23 ms·

Cal State L.A. turns the most low-income students into top earners

226 points by burritofanatic 9y ago

fidels 9y ago
Highlight for me: > One of the really striking findings of the study was, that you would in some sense really rather know where somebody went to college rather than how much money their parents make, if you wanted to guess how much money they were going to make in the future
- CryoLogic 9y ago
  https://www.ssc.wisc.edu/cde/cdewp/98-07.pdf https://www.ssc.wisc.edu/cde/cdewp/98-07.pdf At the bottom of the study you see education is the most important factor in career success for your first job. About 7x more accurate than parent's income.
  - oculusthrift 9y ago
    hm, how much does parents income determine education though..
    - alehul 9y ago
      Why is this being downvoted? To elaborate: if, hypothetically, one's parent's income was a huge determining factor in one's education, and in turn one's education was the only relevant factor to one's income, then there would be a 100% correlation between one's education and one's income, and a statistically much smaller one between one's parent's income and one's education. Although we see that strong correlation between education and income, we should evaluate the previous step through analyzing the correlation of parent's income to your education, not the correlation of parent's income to your income as that would be more indirect. Please correct me if I'm missing something.
      - alehul 9y ago
        Edit: in the last sentence of the first paragraph, the statistically smaller one would be parent's income and your income; sorry for the mixup
      - aaron695 9y ago
        > Why is this being downvoted? A young teenager understands correlation and causation If a study gets this wrong (it might happen) please explain how it has? Or please explain or say how the study didn't try and differentiate? Else OP is just producing spam. Studies obviously account for it. The default is something so very simple is looked at. It's up to OP to explain why the obvious isn't correct. Besides you care about causation then a parents income is not really a changeable variable. People can chose to study further (Or helped to study further) or chose to study less. What's important is not a parents income, which lucky isn't anyway.
frank_nitti 9y ago
I got my BSCS from this school, and landed a great gig within a month of graduation. As a "re-entry" student on a tight budget (30 year-old working food service), I met many others who were similarly driven to build the skillsets and relationships to launch their careers as efficiently as possible. Anecdotally, I will say these factors likely boost the effectiveness of this particular campus: 1. Smart, capable students have the "inferiority complex" of being surrounded by CalTech, USC, UCLA. They know they need to push harder to have equal footing when stepping into the industry. 2. Several of the industries represented in Los Angeles are more interested in loyal, hard-working candidates than prestigious/elite geniuses. I have talked with many representatives from companies partnering with CSULA on student projects who have expressed this. 3. Students I met were generally more interested in launching their careers than in pursuing the quintessential "college life", e.g. parties, campus societies 4. Specifically for STEM students: the Los Angeles tech scene has deep roots with the aerospace industry, as well as a lot of companies doing real tech work without the flair of typical SV/NYC companies. I had instructors who work (or have worked) at NASA JPL, AT&T, Boeing, Western Digital, and in medical research at USC/UCLA.
- kelukelugames 9y ago
  Number 2 could be a positive spin on not wanting to pay employees more.
  - afterburner 9y ago
    Absolutely. I've personally experienced a workplace where the managers preferred hiring from the lesser respected university in the area, because they were able to undercut even more on salaries.
  - dbcurtis 9y ago
    Eh... maybe. But that is only an initial hire effect. Once you get into a big company, there is a salary band for each pay grade, so things even out if there is meritocracy. Years ago, when I lived in the upper Midwest, I had fellow manager tell me he liked to hire engineers that grew up on dairy farms. "They know that they have to show up every day. They know that a certain amount of st comes along with every job, even great ones, so you might as well just spend a few minutes with a shovel and get it out of the way. They know the work doesn't get done by somebody else if they don't do it." As a manager I've had the experience myself of convincing kids from fancy schools that, yes, I really do expect them to contribute to the less fun assignments, too. Only once did that not have a good outcome -- but that guy had other issues, too.
obblekk 9y ago
One thing I don't understand - if these universities are: 1. Running at a profit (growing endowments) 2. A path to the middle class Why doesn't the government just roll the profits from the current pool of public uni's to new public uni's until prices start falling and demand is satisfied? Seems like it could only be good for society?
- whatshisface 9y ago
  That sounds like it would destroy the incentive to do a good job in the first place (and the incentive to donate/make endowments to your alma matter, why bother when that money will just be taken away?). Instead, why don't these univiersities roll their own money into expansion?
  - akhilcacharya 9y ago
    I'm still not sure why people donate either.
    - IncRnd 9y ago
      People donate through what are known as charitable gift annuities. It's a tax minimization and income strategy.
      - akhilcacharya 9y ago
        Does that actually work? You're still parting with $X after all.
