Utilising the community cultural wealth framework to explore Sierra Leonean parents’ experiences of outdoor adventure education in the United Kingdom

ABSTRACT

Research exploring race and ethnicity and outdoor adventure education (OAE) has tended to focus on students’ experiences. This paper discusses findings from a small-scale empirical study of Sierra Leonean parents involved in organising their child’s participation in a camping-based, OAE residential visit. The visit was organised by one primary school in London (UK). The community cultural wealth framework by Yosso is utilised to explore the parents’ contributions to the visit. The findings reveal the ways in which parents strove to meet the expectations placed on them and overcame challenges of facilitating the visit by drawing on aspirational, familial, navigational, resistant and social capital. Additionally, the role of spiritual capital is discussed. I conclude with recommendations for the ways in which the schools and providers of OAE could take account of ethnic minority parents’ perspectives and experiences.

KEYWORDS:

• Outdoor adventure education
• critical race theory
• community cultural wealth
• ethnic minority parents

Introduction

Outdoor research has long critiqued the economic, social and environmental values and relations that have maintained the countryside as a space of exclusion and discrimination of ethnic minority individuals and groups. For instance, Agyeman and Spooner (1997) describe the countryside as a ‘white landscape’ associated with multiple dimensions of exclusion. Neal (2002) contends the countryside is racialised in the national imaginary through media and popular discourse. Constructions about rural life serve to reproduce exclusion as a kind of ‘colonial amnesia’ (Tyler, 2012). This construction denies the existence of multi-culturalism and difference that exists within rural areas (Panelli, Hubbard, Coombes, & Suchet-Pearson, 2009). Research has revealed the lived experiences of racism and ‘othering’ experienced by ethnic minority individuals and groups (Bhopal, 2011; Dhalech, 1999). The racist attack on Christian Cooper, a black birder in Central Park in the US in 2020 by a white dog-walker, shone a spot light on the reality that racial discrimination is a lived experience for non-white visitors to outdoor spaces.

Kobayashi and Peake (2000) have argued that examining the beliefs, norms and assumptions inherent within cultural practices is important to understand the ways in which the dominance of whiteness maintains and reproduces social exclusion. Regarding outdoor adventure education (OAE), research along this line has focused on probing disparities in students' enjoyment as well as uptake of OAE experiences (Rose and Paisley, 2012; Browne, Gillard and Garst, 2019). Research points to the intersection of social class with ethnicity/race. It also shows race has an independent significance when OAE experiences fail to account for diverse students' interests and lived experiences. As Rose and Paisley (2012) discuss, white privilege is maintained and reproduced when the individuals and groups who lead OAE are not representative and design experiences in ways that fit with their own ways of doing and being in wilderness spaces. As Browne et al. (2019) explore in their discussion about mis-representation of indigenous Native American (NA) culture within OAE camps in the US, it is through a process of reflection and consultation with NA tribal leaders that practice and policy can change.

Turning to school-related provision in the UK, a survey by Power, Taylor, Rees and Jones (2009) suggested that some groups of students, such as Asian girls, were less likely to take up places on residential visits. The teachers who took part in the survey said this was because of the high financial cost of residentials. They also suggested Asian parents wished for their daughters to stay within the home and within family life, rather than spend several nights away with the school. Yet, there has, hitherto, been less research with ethnic minority parents themselves, examining their perspectives of OAE residential visits organised by schools, which is a gap this paper seeks to address.

Parents, per se, are important stakeholders of OAE residential visits organised by schools, in having to provide consent, needing to pay for the visit as well as preparing their child’s clothing and equipment. International literature has primarily framed ethnic minority parents’ motivations for pro-actively engaging with OAE activities, such as scouts and adventure summer camps, as a cultural process of aligning with dominant societal norms. Lo, Gidlow, and Cushma (2014) explored first-generation Chinese parents’ motivations for facilitating their child’s participation in OAE activities in Canada. The authors argue that parents aimed to ensure the partial acculturation of their children into Western culture through their uptake of OAE as part of the public/private negotiation of Chinese identity.

The narratives discussed in this paper pertain to eight Sierra Leonean parents’ perspectives and experiences of an OAE residential visit, which they were asked to accede to as part of their child’s last year at primary school in London. All parents were from lower-income backgrounds. The parents in this paper had consented to their child attending the OAE residential visit, which was due to take place after this study was carried out. In this paper, I problematise the notion that facilitating OAE is a power-neutral choice. Ethnic minority parents’ apparent support for their child’s participation in residential visits organised by schools has the potential to create and/or exacerbate structural inequalities.

