Another Nail in the "Need-Blind" Coffin

Parents Forum
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<p>Being so-called "need-blind" (doesn't exist) doesn't make a school more generous (in fact, at least last year, 7 of the 10 prestige privates with the largest amount of grant-in-aid per student attending were "need-aware".) "Need aware" can be used just as well to identify low-income students who would benefit from admissions as it could be used to screen them out. If you want the extreme example of that, look to Berea, with a huge $900 million dollar endowment, and ALL the students attend tuition free, but they have to be relatively poor to get in. Admissions are tough, and yield is the same as Harvard's.. (Indeed, on the face of it, the purpose of the Williams "socio-eq" tag, and the quota it implies, is to screen a small percentage of students in.)</p>

<p>Statistically, MIT is one of the good guys, if one means by that the percentage of students receiving need-based aid. Bowdoin is an interesting example: supposedly "need-blind", 58% of students receive no need-based aid whatsoever. But they are both "good guys" - they are not set up to correct the ills of the society around them (nor do I think they necessary should be.)</p>

<p>If if you look at the Bowdoin numbers, if 58% of students come from families with incomes above $160k minimum (their website says only 42% receive aid), and 10% are Pell Grantees (low-income families), and (like other institutions), 70% come from the top quintile, then less 10% of the student body comes from the "middle class" (incomes $40k - $92k). So what, exactly, did "need-blind" mean? The vast majority of valedictorians and salutatorians in town and cities across America likely come from this income class. We know they are out there - you just have to look at Berkeley and UCLA student bodies to find the ones from California. So did being "need-blind" (doesn't exist) keep middle-income students out, or bring them in? (That's a real question - I'm not attempting to be rhetorical.)</p>

<p>My plea is NOT that these schools enroll more low- and middle-income students. My d. having been one, I hardly have cause to complain, and I am very grateful, though I probably have to rethink whether I really want to subsidize the millionaire's kid with my $25 check. My plea is simply for more transparency, so that those who can't afford Michelle know what they are getting into, and can make sound decisions accordingly.</p>

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<p>Well, how many people in a typical middle class American town do you think you'd have to ask before you'd find one of them who'd have heard of Bowdoin? Whereas it is a school that is well known to elite New Englanders. My point being that the Val from the middle class has to APPLY to get admitted.</p>

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<p>I'm not attacking MIT - the issue is that an MIT ad com posted here and said that the school is "need-blind". I'm just calling him on the validity of the claim. The college does discriminate based on economic factors, whether or not the factors are overt or simply inherent in their admissions process. My point is that at a certain level, "need-blind" is just an additional barrier to the needy.</p>

<p>At least the "need-aware" colleges are honest.</p>

124

<p>wow, Barkowitz, did you reinvigorate this thread. Go to brief business meeting and this thing takes off. I'm going to watch Madam President show, then get back to the box. </p>

<p>I'm not responding to MIT's FA or admit process. Kid is thinking about MEng with MIT in the running. I will say that he is not exactly impressed with the amount of concrete at MIT.</p>

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<p>We are a middle income and very close to the SAMMI values for our area. </p>

<p>*Again, Carolyn offers an source that slants opinion and is offered for debate. </p>

<p>Carolyn's refers, CMU gives merit aid to top students and FA to demonstrated need students and virtually nothing to the "bottom"; Lets put some numbers to this-tuition at CMU ~$35000. Top students "could" get perhaps $. How much they get is dependent on the other school's offer, and there is a cap that CMU will offer. </p>

<p>We got a generous reconsidered offer from CMU but, We still today foot $30,000/yr, our last year, thankyou. We see the issue is that a student and family CAN get merit aid when they really did save and invest and took big chances. We only need to look at the threads to discover what the kids are asking- Do I qualify for merit aid, or What schools offer the best merit aid...
They already know that they can get FA, but can they afford it and how do they make up the difference between FA and the real need.</p>

<p>If however we did not save, invest, take chance and kid is still smart and capable, and thus qualify for FA, we would have gotten a mix of $ of 75% of tuition or a remainder of $8750, which approximates the COA of State U. Since the COA is now parity, CMU has done its civic responsibility and offered a great education to great students. </p>

<p>So what about the "bottom" 142 accepted students? Perhaps they are internationals, CMU offers $0 to them regardless of merit or need, and CMU is heavy international at ~25% (perhaps 35-45 of the 142). The remainder are students are perhaps wealthy and good students, who could very well reject CMU's offer and go to MIT, which only does need base, and would likewise offer these students $0 buckaroos.</p>

