The importance of studying elite education lies in that social classes are always relational and need to be contextualized to wider social hierarchies. Therefore, to understand educational inequalities we also need research on how privilege and power are (re-)produced in education (Bourdieu & Passeron, 1977). Privilege can be understood referring to individuals but also to being part of an exclusive elite school. Previous studies on elite education have illustrated how the school as an institution and its position within the field of education shapes students’ orientations towards their future education and beyond (forber & Lingard, 2915; Maxwell and Aggleton, 2014). Gaztambide-Fernández and Maudlin (2015, p.62) have described this as envisioning, where the “sense of entitlement is then projected into the future through the ability to envision elite futures” and when the students apply to an elite school, they already need to be able to envision themselves as students who can fit that particular school. In this presentation we use ethnographic research data to explore (re)production of privilege in Finnish elite general upper secondary school and its relation to admission-seeking to higher education. More specifically we ask: how elite status is being (re-)produced and maintained (1) in the everyday life of an elite general upper secondary school and (2) in relation to admission-seeking to higher education.

Elite is not typically linked to Nordic education, known for its egalitarian ideals and tuition free public education. Yet, there are schools that are known as elite general upper secondary schools in Finland. The students who wish to continue to general upper secondary education can choose the school they want to apply. Students are then selected based on their comprehensive education grades and the general upper secondary schools that have the highest entrance limits nationwide are the ones referred as elite general upper secondary schools (see Magnusdottir & Kosunen, 2022; Laaksonen & Niemi, 2022; Tervonen, et. al. 2018). As the elite status is constructed on academic achievement rather than on economic means, previous research conducted in the Nordic context has described institutions like this as “meritocratic elite schools” (see e.g., Halvorsen, 2021). However, previous research exploring elite education has also illustrated how the discourse on meritocracy can be used to blur social distinctions and explain privileged positions within education (e.g. Törnqvist, 2021; Kahn & Jerolmac, 2013). Bourdieu (1998; Bourdieu & Passeron, 1977) engaged in the deconstruction of the meritocratic myth of social mobility to illuminate how education is not a neutral field, but as a field that consists of several options for different people (Skeggs, 2013). The starting point for this presentation is how social inequalities do not lie only in the processes of (non-)access to higher education, but also in the patterns of how students’ educational paths are formulated and, in admission-seeking strategies that are available for them when making higher education choices. Rather than understanding the application process to higher education as an equal, similar process for every applicant, it can be seen as a distinctive process, where students have very different admission-seeking strategies available for them.

The research data was produced during an ethnographic fieldwork period in an elite general upper secondary school in the Helsinki Metropolitan area. Data production took place between January 2019 and February 2020. The data comprises ethnographic field notes and interviews with students (N=17) and educators (N=4). The school selected had an entrance limit which was one of the highest in the whole country and it is known as an elite general upper secondary school in Finland (see Tervonen et. al., 2018). The students enter the school with high grade point average from comprehensive education and graduate with one of the highest grades nationwide. This presentation draws from a wider Privatisation and access to higher education -research project with a focus on student admission reform and the related privatisation processes. Access to the school was first negotiated within the research project: formal permissions by the municipality and school were obtained. Yet more importantly, access was constantly negotiated with individual educators and students on an everyday level (see Gordon, Holland, Lahelma and Tolonen, 2005, p. 116). All data production was based on voluntary informed consent, and the data was carefully pseudonymized. During the fieldwork period we participated in the everyday life of the school, school events, meetings, and lessons for all age groups. Special emphasis was on following the work of the guidance counsellors and guidance counselling courses at the school. In the ethnographic interviews we discussed students’ educational history and prospects as well as their experiences and thoughts on general upper secondary schooling, guidance counselling, admission-seeking to higher education and their leisure time and family. In the educators’ interviews we discussed themes considering everyday life at the schools, guidance counselling and the organizational practices of the school. Ethnographic interviews were conducted during fieldwork and participation in interviews was voluntary. The analytical interest lies in mechanisms of educational reproduction, but also in the contradictions and ambivalence between elite and egalitarian in the Finnish context. What especially intrigued us was the discrepancies between saying and doing in the everyday life at the school. We conducted qualitative ethnographic analysis (e.g. Coffey & Atkinson, 1996) and the analytical section of this presentation is a result of several read-throughs in a dialogue of theory and empirical findings. Drawing on the analysis we discuss our preliminary results concerning elite status in education and its relation to admission-seeking to higher education.

Drawing on the analysis based on the interview and observation data, we discuss preliminary findings: both students and educators made distinctions to presumed other general upper secondary schools and described how they had chosen both their previous and current schools as they had good reputation, quality teaching and a preferable peer-group. The students described a sense of entitlement but addressing the school directly as “an elite school” was avoided by most students and teachers as it was “uncomfortable labelling”. However, the elite status of the school was discussed and reproduced on the everyday level constantly, as the students and educators discussed and often mentioned how “other people call this an elite school”. When seeking access to higher education the students had many admission-seeking strategies available to them due to high educational attainment. The students were encouraged and expected to succeed, and the school had practices supporting this. Besides high grades many students at the school also had extensive amounts of economic, social and cultural capital to mobilise. Yet we propose that even for students with the highest amounts of capital, admission-seeking to higher education is somehow limited as educational choices were related to what the students think were “suitable for elite general upper secondary school students” and where they felt they could fit in (Ball et al., 2002; Bourdieu, 1990; Reay et al., 2001).

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