Ethnic minority parents’ involvement and schools

A reading of the sociological and educational literature affords the ability to place the OAE residential discussed in this paper within the broader context of ethnic minority parent involvement and schooling. This research has focused on examining the mechanisms by which parents are involved in processes and decisions about their child’s education. For instance, Barton et al. (2004) frame parental involvement as a dynamic, interactive process in which parents draw on multiple experiences and resources to define their inter actions with schools and among school actors. This research also illustrates the multi-faceted ways in which ethnic minority parents may be marginalised. For instance, Crozier (2001) argues that when a ‘one size fits all’ approach to involving parents is adopted by schools this masks the different needs of ethnic minority parents as well as the issues of systemic racism. Research conducted with Pakistani and Bangladeshi heritage parents (Crozier and Davies, 2007) has found that labels, such as ‘hard to reach’, blame parents for not being involved when many of the mechanisms put in place by schools to involve parents do not align with the context of their’ lives. Crozier and Davies discuss Dale’s (1996) expert and transplant models for school-parent relations. In both models the power of decisions is held by educational professionals and at best only allows parents to support in ways that reflect educational professionals' decisions. Chapman and Bhopal (2013) argue parent involvement is often positioned as joining events at school, attending parents evenings and fundraising for the school. The authors argue that this narrow conception does not take into account the various other ways in which ethnic minority parents may be involved, such as advocating their child’s needs or family circumstances. Moreover, black parents may be positioned as non-participatory and uncaring, if they do not meet a school's expectations (Bhopal, 2014).

Next, I turn to Yosso’s (2005) community cultural wealth framework to provide a theoretical lens through which to understand the parents’ contributions to facilitating the visit.

Community cultural wealth

Within much social science research, the idea of ‘capital’ has prevailed that equates it as resources that generally more affluent families hold and that can be transferred from parents to offspring. This form of capital draws on Bourdieu’s (1986) concept of ‘cultural capital’, as the social class related resources that exist within families that can be converted into power, prestige and privilege. Bourdieu argued that schooling represents middle-class values, which make it easier for more privileged students and their parents to build on their existing resources. Scholars, such as Wallace (2017) have challenged prevailing analyses of cultural capital in research, arguing that all too often these align with notions of white middle-class values. Countering this stance, Wallace discusses the strategic use of Black cultural capital by middle-class Black students and parents in education. Meghji (2019) also examines Black cultural capital as the strategic social class expressions of students, which are attuned to the tastes, expressive traditions and cultural modes of the African diaspora.

Yosso’s (2005) community cultural wealth (CCW) framework also counters Bourdieu's conception of cultural capital, drawing on Critical Race Theory (CRT). CRT examines race, racism and the intersections of the latter with other forms of oppression in the lives of people of colour (Ladson-Billings & Tate, 1995). As Dixson and Anderson (2017) contend, CRT affords the examination of the role of education policy and educational practices in the construction of racial inequity and the perpetuation of normative whiteness. Yosso (2005) countered the dominant interpretations of cultural capital to shift the research lens away from the deficit view of Communities of Colour. Yosso contends that students and their families may not have access to wealth, but they do have access to a wealth of assets or capital, which can be used to transform their schooling experiences, if acknowledged. CCW represents, ‘an array of knowledge, skills, and abilities possessed and utilized by Communities of Color to survive and resist macro and micro-forms of oppression’ (Yosso, 2005, p. 75).

Yosso’s (2005) theoretical framework has been applied to understanding how ethnic minority parents influence the educational experiences of their children (for example, Guzmán, Kouyoumdjian, Medrano, & Bernal, 2018). I use Yosso’s (2005) framework to examine the parents’ role in facilitating their child’s participation in the planned OAE visit. I argue that the CCW framework helps to make visible the resourcefulness and commitment of parents. It also helps to reveal the ways in which the parents overcame the challenges of organising the visit and their sense of marginalisation, which is evident from some of their reports on their experience. Yosso’s framework denotes six forms of capital as follows:

1. ‘Aspirational capital’ refers to the ability to maintain hopes and dreams for the future, even in the face of marginalisation and challenges. It is developed and transmitted through cultural lessons in families about continuing to ‘dream of possibilities beyond their present circumstances’ and nurturing a ‘culture of possibility’ (Yosso, ibid., p. 78). Yosso also explained that aspirational capital is tied to other forms of CCW.