<p>Perhaps CMU's Policy and Practice Statement really benefits more students than a need blind policy?</p>

<p>*opinions, numbers, and inferences are my own and not of any school.</p>

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<p>"Well, how many people in a typical middle class American town do you think you'd have to ask before you'd find one of them who'd have heard of Bowdoin? Whereas it is a school that is well known to elite."</p>

<p>Agreed. It took Smith 30 years to develop a program to get the low-income candidates they wanted. It has now taken Amherst ten. It is hard to do - and very costly in time, energy, and money,, and it is virtually guaranteed to hurt you in the college rankings gain. </p>

<p>But the flip side of the argument is that Bowdoin (and they could stand for 75 other schools) is just not very large. They don't need to be well-known by the population generally speaking, just very well-known among guidance counselors at schools not heavily attended by upper middle class kids. I am not downplaying the difficulties or the costs, only noting that those difficulties are not insurmountable. </p>

<p>Berea has no dearth of applicants.</p>

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<p>"Well, how many people in a typical middle class American town do you think you'd have to ask before you'd find one of them who'd have heard of Bowdoin? Whereas it is a school that is well known to elite New Englanders."</p>

<p>It's true that for over 200 years New Englanders have known Bowdoin as a first-rate school, and it's true that probably most typical middle Americans have never heard of it. But it is also true that MANY elite non-New Englanders have heard of it. In the past few months, I have spoken to seven sets of parents - two from Texas, two from DC, and three from California who all said the same thing - which essentially boiled down to:
"My s/d and I would would LOVE to get an acceptance from Bowdoin." I believe the primary reason it doesn't rank with AWS is simply geographical: it is harder to visit than many other top LACS, and some students have reluctantly turned it down because of the plane changes it would take to get to Maine.</p>

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<p>It could be that some schools offering the best need-based aid and incentives for low-income students do not want to advertise these policies. They may want students who are most interested in attending rather than students who are looking for the most financial aid.</p>

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<p>nedad, ... harder to visit, yes; also harder to visit <em>home</em>. Harder = more expensive, too. Many "elite" LAC's are not viable options for low-income families; that's been pointed out in other threads. These also may not be viable options for many middle-class families receiving no FA, for the same reason. </p>

<p>Since higher profile U's are often generous with FA to low-income, whatever "discretionary" (ha) family income remains can be set aside for travel. But even then, travel costs can double for multiple connections or isolated locations. I've not searched for this, but possibly the OOS student body segment of Bowdoin is more "elite," certainly wealthier, than Ivy populations?</p>

<p>Also (addressing earlier posts on this thread), it seems inappropriate that families or students should be attacked or held responsible for the accuracy or inaccuracy of private school reputations, specifically or generally. And since CC parents in particular seem more informed than Citizen Q about reputations vs. realities, there seems to be some preaching-to-the-choir going on by the "anti-elitist" wing.</p>

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<p>The town where Bowdoin is located just got named one of the five best places to retire by a CNN/Money -the story is front page at AOL. So, I assume that the name Bowdoin will reach a new plateau. </p>

<p>In addition, Bowdoin seemed to have moved in that very elite group of US News most favored schools, as its latest ranking exemplified. The bad news is that to climb further, it would have to displace two schools that receive an evern larger preferential status. Otherwise, Bowdoin could become the fourth letter in AWSx as Stanford is in the famous HYPS acronym. Obviously, some people will point out that the correct acronym already exists in the form of WASP. </p>

<p>This would send the typical group that ranks its applications solely based on the ephemeral prestige of a high USNews' rank to the next Barnes and Noble to buy the latest Rand McNally atlas. They know where Stan'foo is, now they'll need to learn about Brunswick, Maine. </p>

<p>Oh well, life is full of surprises. !</p>

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<p>Xiggi - Outside Magazine also named Bowdoin one of the 40 best college towns (#16). Another reason to go to the Atlas!</p>

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<p>I dunno- tommorow it is going to be in the mid/low 30s ( F) in Bowdoin
In Seattle it will be 60 F</p>

