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Early School Transitions of Immigrants’ Children

This research focuses on the early educational paths taken by children of immigrants in the United States as they make their first transitions into non-familial educational settings and follows children through elementary school. Children of new immigrants face many possible pathways of adaptation in the United States depending on the economic and non-economic resources of the family and the interaction of these resources with school context. This project relies on longitudinal data from two childhood cohorts in the United States. The research goes beyond reliance on immigrant status as a proxy but rather explores how the multiple traits associated with immigrant families, such as language background, national origins and ethnicity, are related to school readiness and early academic progress.