2. ‘Linguistic capital’ pertains to intellectual and social skills attained through the communication and capacity to speak more than one language. It involves the ways in which storytelling and oral histories are central to students and parents’ communication and family life, which involve skills, such as memory recall and real-world literacy skills.

3. ‘Familial capital’ refers to cultural knowledge, cultural norms and socially sanctioned behaviours that support families. It includes a sense of community history, memory, and cultural intuition that influences the way parents provide guidance, advise their children, and mentor them.

4. ‘Resistant capital’ can be understood as skills that parents have fostered to challenge inequality when dealing with educational institutions, including school processes and procedures as well as relations with educational professionals.

5. ‘Navigational capital’ pertains to the skills that parents have acquired and make use of when negotiating their involvement with institutions, such as schools and in this case the OAE residential visit.

6. ‘Social capital’ pertains to the networks in and outside the family, community resources, and social media to which parents may have access that can help them to understand and prepare for education, or in this case the OAE residential visit.

The Sierra Leonean diaspora in London

The Sierra Leonean diaspora population in the UK comprises a number of ethnic groups, such as Krio and Mende. The population has been estimated at approximately 23,000 (Office for National Statistics, 2011), concentrated largely in London and the southeast (Aspinall & Chinouya, 2016). Rubyan‐Ling (2019) argues the diaspora population in the UK can be described as comprising broad groupings: those who migrated before the civil war; those individuals who arrived during the war through the asylum process and through family reunification; and those who arrived since the end of the war as students, or those joining family members.

This study

Specifically, in this study I ask:

• How do the Sierra Leonean parents frame the benefits and values of the outdoor residential visit?

• What are the strategies they draw upon to organise their child’s visit?

• How can the community cultural wealth framework help us to understand the parents’ experiences of OAE?

St Michael’s School is located in a London local authority with students of African heritage comprising the largest ethnic minority populations within the catchment area of the school. The residential discussed in this study was organised as a stand-alone activity at the end of the summer term of the final year of primary school. This comprised camping accommodation at an OAE centre in the countryside with a programme of activities, including kayaking, abseiling, ‘high ropes’ and tightrope walking. The visit was open to all children in the year group to attend and was subsidised by the school using the government Pupil Premium allocation. Parents were required to pay half of the costs of their child’s participation. There were a limited number of full cost bursaries from the school, where costs were deemed prohibitive for parents. All parents received two letters from the school about the visit. The first, emphasised the benefits to students’ learning from attending the visit, such as team building, developing dispositions towards being responsible, building confidence (Scrutton, 2015) and enhancing students’ social and inter-personal skills to support the transition to secondary school (Slee & Allan, 2019). Hence, the letter illustrated the dominant forms of cultural capital associated with OAE visits. The second letter outlined the logistics and practical arrangements for parents to consider and address. The school also offered parents the opportunity to attend a meeting, where there was a presentation about the visit.

The parents participating in this study were recruited from a parents evening meeting in the autumn term. The research participants self-identified as being of Sierra Leonean national identity and living with their children in London. Table 1. shows the participant biographies of the parents. The parents’ migration histories varied. Three parents had moved to London during their own schooling years, whilst three parents had migrated to London from Sierra Leone within the last ten years. Three parents were of Muslim faith, while five held a Christian faith. All the parents were from low-income backgrounds.

Table 1. Background characteristics of research participants

Name of parent	Female or Male	Number of years residing in UK (at time of data collection)	Religious faith
Mariatu	F	20 years	Christian
Chimdalu	F	11 years	Muslim
Zara	F	20 years	Christian
Isatu	F	20 years	Muslim
Julie	F	3 years	Christian
Umaru	M	3 years	Muslim
Sophia	F	8 years	Christian
Fatu	F	11 years	Christian

Formal and informal interviews were carried out in the research participants homes, thus allowing for some distance from the school (Hammersley & Atkinson, 1995; Wolcott, 2008). They were interviewed before the start of the residential visit, being asked asking questions, such as ‘Can you tell me what you know about the residential visit?’ ‘What learning do you think will take place there?’, ‘What do you think the benefits will be for your child?’ ‘What concerns, if any, do have?’ ‘What do you need to buy for your child?’ and ‘In what ways have you been in touch with the school about the visit?’

All data were recorded digitally and transcribed verbatim before analysis using NVivo 11 software to allow for initial coding. Data analysis involved content analysis, including open and thematic coding (Cohen, Manion, & Morrison, 2011). An inductive approach was used to examine the parents’ perspectives, which allowed for different forms of capital to be identified. I then used a CCW lens as a data analysis tool to explore categories proposed by Yosso (2005).

