Science students’ post-bachelor’s choice narratives in different disciplinary settings

Publikation: Bidrag til tidsskriftTidsskriftartikelForskningfagfællebedømt

In this paper, we aim to understand the implications of the structural changes of the Bologna process from a student perspective. We investigate how bachelor’s degree students’ in a post-Bologna era with three-year bachelor’s degree and two-year master’s degree units construct their post-bachelor’s choice narratives in two different science degree programmes (chemistry and natural resources) at a Danish research-intensive university. We pay special attention to how science students’ narrative repertoires and imagined futures interact with and set the scene for their choice narratives in specific disciplinary settings. We draw on theoretical ideas of science identities including ‘narrative repertories’ and ‘imagined futures’, combined with disciplinary cultures and institutional capital. The analysis draws on small-scale rich qualitative material including 12 narrative interviews and focus groups with 44 students, including reflective essays, drawings and word-cloud brainstorms. Results show that the post-bachelor’s trajectory is a choice that students must relate themselves to in their identity negotiations. We document how students within the same faculty are presented with different narrative repertoires to construct and negotiate their choices from and as a result experience different choice processes and negotiations due to the different disciplinary settings they encounter. The implications for higher education institutions are given.

OriginalsprogEngelsk
TidsskriftEuropean Educational Research Journal
Vol/bind22
Udgave nummer2
Sider (fra-til)216-235
Antal sider20
ISSN1474-9041
DOI
StatusUdgivet - 2023

Bibliografisk note

Funding Information:
The author(s) disclosed receipt of the following financial support for the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article: This work was supported by the Independent Research Fund Denmark under Grant Number: DFF – 7013-00104.

Publisher Copyright:
© The Author(s) 2022.

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