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<p>Inasmuch as the original post by Mini made references to an analysis of COFHE schools to show a bias in admissions, it is necessary to expand the view to see if there is really a “smoking gun”. While I believe that the comparisons among the various COFHE schools are mostly trivial, the situation for lower SES students is a LOT more alarming when looking at the so-called first tiers schools. It seems to me that focusing on very well endowed schools such as Harvard, Princeton, or Yale is NOT the best place to find examples of class –or even racial- distortions. </p>

<p>I also believe that Mini’s allegations were well-founded, but that he picked the wrong “candidates” to drive his point home. Thus, I have to apologize for making a similar mistake and failing to look at the “bigger” picture that goes well beyond the COFHE membership. It is obvious that the differences reported below are mostly generated by the schools that are in the lower rungs of the prestigious group. Sadly enough, as opposed to the higher ranked schools, it seems that many public schools are failing to fulfill their stated mission in this regard. </p>

<p>In particular, it is worth noting the the central finding of the study “SOCIOECONOMIC STATUS, RACE/ETHNICITY, AND SELECTIVE COLLEGE ADMISSIONS” written by Anthony Carnevale and Stephen Rose for the Century Foundation was that access to selective colleges is even more highly skewed socioeconomic status (SES) than it is by race and ethnicity. The study showed that 74 percent of students at highly selective colleges came from families in the top quarter of the SES scale while just 3 percent came from the poorest quarter of American families. The study is availabe at <a href="http://www.tcf.org/Publications/Education/carnrose.pdf%5B/url%5D"&gt;http://www.tcf.org/Publications/Education/carnrose.pdf&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p>

<p>Access to selective colleges is highly skewed by race and ethnicity, although not as much as by socioeconomic status. While Asians attain a greater share of seats in four-year colleges than their proportion of the population of eighteen-year-olds, African Americans and Hispanics constituted only 6 percent each of the freshman classes of the 146 “most” and “highly” selective four-year colleges. </p>

<p>What are the TOP TIER or“Most” and “Highly” Competitive schools? Generally, students in this tier are in the top 35 percent of their high school class, have a high school grade point average that is B or better, and score about 1240 on the SAT I or above 27 on the ACT. Colleges in this tier accept less than 50 percent of the applicants. There are 146 four-year colleges in this category, and approximately 170,000 students enroll as freshmen at these institutions each year. Only a tiny percentage of the student population applies to the 146 most selective colleges, a few hundred thousand out of three million high school graduates each year, and an even smaller group attends. Enrollments at the most selective 146 colleges represent less than 10 percent of the nation’s postsecondary freshman class, including four- and two-year colleges.</p>

<p>African Americans and Hispanics were 15 and 13 percent, respectively, of all 18 year-olds in 1995. So blacks and Hispanics were considerably underrepresented at these top schools even with affirmative action.</p>

<p>There is even less socioeconomic diversity than racial or ethnic diversity at the most selective colleges </p>

<p>*SOCIOECONOMIC STATUS OF ENTERING CLASSES *</p>

<p>At first tier colleges:
Quartiles = percentage
Quartile 1 = 3 (poorest)
Quartile 2 = 6
Quartile 3 = 17
Quartile 4 = 74 (richest)</p>

<p>At Community Colleges
Quartile 1 = 21
Quartile 2 = 30
Quartile 3 = 27
Quartile 4 = 22</p>

<p>Seventy-four percent of the students at the top 146 highly selective colleges came from families in the top quarter of the socioeconomic status scale (as measured by combining family income and the education and occupations of the parents), just 3 percent came from the bottom socioeconomic status quartile, and roughly 10 percent came from the bottom half of the socioeconomic status scale. If attendance at these institutions reflected the population at large, 85,000 students (rather than 17,000) would have been from the bottom two socioeconomic status quartiles. Overall, a little more than 22 percent of the students in the top tier of college selectivity are Asian, African American, or Hispanic (11 percent Asian, 6 percent black, and 6 percent Hispanic), while only 3 percent are from families in the lowest socioeconomic status quartile and only 10 percent are from the bottom half of the socioeconomic status distribution. There are thus four times as many African American and Hispanic students as there are students from the lowest socioeconomic status quartile.</p>

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<p>Calmom, Barowitz said it very clearly, and I think honestly --</p>

<p>"Our issue is that many of them aren't applying. The data shows that many students in the lowest quintile just don't have the academic preparation for the rigors of the academic pursuit at selective schools. What we all need to do (and many of us are) is focus on the pipeline. How do we make sure that every student in early and secondary education has access to the same resources to make sure that everyone has an equal chance to build the core competencies needed to pursue higher education."</p>

