There are few studies researching rural youth and issues related to education more generally (Hargreaves, Kvalsund & Galdon, 2009). Recent research from Eastern European and Nordic countries show that young people from outside metropolitan regions more often express a lack of confidence in government and political institutions than other youth do (Ungdomsstyrelsen, 2010). The analyses in this paper relate to this research by presenting preliminary results from an ongoing research project named “Rural youth – education, place and participation”. The project focuses on education and participation for youths in Swedish rural (and urban) areas and investigates how schools in different places address student’s social inclusion.

Theoretically the analysis is based on Doreen Massey’s (1994) conceptualization of space as stretched out social relations. Particularly Massey’s (1995) thinking on power related to place (and space) brought a wider context into the analysis of the student’s adaption and resistance. The particular interest in this paper in this respect is the student’s agency and their adaption, resistance and confidence in society on a local, regional and national level. The specific analysis focuses on identifying themes, in both observations and in students’ statements about agency, connected to the local school and the community but also to a wider regional and national context.

Hargreaves, L, Kvalsund, R & Galdon, M. (2009). Reviews of research on rural schools and their communities in British and Nordic countries: Analytical perspectives and cultural meaning, International Journal of Educational Research, 48(2), 80-88. Jeffrey, B. & Troman, G. (2004). Time for ethnography. British Journal of Educational Research, 30(4), 535-548. Johansson, Monica. (2009). Anpassning och motstånd. En etnografisk studie av gymnasieelevers institutionella identitetsskapande. [ Adaption and resistance. An ethnographic investigation of the development of institutional identities amongst upper secondary school pupils] (Doktorsavhandling. Göteborg Studies in Educational Sciences 281). Göteborg: Acta Universitatis Gothoburgensis. Massey, D. (1994). Space, place and gender. Cambridge: Polity Press. Massey, D. (1995) The Conceptualization of Place. In A Place in the World?: Places, Cultures and Globalization. Doreen Massey and Pat Jess, eds. Oxford, UK: Oxford, University Press. Ungdomsstyrelsen (2010). Fokus 10. En analys av ungas inflytande. [Focus 10. An analysis of young people’s influence]. Stockholm: Ungdomsstyrelsen.