1.1 1.2 1.3 How and when Do Educational Aspirations, Expectations and Achievement Align? by Nabil Khattab University of Bristol Sociological Research Online, 19 (4), 7 <http://www.socresonline.org.uk/19/4/7.html> DOI: 10.5153/sro.3508 Received: 4 Mar 2014 | Accepted: 22 Sep 2014 | Published: 30 Nov 2014 Abstract This paper proposes a new typology of educational aspirations, expectations and achievement. This typology is derived from combinations of aspirations, expectations and achievement, creating eight possible combinations of aligned and irregular profiles. To฀ devise this new typology, data from the Longitudinal Study of Young People in England (LSYPE) panel survey and matching administrative data from the National Pupil Database (NPD) was utilised. These data were collected in 2004 from a sample of 15,770 young people (YP) aged 13 to 14 attending 647 different schools in England. This study demonstrates that aspirations, expectations and achievement do converge amongst some students; but for most young people they do not always intersect. Many young people succeed academically, but without necessarily developing high aspirations or high expectations. For one out of every five young people,฀ high aspirations and high expectations do not lead to academic achievement. The findings in this paper provide a distinct analytical฀ framework for further research and policy development in this area. Keywords: Students, Expectations, School Achievement, LSYPE, England Introduction Norms and values associated with different classes and ethnic groups are often the main driving forces that stimulate attitudes underscoring the importance of education in the lives of young people and for their future. These, in turn, affect the behaviour of young people at school and, subsequently, their educational performance levels. Sociologists in the 1960s and 1970s (Sugarman 1970, Willis 1977,Marini and Greenberger 1978) have highlighted class and gender differences in relation to the valuing of formal educational achievement as a means of upward social mobility. For example, these studies have pointed out that middle-class students (and boys more than girls) place a higher value on educational achievement than working and lower class students. Thus, the latter are likely to have lower levels of aspirations and school performance. These students' aspirations and expectations were regarded as an accurate predictor of their future educational performance. However, recent generations of students have tended to develop ambitious future plans (aspirations) regardless of their actual educational achievement. For example, Schneider and Stevenson (1999) defined contemporary American young฀ people as 'the ambitious generation', arguing that rising ambitions occur among students from all sexes or ethnic, racial and class backgrounds. Conversely, they also found that many of these students have 'misaligned ambitions,' or are caught in what they define as the 'ambitions paradox'. According to this theory, students who฀ are caught in this paradox tend to have high ambitions but lack the knowledge and skills they need to achieve their aims. Moreover, there are two aspects of the 'ambitions paradox': 1. a gap between educational plans and educational achievement, and 2. a gap between educational and occupational goals (e.g. a divergence between expected and required levels of education for the employment they aspire to obtain in the future). Furthermore, Hanson (1994), who used a three-dimensional approach; found a paradox not only between aspirations and achievement, but also between aspirations and expectations, and between expectations and achievement. This paradox has been well reported in the literature, even before the publication of Schneider and Stevenson's work (Sue and Okazaki 1990, Mickelson 1990). Yet little if any attention has been paid to exploring and understanding situations of the 'ambitions paradox' where actual achievement is higher than aspirations, expectations, or both. This leaves us with a limited understanding of the relationship between these different concepts and growing concerns about the importance of aspirations and expectations as predictors of educational achievement. It is certainly important to understand why some students may hold aspirations or even expectations that are beyond their ability to achieve in reality. Equally important, if not more, is the ability to understand why some students may actually end up achieving more than what they would aspire to or even expect. The latter option has been largely neglected by the 'misaligned ambitions' theory and by most studies in this field. In this paper,฀ the theory of aligned ambitions is utilised in conjunction with Hanson's three-dimensional approach to explore the entire range of the ways in which educational aspirations, expectations and achievement interact (match and http://www.socresonline.org.uk/19/4/7.html 1 29/11/2014