however exclusive private schooling has perpetuated social and economic disparities by granting unequal advantages to select groups, deepening educational gaps in society. This dissertation…

Beneath the veneer of prestige and promise, a hidden issue pervades the campuses of America's selective universities. In "Starving the Dream," Nathan F. Alleman, Cara Cliburn Allen, and Sarah E. Madsen reveal the startling contradiction between the celebrated opportunities of these prestige-oriented institutions and the food insecurity…

Although internationalisation underpins many practices in higher education, its adopted approaches can be uneven between institutions and create ambiguous conceptualisations of how it is enacted in practice. Therefore, a whole-sector analysis can provide insight into whether spaces exist for new and innovative approaches to internationalisation,…

This article discusses the methodological challenges of researching elite boys' schooling, in a study involving interviewing alumni who attended these schools from the 1970s to the 2020s. In particular, through a feminist poststructuralist methodological framing, it considers the necessity for researcher reflexivity in engaging in research in such…

This study explores how Chinese international students at a state university navigate the U.S. college choice process. Through semi-structured interviews with 10 Chinese international college students at a large public research university located in the northeastern U.S., this study explains how these economically privileged students regard…

Despite college rankings' popular yet controversial nature, there is little known about the relationship between college rankings and students. Prior literature suggests that students who make use of rankings are more privileged, yet there lacks a comprehensive analysis surrounding the types of students who place importance on rankings in more…

Selecting a major is a critical decision for undergraduate students, yet research on their decision-making processes within the Chinese context remains limited. Using cultural capital and the dual-process model of culture in action as theoretical frameworks, this study examines the major selection processes of 45 first-year students at two elite…

In England and Wales, fee-charging independent schools can be legally classified as charities and, therefore, receive associated benefits, the most obvious being taxation advantages. The high fees charged by many of these schools create financial exclusivity, which, it will be seen, confers significant social and cultural capital to those who can…

This research looks at higher education choice through the lens of extended self in consumer behavior. An online survey at two US universities, one public and one private, found that extended-self moderated how much fulfillment of self-image needs led students to like a university. Self-esteem needs were a critical part of this process, positively…

Private schools have long played a crucial role in male elite formation but their importance to women's trajectories is less clear. In this paper, we explore the relationship between girls' private schools and elite recruitment in Britain over the past 120 years -- drawing on the historical database of "Who's Who," a unique catalogue of…