As an ‘outsider’ to the lives of the Sierra Leonean parents in this study, the interpretation of their views in this paper is partial (Gregory & Ruby, 2011). It is not intended in any way as a ‘coherent summary or singular interpretation of someone’s life’ (Holland, Renold, Ross, & Hillman, 2010, p. 371). Aware of interpreting parents’ experiences through my own racialised and privileged experiences as a white British woman, I used a reflexive field-diary throughout the study (Mills and Morton, 2013). I examined where I held prior assumptions and biases that may have influenced the research process, for instance, relating my positive views about the value of OAE residentials. Furthermore, my initial interpretations of the findings were explored with the parents during follow up visits to their homes as part of a wider study.

Findings

As the findings illustrate, the parents’ experiences of organising the residential visit were mixed and wide-ranging. The findings described in the following sections are presented along the lines of the different forms of capital revealed from the parents’ first-hand accounts. The forms of capital discussed by parents were found to be interdependent and overlapping. These forms of capital were notably aspirational capital, familial/resistance capital, navigational/resistance capital and social capital. I also consider their spiritual capital (Park, Dizon, & Malcolm, 2020). Spiritual capital in this paper pertains to the ways in which some parents’ religious beliefs guided them in determining why they should let their child attend the residential.

Aspirational capital

It was evident from the parents’ accounts that they held high aspirations for their children to achieve and do well at school as an illustration of their aspirational capital. Several parents discussed their use of supplementary schooling and oversight of homework as examples of their determination to get the best education for their children. The findings support previous research by Demie (2013) about the high value placed on education by African parents in London.

Fatu said her aspiration for the visit was that it would help to broaden her son's horizons, so that he would have first-hand knowledge on which to draw during lessons at school. This finding lends support to previous research by Lo et al. (2014) as discussed above. The parents in this study also discussed the personal and social skills described to them by the school, which they anticipated their children would gain from the activities and camp life. For instance, Umaru was keen for his daughter to develop skills for being self-reliant. In the context of the OAE residential visit he suggested:

She will learn to have confidence of being in a different environment, and coping with whatever experience that she might come up. That will be good for her going to secondary school.

Like several parents, he said he imagined the residential would be useful in supporting the transition to secondary school as well as classroom learning (Richmond et al., 2018). Yet, he said he knew little about how the expected learning would come about. He was concerned that he did not know more, but explained he did not have time to push the school about this. Despite not knowing the exact nature of the activities, he expressed the hope that the residential would support his daughter on the path to the ‘imagined future’ (Ball, MacRae, & Maguire, 1999, p. 210) that education could provide. In contrast to Umaru’s perspective, Isatu said she had been on a similar experience during her schooling and this was why she wanted her daughter to attend.

A theme that was discussed by three parents was their aspiration to ensure children had the same experiences as their peers by going on the visit, which was arguably much anticipated for most of the children attending. The visit was the last opportunity for some of the children to be together before they dispersed to different secondary schools. Wanting to be understood as a good parent, parents said they knew other parents had consented to the visit and their children’s friends were going and therefore, to miss out would have had consequences. In a similar way to another parent, Mariatu had been on a residential ‘trip’ when she was at school. Mariatu, confessed:

I did it at school, and I didn’t like it – the insects and all that, but that is what happens, and they will do what they do on these things.

Mariatu did not romanticise about the notion of a week in the countryside. Her response was to comply with the decisions made by the school, but this created tensions for her in relation to the cost, which she could not afford. She wanted to ensure her daughter had the same experiences as the other children.

Some parents struggled to connect with a sense of having a choice about consenting to the residential and worried they would be considered as being as bad parents, if they did not. Julie said:

It is a big cost, and some parents worry about what will be said, if they do not let their children go, how will it look?

Julie asserted that parents were concerned about how they would be perceived by the school if they said no, so they consented to their child going. As Crozier and Davies (2007) have argued, the determination of what constitutes ‘good’ and ‘acceptable’ parent involvement lies in the power of the schools and policy makers, rather than the parents. The parents in this study felt their actions could be viewed as an indication of their commitment to their child’s education.

