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> But some elite colleges have focused more on being affordable to low-income families than on expanding access. “Free tuition only helps if you can get in," T
by plandis 10y ago
> But some elite colleges have focused more on being affordable to low-income families than on expanding access. “Free tuition only helps if you can get in,"
This is, I think, the bigger problem. Educational opportunities are highly differentiated by wealth at a young age. Better public schools require living in more expensive neighborhoods. Private schools are expensive and even on financial aid difficult for some people to get to. Poor people can't afford to send their kids on summer trips (i.e. summer camp) and effectively the poor are more likely to have learning stop in the summer. To top if off, the guidance people in poor school districts get in/around their senior year is rarely helpful and sometimes just terrible (I.e. councilors telling students to not even bother applying to Harvard, etc...)
So yes, I'd say it's more complicated. When you're poor you're playing against students with a stacked deck. That's not to say there is no personable accountability, but it's not the only determining factor.
- pkaye 10y agoI don't know if we can account for the wealth difference and "stacked desk" at the school level. My city school district has five high schools in difference part of the city. The best ones is near the top of the state academic ranking while the others are average. They all get the same level of funding from the city and the schools look all equally run down. The difference is the demographics of those attending these schools. When they started statewide ranking of schools, families started gravitating to the slightly better schools and driving up the prices on neighboring houses. So this school is full of wealthy and high achieving families despite equal levels of funding.
- EduardoBautista 10y agoYup. I believe that the success of a person has much more to do with their family than what school they go to. But that would place the responsibility on parents instead of the government so this is not a popular opinion.
- striking 10y agoI'm an immigrant. I used to be poor. (after rigorous testing, etc., etc.,) I was given financial aid and accepted into one of the more prestigious private middle schools near me. After that, I went to a (very good) public high school. The difference was that of night and day. The middle school put me ahead of my high school colleagues. I was a year ahead in math, and two years ahead in english. Their computer science education led me to taking APCS a year early, with CS courses at a university shortly thereafter. They had even prepared me for standardized testing like the SSAT and SAT. Yes, your family's important. Yes, there's some anti-intellectualism along the bottommost socioeconomic ranks. But the quality of one's school is a massive factor in how one learns.
- the_gastropod 10y agoDon't most cities contribute a proportion of a school district's property taxes to that district's school(s)? So districts with expensive housing receive more funding than those with cheaper housing. I agree that home life influences schooling outcomes as well. Families with higher incomes can afford for one parent to stay home or to pay for a nanny or whatever. But in addition, many schools are funded disproportionately, where the schools with the most need receive the least funding.
- pkaye 10y agoFor us the school district and city are both the same set so all the property tax funding is pooled together and divided among the schools based on student population and other needs.
- tnecniv 10y agoIf I recall, many of the worst school districts (inner cities) also spend the most dollars per student. I've been told this multiple times, but can't look for a source at the moment. Can someone else confirm or deny?
- vanattab 10y agoThey definitely receive more in federal funds but I am not sure if this takes into account local money raised through levies/property taxes.
- euyyn 10y agoNot disagreeing with the overall point, but summer camp? My grandma had us spend the summer reading and solving exercises of the following grade's textbooks. A trip would have meant to stop learning.
- Broken_Hippo 10y agoYes, summer camp. For example, I spent 2 weeks at a college between 11th and 12th grade taking a graphic design thing - and earned college credit for doing so. I got introduced to plenty I didn't have access to and thoroughly enjoyed the time. Now, my family hasn't been rich by any means, but they wouldn't have been able to afford such a thing just a few years prior. The same goes for after school activities - or even just a trip with the French club to France or Canada. When you are poor, these things are out of reach.
- euyyn 10y agoHuh, interesting. Where I'm from, summer camp is spending time with the Boy Scouts, or volunteering, or literally camping. American movies don't paint a very different picture, so I wasn't aware of "go to college"-kind of camps.
- cgriswald 10y agoIt doesn't even have to be summer camp. Until I could get a job and drive myself, I had trouble even finding transportation to and from extracurriculars, which made my experience at my very good public high school quite a bit less than that of my peers. I also ended up dropping a zero hour AP class, because there was no bus service for classes that early. Any time things like summer camp came up, I just tuned out, because I knew it wasn't going to happen for me. As an adult, I can see that, in some cases, I could have made something happen if I had really wanted it. But as a child, I had the mentality "that's not for me" and could not have even begun to figure out how to make it happen, because I wasn't just poor, but lacked any real support at home. (I was babysitting, but I fell into the poor person trap of spending money to feel better. All my cash went straight to comic books and soda.)