Voices from the Margins: The Stories of Vocational High School Students

Voices from the Margins is an examination of the school experiences of twenty working-class students in vocational high schools. Recognizing the complexity and the significance of these school participants’ experiences enriches our understanding of the hierarchical distribution of power structures within schools. At the heart of the book are the words of the participants who took part in the phenomenological interview process. They talk frankly about their lives in school and reflect on the meanings that they drew from their experiences. What is truly remarkable about their stories is that the majority of the participants interviewed never gave up their struggles to overcome the barriers that were preventing them from attaining their rightful places within the school. By telling their stories they are informing us about what is happening to the disempowered in schools.