Immigrants and Education in the US Interior: Integrating and Segmenting Tendencies in Nashville, Tennessee

  • Nashville immigrants treat educational attainment as a vehicle for becoming integrated and upwardly mobile in the general local community. Most of the expressed educational need reflect integrating tendencies, whereas a minority of these needs reflect segmenting tendencies.
  • The pattering of integrating and segmenting tendencies, in turn, is linked to the structure of opportunities and obstacles afforded immigrants and refugees by local Nashville society and to the modes by which foreign-born residents are incorporated into Nashville.
  • Global immigration to the US interior is yielding a new mix of integrating and segmenting tendencies in local communities and education systems.
  • Integrating tendencies are more prevalent than segmenting tendencies among immigrants and refugees and integrating tendencies are linked to the desire of immigrants and refugees to overcome economic, child care, legal, linguistic and discriminatory barriers to obtaining educational opportunities.