Continuing political conflicts in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) have pushed many individuals to seek refuge in other countries. The U.S.  has remained one of the preferred destinations for refugees and immigrants from various parts of the world (UNHCR, 2022). According to the literature on displaced people and their resettlement, the U.S. currently has a population of over 10,000 Congolese refugees who resettled in different parts of the country. After entering the host country, Congolese children, like other refugees, must adapt to a society with different customs, learn the English language, attend school, and interact with their peers. They often encounter difficulties regarding their ethnic identity, experiences with microaggression and discrimination, and more nuanced social and behavioral expectations. The Migration Policy Institute (2015) emphasized the interconnection between stress, unemployment, and poverty that resettled families initially struggle with when they move to a new place. These reasons might be the most significant factors preventing refugee students from progressing in their educational journeys and successfully integrating into society. Through a qualitative case study, this study led to two dissertation manuscript chapters that examined the perspectives of one Congolese family on their children鈥檚 transition to a U.S. college education.

In the first manuscript, I drew upon the tenets of Critical Race Theory to focus on the racialized perspectives of the family鈥檚 experience in U.S. higher education. The findings highlighted 1) the role of difference, 2) multilingualism as an asset, 3) segregation based on difference, 4) systems that confuse rather than clarify, and 5) educational aspiration as counter-storytelling. In the second manuscript, I utilized Tara Yosso鈥檚 Community Cultural Wealth (CCW) model to examine the children鈥檚 experiences transitioning from high school to college. In highlighting the CCW tenets, I described the narratives that the family constructed to describe their experiences related to resistance capital, familial capital, social capital, and linguistic capital. The use of these two frameworks contributed to a deeper understanding of the intersectional experiences of this transnational family as they related to their post-secondary aspirations and transition from high school to college. This study seeks to reframe the conversation about families with refugee experiences from one of pity and benevolence to one of resilience and familial resourcefulness.