        twblalock 9y ago
        Yes, it works. There are a lot of ways to use charities, trusts, and similar things to avoid taxes.
      - twblalock 9y ago
        Plus they can get their name on a campus building.
SamReidHughes 9y ago
The top five schools are all in areas with a lot of recent immigrants, of course. That's the best supply of smart kids from low-income households.
- woodandsteel 9y ago
  Don't worry, the Trump administration will soon end that.
- tabtab 9y ago
  I have to agree. The first generation of immigrants are generally poor, but eager for their children to move up the ladder, and do everything they can to make that happen. It's often the main reason they came.
aerodog 9y ago
Did anyone catch how deliberate they were with ensuring two Jewish students were in the picture? Why?
- BackPropagate 9y ago
  @dang YCombinator seems obsessed with criticizing Jews. Why?
- danans 9y ago
  Why does it matter that they were in the picture?
  - Girlang 9y ago
    Because YCombinator hates Jews. They are obsessed with them, and will always criticize Jews whenever they can.
- krapp 9y ago
  No, but I am wondering why you feel two Jews in the same crowd at a school in Brooklyn is even worth mentioning.
akhilcacharya 9y ago
This was a good article and despite the location of CSLA a good look outside of the coastal elite education bubble. Far too often the focus is only on the elite students at the elite schools when its clear upward mobility, just in sheer quantity, is better created at less elite public institutions like the CUNY schools or the CSUs. Hell even the culture war aspects are overstated - the "campus free speech" pearl-clutching is based on the experiences of maybe 5-7 elite institutions, and the entirety of the "Asian discrimination in admissions" controversy is based entirely on the superiority of 3-5 elite schools. Far more needs to be done to extend upward mobility to everyone in this country and that isn't going to happen by focusing energies entirely on the HYPSM. Relevant - https://fivethirtyeight.com/features/shut-up-about-harvard/ https://fivethirtyeight.com/features/shut-up-about-harvard/
- SamReidHughes 9y ago
  CSU LA has had one of the most notable campus free speech problems. California's public universities try to discriminate by race but are hindered by Prop 209.
- kenhwang 9y ago
  There's a reason why California has the CC/CSU/UC system split up. Each system and tackle different missions within public education. The CC system works for adults with many weekend/night offerings and a huge emphasis on usable skills and trades. The CSU system is the budget/value offering to young adults with a good blend of trades/liberal arts with a focus on practical applications. Both of these systems are excellent for high volume upward mobility when they're functioning. Then there's the UC system which serves as the halo product that's supposed to draw in or retain the best and brightest. This mostly serves to keep the middle class from leaving California, or when that fails, draw in upper-middle class from elsewhere. Are California's "elite public institutions" doing less for upward mobility than the CC/CSU system? Probably, but that's not it's main mission. It's trying to preserve the existing middle class, which is arguably just as important as raising the lower class.
  - DrScump 9y ago
ausjke 9y ago
Glad to know there is a better way than Affirmative Action. I know AA does two things: 1. upper class non-white/non-Asian young adults took advantage of economically disadvantaged white/Asian students to enroll into good universities, shamelessly just because they have a better skin color. 2. these not so well-prepared AA students got into good universities because of their skin instead of their merit, unsurprisingly many of them can never graduate and thus have wasted resources for all. They could earn a decent life by going to the school that fit them the best, including the school mentioned here, plus so many others to choose from.
- kelukelugames 9y ago
  3. it divides Asians against other people of color. So white students can be admitted at lower GPAs and SAT scores than Asian students without upsetting them.
  - whatshisface 9y ago
    Privilege schemes set everyone against whichever groups are perceived to be getting better treatment. If you want to make a kid hated, treat him better than his friends for no reason...
    - kelukelugames 9y ago
      Every group but Asians get better treatment in college admissions. Yet we, in general, ignore the group with the most admits due to privilege schemes.
      - adventured 9y ago
        You'll need to present a substantial study proving that extraordinary claim (that every other group gets better treatment in admissions across the whole of the US). The actual evidence for that across the US is practically non-existent. I'm aware of a few infamous instances of argued bias in California, which has resulted in lawsuits. Asians have the highest university attendance rate and the highest education attainment rate in the US.
base3 9y ago
I had a privedged international education and taught at Berkeley and Chicago, but the hardest working student I ever knew was an undocumented refugee who started at CSLA and transferred to Northridge for his junior and senior years. To save bus fare, he slept in the bushes at Northridge. Last year he got his BS and found a good job. He supported himself through school as a sexworker. I'm in awe of his grit and endurance. We need schools that can accommodate hard-working students who succeed despite unconventional lives. And We need such people of remarkable courage and character to become leaders in corporate life. I'm proud to support the Cal State system with my taxes.

