| dc.description.abstract | This study sought to understand how the educational expectations of adolescent boys and girls are shaped in Ghana, drawing on interviews with students in the final year of junior high school (JHS). The expectations of boys were found to be higher than that of girls. This was in line with the finding in Bofah and Hannula (2015) about students’ expectations in Ghana. The norms, values, and expectations of the study area, concerning the possible selves of boys and girls in most social domains, do not permit them to forge equal academic possible selves focused on similar educational attainments. For girls, the massing of their expectations around diploma attainments was the result of what they hoped to become or avoid becoming in domains that are family-related. Within similar domains, the possible selves of boys did not delimit they education they could have. They, therefore, had academic-focused possible selves and those who reported doing well in the class were inclined towards university level attainments. They usually linked their academic performances to future educational institutions and programmes. Girls mostly had possible selves focused on vocations and hoped to complete school early; engage in less demanding vocations; get married, and spend more time on family-related activities. This led to the massing of their expectations around diploma attainments because some educational attainments, such as university degrees, were perceived by them to lead to occupations that have demands that could alienate a person from the family. The influences of ‘significant others’ on adolescents’ expectations took a gendered pattern. And, the differences in expectations between boys and girls reflected inequalities existing in those patterns and in favour of boys. Within the family, the models for adolescents’ expectations were parents and siblings of the same sex; within the school, female teachers encouraged girls to work hard so that they could in the future enrol in tutorial colleges just as they did; girls had shared expectations with their peers, and role models outside of their families were important to them; on the contrary, shared expectations were not present in boys’ peer groups, and there were lesser influences of role models outside of boys’ families on their expectations. It was suggested that interventions to increase girls’ expectations should focus on the family and the school, by encouraging norms that emphasise the importance of higher education for all young people irrespective of gender. | eng |