Familial/resistance capital

Familial capital was represented in the ways in which parents reframed the personal and social outcomes associated with the residential to take account of their own efforts to socialise their children. For instance, Zara spoke about cultural assets and strengths, which had not been acknowledged by the school in their communication. She spoke about the way in which her daughter helped her community and family and with errands that her daughter carried out. These practices were associated with an African sense of responsibility towards her family and community (Dei, 1994). She felt her daughter was already ‘mature’, ‘dependable’, ‘trustworthy’ and ‘responsible’, because she had raised her child to embody these qualities. She acknowledged some children needed to learn how to be mature, but not her own children. Zara said she would feel great shame to hear reports of her children not behaving well from their teachers or from extended family. Knowing her daughter was dependable to behave well afforded Zara peace of mind and contributed to her decision to allow her daughter to go on the residential visit. She said:

No, I don’t have any worries. It’s good practice for her. She is very responsible; I can vouch for that.

Zara felt the change in location, away from home, was a good opportunity. to put these dispositions into practice, because she would not be there to support her daughter. Zara’s comments reflected the interdependence between familial and resistance capital. That is to say, by reframing the experience to illuminate the ways in which her daughter already was independent and mature, Zara was making visible the familial capital that had been unaccounted for in the way the residential was conceptualised by the school. This was a form of resistance capital to the experience of being marginalised by the decontextualised outcomes, which were set out in the letter to parents.

Navigational/resistance capital

Strategies of resiliency were important for some parents navigating the complex set of expectations and pressures associated with organising the OAE residential. These navigational/resistance strategies involved refashioning the ways in which these parents communicated with the school about the residential in order to ensure they could get their needs met. For instance, Fatu said:

It’s too much and I’m not working, so how can I do this? So, that is the reason I want to go and meet [them]. Their letter said to call them. That is not how I do things. I will go into the school and talk to them. I told my daughter I don’t have money to go. She was crying “mummy, other children are going”. I said “OK, don’t worry I will go to your school and talk to your teacher and see what we can do”.

Like other parents, Fatu felt pressure from her daughter to ensure she did not miss out on the visit. Fatu spoke about how she wanted to understand the teachers’ perspectives better and discuss her situation with them. It was notable that Fatu felt she could present her case better in person. Considering the literature on school-parent relations discussed above, it appeared that Fatu felt more empowered to discuss the OAE visit in ways that fitted with her needs to question the school about the costs.

Social capital

Social capital helped parents navigate their role in facilitating the OAE residential. Social capital was important in securing financial, practical and organisational support for the visit. Many parents discussed the visit with extended family, who had older children at the school. Zara highlighted that her daughter had re-visited, with her aunties, several outdoor locations she had been to previously with the school, including a residential centre. These aunties enjoyed camping and could lend equipment.

Several parents discussed how they did not own the sort of outdoors equipment that was set out in the letter from the school. As Rose and Paisley (2012, p148) note, ‘the construction of “living simply” for a period of time carries a hefty price tag in terms of gear and access’. Isatu was not alone in feeling frustration at the cost of having to buy equipment as well as costs being charged by the school. Like three other parents, she explained how she had also been asked to pay a deposit towards the forthcoming cost of an outdoor residential visit that was planned for first year of secondary school. She said that she could not afford the cost of two residentials on top of the equipment at this time. Her response was, in part, to draw on her family and extended networks, rather than discuss this situation with the school. This was a pragmatic decision, because she said she did not have time to go into school and she did not think they would listen to her anyway:

Isatu: They sent me this letter with three pages of things to buy. There is a lot on the list and then on top of that it’s like they’re charging parents that amount to pay for a trip, then you’re given a list saying that they need three pairs of trainers, this yoga mat, sleeping bag, how many pairs of clothing? I can’t make her take her good wear trainers, I’ll have to go and do a whole lot of shopping

Researcher: Have you talked to them [the school] about it?

Isatu: No, I haven’t really had time, even if I did what would they do? They won’t change it. I work seven to five, basically 11 hours every time I work and that’s long, so I don’t have much time. I have asked her Aunty what I have to do and to give me some things, because she can afford this; she is in a better position than me.

Isatu’s response illustrates how issuing letters about buying equipment appeared like an additional burden to several parents already struggling to fund the OAE visit. She drew upon her extended family to help with financial support and sourcing equipment as well as to obtain general advice. She borrowed sleeping bags and a yoga mat and asked her family, whose children had already been on a residential through the school, what she needed to do.

