ABSTRACT
Drawing on both international and U.S. studies, this article takes stock of what recent ethnographic research on immigrant and involuntary minority youth reveals about variability in school performance. Empirical reality proves to be far more complex than what can be explained through dichotomous typologies of accommodation and resistance, success and failure, or immigrant and involuntary minorities. Moreover, minority youth do better in school when they feel strongly anchored in the identities of their families, communities, and peers and when they feel supported in pursuing a strategy of selective or additive acculturation.
