Educational achievement is considered central to economic development and social inclusion, which makes measuring and analysing learning outcomes central to education policy and research in Europe and beyond. Against the dominating views of learning outcomes as a phenomenon that can be made easily visible and objectively measured, the starting point of this study is that learning outcomes are constructed through complex processes influenced by manifold intersecting factors and actors. Thus, this study approaches learning outcomes as a dynamic, context-sensitive, and interactional phenomenon, which take various shapes, forms, and meanings for different people.

The objective of this study is to analyse and compare how young people perceive, cope with and relate learning outcomes to their life courses and biographies in the context of differing opportunity structures in Finland and Bulgaria. The study analyses the subjective meanings young people give to learning outcomes as part of their life projects in their particular contexts (c.f., Kovacheva & Rambla, 2022). The focus is on young adults who live in socio-demographically declining regions, who are or have previously been in vulnerable or multi-disadvantaged life situations, and who have faced disruptions on their educational pathways.

In this study, young people are addressed as experts of their own life courses and biographies. Theoretically the study draws from life course research and theorizations of opportunity structures (Roberts, 2009) together with the perspective of spatial justice (Soja, 2013). Life course research places young people’s life coursesat the centre of the examination and considers how individual lives are embedded in institutional and socio-historical frames (Heinz et al., 2009). As part of individual life courses, also learning outcomes are constructed in the particular socio-historical contexts and socioeconomic conditions that form the structures of opportunities (Cefalo et al., 2020; Cefalo et al., 2024; Scandurra et al., 2020). Individuals are not seen as being imbued by social forces, order, and institutions, but also as active agents who respond and act to change them (e.g., Mortimer & Shanahan, 2003). That is, individuals exercise their agency within the limits of opportunity structures (Roberts, 2009). In other words, life courses of young people are constructed in a reciprocal and dynamic interaction of political, social, economic, cultural, and spatial conditions, welfare state regulations and provisions, and biographical decisions and strategies. In this frame, agency is understood as an intentional action within a given context, which is influenced but not determined by societal structures and socioeconomic conditions (Evans, 2007).

The viewpoint of spatial justice emphasises both the significance of space as an active force shaping human life, and the intersection of space and power in the distribution of socially valued resources and opportunities to use them (Soja, 2013; Williams, 2013). The spatial justice perspective is crucial when conducting in-depth comparative analyses in differing spatial contexts. In the field of education, spatial justice may be referred to the uneven distribution of resources and learning opportunities among regions, cities, neighbourhoods, and schools, along different divides and related to different factors. Spatial justice also helps to conceptualise learning outcomes as spatially conditioned phenomena. Furthermore, the spatial justice approach draws attention to the interaction of space and power and enables studying the spatial distribution of resources and opportunities of young people and their impact on the quality of learning outcomes. The spatial justice approach also re-interprets the analytical perspective on the agency of young people and their ability to shape their learning environments and navigate their life courses. Regarding young people in vulnerable and multi-disadvantaged positions, it helps to view them in light of the spatialised forms of exclusion and discrimination, which open or close their possibilities and opportunity structures.

The data originate from a European research project Constructing Learning Outcomes in Europe: A multi-level analysis of (under)achievement in the life course (CLEAR). The data consist of 20 narrative biographical interviews of young adults (18–29-year-olds; 10 Finnish and 10 Bulgarian) carried out in early 2024. The national samples represent both young people in vulnerable or multi-disadvantaged life situations and young people who have been able to move on from those situations and found their pathways into education or the labour market. In both countries, the data is collected from a socio-demographically declining region. The biographical interviews focus on the educational and learning experiences, current life situations, and future expectations of the Finnish and Bulgarian young adults, but also cover the perceived effects of regional conditions on their educational pathways and the realization of their own aspirations. Regarding the comparative dimension of the study, Finland (a Nordic welfare state) and Bulgaria (a post-socialist country) represent an interesting European pair for comparisons particularly due to the countries facing some similar challenges (e.g., concerns about the declining educational performance of young people) but displaying different (policy) understandings of their solutions (Benasso et al., 2022; Parreira do Amaral et al., 2019; see also Roberts et al., 2023). While the two regions have more limited opportunity structures accessible for young people than the countries’ more affluent regions, there are clear differences between the compared regions in the in the availability and subjective relevance of the regional opportunity structures and in the realisation of spatial justice. In Bulgaria, Gabrovo is a mountainous area experiencing population decrease due to population ageing and high outmigration, deindustrialisation and economic decline. Young people in particular face the challenges of high risks of poverty or social exclusion and low youth employment rate. In Finland, Kainuu is a mostly rural area in the northeast. The key issues facing Kainuu are acquiring skilled workforce, decreasing population – which is partly due to the limited educational opportunities – and higher levels of (youth) unemployment and dependency ratio than in the country on average. The data are analysed with qualitative content analysis to describe patterns or regularities in the data and identify shared meanings. This approach was chosen particularly for its usefulness in addressing both manifest content and the themes and core ideas found in the biographical interviews, which includes also contextual information and latent content (Drisko & Maschi, 2015).

Firstly, the results of this study will illustrate the subjective meanings Finnish and Bulgarian young adults from socio-demographically declining regions give to learning outcomes within their own life courses in the contexts of the surrounding opportunity structures. Secondly, the comparison of young people’s views and experiences from differing national and local opportunity structures in the two European countries will reveal the different ways in which space interacts with the agency of young people and their ability to shape their learning environments and navigate their life courses. Particularly as the interviewees are young people currently or previously in vulnerable and multi-disadvantaged life situations, the results will shed light on the spatialised forms of exclusion and discrimination, which open or close possibilities and opportunity structures for young people. Lastly, the study will also focus on the factors and actors that young people have experienced as significant sources of support in their efforts to find an exit from situations of structural limitations. Thus, the study will strive to underline the policies that work to open new opportunities which are meaningful for young people constructing their life projects.

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