Highlight for me: > One of the really striking findings of the study was, that you would in some sense really rather know where somebody went to college rather than how much money their parents make, if you wanted to guess how much money they were going to make in the future

CryoLogic 9y ago
https://www.ssc.wisc.edu/cde/cdewp/98-07.pdf https://www.ssc.wisc.edu/cde/cdewp/98-07.pdf At the bottom of the study you see education is the most important factor in career success for your first job. About 7x more accurate than parent's income.
- oculusthrift 9y ago
  hm, how much does parents income determine education though..
  - alehul 9y ago
    Why is this being downvoted? To elaborate: if, hypothetically, one's parent's income was a huge determining factor in one's education, and in turn one's education was the only relevant factor to one's income, then there would be a 100% correlation between one's education and one's income, and a statistically much smaller one between one's parent's income and one's education. Although we see that strong correlation between education and income, we should evaluate the previous step through analyzing the correlation of parent's income to your education, not the correlation of parent's income to your income as that would be more indirect. Please correct me if I'm missing something.
    - alehul 9y ago
      Edit: in the last sentence of the first paragraph, the statistically smaller one would be parent's income and your income; sorry for the mixup
    - aaron695 9y ago
      > Why is this being downvoted? A young teenager understands correlation and causation If a study gets this wrong (it might happen) please explain how it has? Or please explain or say how the study didn't try and differentiate? Else OP is just producing spam. Studies obviously account for it. The default is something so very simple is looked at. It's up to OP to explain why the obvious isn't correct. Besides you care about causation then a parents income is not really a changeable variable. People can chose to study further (Or helped to study further) or chose to study less. What's important is not a parents income, which lucky isn't anyway.

frank_nitti 9y ago

I got my BSCS from this school, and landed a great gig within a month of graduation. As a "re-entry" student on a tight budget (30 year-old working food service), I met many others who were similarly driven to build the skillsets and relationships to launch their careers as efficiently as possible. Anecdotally, I will say these factors likely boost the effectiveness of this particular campus: 1. Smart, capable students have the "inferiority complex" of being surrounded by CalTech, USC, UCLA. They know they need to push harder to have equal footing when stepping into the industry. 2. Several of the industries represented in Los Angeles are more interested in loyal, hard-working candidates than prestigious/elite geniuses. I have talked with many representatives from companies partnering with CSULA on student projects who have expressed this. 3. Students I met were generally more interested in launching their careers than in pursuing the quintessential "college life", e.g. parties, campus societies 4. Specifically for STEM students: the Los Angeles tech scene has deep roots with the aerospace industry, as well as a lot of companies doing real tech work without the flair of typical SV/NYC companies. I had instructors who work (or have worked) at NASA JPL, AT&T, Boeing, Western Digital, and in medical research at USC/UCLA.

kelukelugames 9y ago
Number 2 could be a positive spin on not wanting to pay employees more.
- afterburner 9y ago
  Absolutely. I've personally experienced a workplace where the managers preferred hiring from the lesser respected university in the area, because they were able to undercut even more on salaries.
- dbcurtis 9y ago
  Eh... maybe. But that is only an initial hire effect. Once you get into a big company, there is a salary band for each pay grade, so things even out if there is meritocracy. Years ago, when I lived in the upper Midwest, I had fellow manager tell me he liked to hire engineers that grew up on dairy farms. "They know that they have to show up every day. They know that a certain amount of st comes along with every job, even great ones, so you might as well just spend a few minutes with a shovel and get it out of the way. They know the work doesn't get done by somebody else if they don't do it." As a manager I've had the experience myself of convincing kids from fancy schools that, yes, I really do expect them to contribute to the less fun assignments, too. Only once did that not have a good outcome -- but that guy had other issues, too.

obblekk 9y ago

One thing I don't understand - if these universities are: 1. Running at a profit (growing endowments) 2. A path to the middle class Why doesn't the government just roll the profits from the current pool of public uni's to new public uni's until prices start falling and demand is satisfied? Seems like it could only be good for society?

whatshisface 9y ago
That sounds like it would destroy the incentive to do a good job in the first place (and the incentive to donate/make endowments to your alma matter, why bother when that money will just be taken away?). Instead, why don't these univiersities roll their own money into expansion?
- akhilcacharya 9y ago
  I'm still not sure why people donate either.
  - IncRnd 9y ago
    People donate through what are known as charitable gift annuities. It's a tax minimization and income strategy.
    - akhilcacharya 9y ago
      Does that actually work? You're still parting with $X after all.
      - twblalock 9y ago
        Yes, it works. There are a lot of ways to use charities, trusts, and similar things to avoid taxes.
    - twblalock 9y ago
      Plus they can get their name on a campus building.

