The social situation for newcomer immigrant students at "a school for everyone"

This research project examines the social situation at school for students that have immigrated to Sweden during the last four years of compulsory school or during upper secondary school. The study focuses on the social situation at school for these students both during different levels of preparatory education and during and after their transition to ordinary education.

My dissertation is based on interviews with 29 newcomer immigrant students and field studies at several compulsory and upper secondary schools in Malmö. One of the most central results of the study concerns some of the interviewed students´ narratives about social exclusion through stigmatization. To be a newcomer immigrant student in the investigated schools often means a social position with a lower social status than both students born in Sweden with parents born here and students born in Sweden with parents born abroad. The stigmatization often involves other students distancing themselves from the newcomer immigrant students in more or less obvious ways, for example by contemptuous comments or by ignoring them. The starting point for the stigmatization is primarily the Swedish linguistic level of the students, being a newcomer immigrant, being categorized as a ”refugee” and placed in preparatory education separated from regular education. Part of the stigmatization of the newcomer immigrant students is connected to the fact that they, as opposed to other students, are not yet considered qualified for regular education. The study shows that there are obvious differences in the social status between students in preparatory and regular education. In this way the reception system for newcomer immigrant students is one factor that can contribute to social exclusion of these students at school. Theoretical tools and concepts from Goffman and Bourdieu are used in the analysis.