Spiritual capital

The findings also reveal a further form of CCW that emerged as distinct to the other types of capital. Spiritual capital can be understood as a set of resources and skills rooted in a spiritual connection to a reality greater than oneself (Park et al., 2020). Parents’ spiritual capital was an important resource in support of their resilience. Three parents drew upon their spiritual capital in their discussions about the residential. This offered a way to maintain hope and faith that the camping would be a good thing for their child. For instance, Zara shared how her faith in God helped her in rationalising why she should let her daughter go away camping. Her spiritual capital was an important resource, which she drew upon to remind her that dangers occur everywhere and that you cannot keep your children wrapped in cotton wool. She said:

We do prayers and leave it up to God to guide and protect them when they go. You cannot stop a child. Even if you keep them in the house. If something is going to happen it will happen anyway, so I don’t have a problem.

Zara explained that she put her faith in God that her daughter would be alright on the residential. She said she trusted her teachers and these factors contributed to her support for the residential.

Discussion and conclusions

The purpose of this paper has been to examine the first-hand accounts of Sierra Leonean parents relating to their experiences of organising an OAE residential visit their children were due to participate in. To date, there has been a lack of research on ethnic minority parents’ involvement in OAE visits organised by schools. The CCW framework was utilised to explore parents’ experiences.

The findings of this study contribute to the literature on OAE in several ways. First, I suggest this study challenges the ways parents are understood as either being invested in providing access to OAE experiences or as being understood as barriers, restricting the uptake of OAE. In this study, the parents' positions were more complex and nuanced. Many parents felt compelled to faciliate the OAE visit in order to secure access to cultural capital that they were told by the school their children would gain. Moreover, the scheduling of the OAE visit appeared to several parents as something they had to go along with, which raises important questions about parents’ choices and nature of their involvement.

Second, how parents faciliated the OAE visit provides insights about the ways in which OAE can be reframed to be more representative by drawing on families' lived experiences and assets and resources they hold. These are resources that are not accounted for in extant narratives OAE. By not drawing on the narratives and experiences of parents, they were marginalised from the OAE visit. In this study, the parents were able to capitalise on their resources to negotiate their role in organising the OAE visit so that their children could attend this much anticipated experience. Yet, there will undoubtedly have been parents who could not do so.

As Rose and Paisley (2012) contend, ‘how we construct educational experiences has powerful and direct impacts on the lived experiences of participants’ (p.151). This study illustrates multiple ways in which inequalities may be exacerbated. For instance, while St Michael’s school offered some bursaries to families, this was not available to many of the parents in this study. Ensuring core equipment, such as yoga mats and wellington boots, is provided to students, so that parents do not have to pay for these is important, as previous research has discussed (Browne et al., 2019; Lynch & Moore, 2004; Rose & Paisley, 2012).

Going forward, providers of OAE could usefully start the conversation about OAE visits by exploring the ways in which OAE may fit with parents’ own aspirations and teaching of their children. Further research is required that build insight about the socio-cultural contexts of students’ family life and how this can be better drawn upon in OAE. Parents’ untapped resources could be the starting point for conversations. The relationship between parents and school could be more democratic and inclusive. As Browne et al. (2019) argue, camp experiences can be understood as institutional socialisation, families are also key sites of socialisation. As Kiramba and Oloo (2019) discuss, there is a wealth of education and learning that happens in first-generation West African families, which contributes to capital-building, that is not accounted for in schools. That such a wealth of resources remains largely invisible within the context of OAE residentials organised by schools is problematic within the context of racial justice. It is problematic given the acknowledged need to re-imagine the shape and form of future OAE programmes to be more representative (Browne et al., 2019).

Limitations

Several limitations of this study must be discussed. First, this study took place before the commencement of the OAE residential visit, which was intentional to focus on parents’ experiences of organisingthe visit. The limited scope of the data was intended to illustrate parents’ efforts and motivations relating to their roles in the preparation of the visit. Yet, it would be advantagous to also have explored parents' accounts after the visit. Second, the parents in this study all agreed to their child’s participation in the residential visit. Their views are not generalisable to parents who would not have consented. Further research is required that build insight about the socio-cultural contexts of students’ family life and how this can be better drawn upon in OAE.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Rachel Cook

Rachel Cook is a part-time PhD candidate in education at the School of Education, Communication and Society at King’s College London. Her research interest is the contribution of the family context to first/second-generation Nigerian and Sierra Leonean girls’ personal resources for engagement with outdoor science learning. Her research is funded through a scholarship with the Rosalind Driver Scholarship Fund at King’s College London and the Field Studies Council. Her thanks also to Natural England for their support.