SamReidHughes 9y ago

The top five schools are all in areas with a lot of recent immigrants, of course. That's the best supply of smart kids from low-income households.

woodandsteel 9y ago
Don't worry, the Trump administration will soon end that.
tabtab 9y ago
I have to agree. The first generation of immigrants are generally poor, but eager for their children to move up the ladder, and do everything they can to make that happen. It's often the main reason they came.

aerodog 9y ago

Did anyone catch how deliberate they were with ensuring two Jewish students were in the picture? Why?

BackPropagate 9y ago
@dang YCombinator seems obsessed with criticizing Jews. Why?
danans 9y ago
Why does it matter that they were in the picture?
- Girlang 9y ago
  Because YCombinator hates Jews. They are obsessed with them, and will always criticize Jews whenever they can.
krapp 9y ago
No, but I am wondering why you feel two Jews in the same crowd at a school in Brooklyn is even worth mentioning.

akhilcacharya 9y ago

This was a good article and despite the location of CSLA a good look outside of the coastal elite education bubble. Far too often the focus is only on the elite students at the elite schools when its clear upward mobility, just in sheer quantity, is better created at less elite public institutions like the CUNY schools or the CSUs. Hell even the culture war aspects are overstated - the "campus free speech" pearl-clutching is based on the experiences of maybe 5-7 elite institutions, and the entirety of the "Asian discrimination in admissions" controversy is based entirely on the superiority of 3-5 elite schools. Far more needs to be done to extend upward mobility to everyone in this country and that isn't going to happen by focusing energies entirely on the HYPSM. Relevant - https://fivethirtyeight.com/features/shut-up-about-harvard/ https://fivethirtyeight.com/features/shut-up-about-harvard/

SamReidHughes 9y ago
CSU LA has had one of the most notable campus free speech problems. California's public universities try to discriminate by race but are hindered by Prop 209.
kenhwang 9y ago
There's a reason why California has the CC/CSU/UC system split up. Each system and tackle different missions within public education. The CC system works for adults with many weekend/night offerings and a huge emphasis on usable skills and trades. The CSU system is the budget/value offering to young adults with a good blend of trades/liberal arts with a focus on practical applications. Both of these systems are excellent for high volume upward mobility when they're functioning. Then there's the UC system which serves as the halo product that's supposed to draw in or retain the best and brightest. This mostly serves to keep the middle class from leaving California, or when that fails, draw in upper-middle class from elsewhere. Are California's "elite public institutions" doing less for upward mobility than the CC/CSU system? Probably, but that's not it's main mission. It's trying to preserve the existing middle class, which is arguably just as important as raising the lower class.
- DrScump 9y ago

ausjke 9y ago

Glad to know there is a better way than Affirmative Action. I know AA does two things: 1. upper class non-white/non-Asian young adults took advantage of economically disadvantaged white/Asian students to enroll into good universities, shamelessly just because they have a better skin color. 2. these not so well-prepared AA students got into good universities because of their skin instead of their merit, unsurprisingly many of them can never graduate and thus have wasted resources for all. They could earn a decent life by going to the school that fit them the best, including the school mentioned here, plus so many others to choose from.

kelukelugames 9y ago
3. it divides Asians against other people of color. So white students can be admitted at lower GPAs and SAT scores than Asian students without upsetting them.
- whatshisface 9y ago
  Privilege schemes set everyone against whichever groups are perceived to be getting better treatment. If you want to make a kid hated, treat him better than his friends for no reason...
  - kelukelugames 9y ago
    Every group but Asians get better treatment in college admissions. Yet we, in general, ignore the group with the most admits due to privilege schemes.
    - adventured 9y ago
      You'll need to present a substantial study proving that extraordinary claim (that every other group gets better treatment in admissions across the whole of the US). The actual evidence for that across the US is practically non-existent. I'm aware of a few infamous instances of argued bias in California, which has resulted in lawsuits. Asians have the highest university attendance rate and the highest education attainment rate in the US.

base3 9y ago

I had a privedged international education and taught at Berkeley and Chicago, but the hardest working student I ever knew was an undocumented refugee who started at CSLA and transferred to Northridge for his junior and senior years. To save bus fare, he slept in the bushes at Northridge. Last year he got his BS and found a good job. He supported himself through school as a sexworker. I'm in awe of his grit and endurance. We need schools that can accommodate hard-working students who succeed despite unconventional lives. And We need such people of remarkable courage and character to become leaders in corporate life. I'm proud to support the Cal State system with my taxes.