<p>But you still seem to think that MIT, for example, is overtly discriminating against lower income kids. But if they have the ability, schools like Harvard or MIT etc. will find a way to help academically talented kids financially. The dearth of applications from the lower income levels is a problem of society in general, and I don't think there is any simple solution. People are different. Those with high academic abilities will rise to the top in a knowledge-based society. Those who persist in the lower rungs need more help than just financial aid at Ivy colleges. They need reliable, well-compensated work commensurate with their abilities. Not everyone is cut out to be an engineer or rocket scientist. We need those people, but we also need carpenters, mechanics, builders etc who don't need an elite education to provide a valuable service to society at large. I believe a society SHOULD identify those kids with exceptional ability, to move them in the right direction which will benefit us all at some point in time. We shouldn't waste that resource.</p>

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<p>Anyone who has read The Chosen knows that it is the CRITERIA for admission that create certain kinds of student bodies. When the Ivies discovered that admission by academic merit had led to their having more Jewish students than their administrations thought desirable, they created other criteria -- achievement in sports and extracurriculars, personality, and even HEIGHT, for heaven's sake. With the current requirement by the most elite schools that applicants be "well-lopsided" so that the schools can boast of the superstars they enroll (and have the excellence in extracurriculars they want on campus) those achievements have become more important than ever. The system that was originally designed to limit Jewish admission would now clearly eliminate many poor and minority students, who are more likely to lack the resources to train for super-achievement in extracurricular areas. So no wonder the colleges tag their applications. Most would have a pretty hard time getting in otherwise. </p>

<p>I don't see the current situation as a conspiracy. I think we are seeing current adcoms dealing with the fruit of a system that has been rotten for decades. At the risk of sounding like an old curmudgeon, it's like just about everything else in the world. </p>

<p>As for the words, "need-blind," I think it's a game of semantics. I don't think a top school rejects a student BECAUSE it is too stingy to give him or her money. The student's NEED ITSELF is not the basis for admission or denial. But the student's socioeconomic status, and the life experience that he or she may bring to the school as a result of that (whether the student is privileged or poor) are part of the admissions decision.</p>

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<p>Those who persist in the lower rungs need more help than just financial aid at Ivy colleges.</p>

<p>It isn't so much that they are low income and aren't aware of the most selective colleges.
K-12 is lack of support for students and families in low or even middle income areas.
Our district is convinced that they are a national magnet for special education, even though they have no concept of students being both learning disabled and gifted and their chanel for services is that its cheaper to force people to sue, than provide appropriate services for many.
Our state is pulling the top students down, and using that as an example that the disproprotionality gap is shrinking.
Yes our college dont' serve a representative percentage of the population as viewed by racial and income lines.
BUt what is more critical is that we don't even count students who drop out in middle school as high school drop outs because they never made it to high school.
We don't recognize students as drop outs unless they notified the district they were dropping out.
How many students just disappear.
Its bad enough that many aren't getting prepared for college, but many aren't even getting prepared to graduate high school</p>

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<p>EK, you are right. </p>

<p>And (at least at my D's very economically & racially diverse HS) those few bright low income kids who make it through the phalanx are then directed towards Community Colleges by well meaning GCs concerned about money. Some of them could be getting free rides at excellent colleges, but nobody is pushing those options.</p>

<p>At our So Cal HS, the GCs (each responsible for several hundred kids) push UCs to higher income, higher stat kids, Cal States to higher income, medium stat kids, and CCs to all low income kids as well as high income, low stat kids. Anyone who ends up at a private or OOS school has done it on their own-- because their family supports that option or is 'in the know.' </p>

<p>That is what I hope to do with my CC knowledge-- help put this info into the hands of the kids who aren't getting it. That is what all of us can do to help bright low income kids in our local communities.</p>

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<p>Okay, so I have now purchased the Atlantic Monthly and read the Enrollment Managemet article. The real issue is not "Need Blind" admissions it is the admit-deny financial aid that the system creates.</p>

<p>So, school X can actually be need-blind but the more economically challenged the student is the less chance they often have at getting the financial aid they need.</p>

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<p>So if a school has only so much money available, which would be better to give 1 student a full ride or to support 2 students who can get by with only 50% aid.</p>

<p>Actually many schools will try to divide up the money. Some will get a full ride, some much less. The more students they have paying full, the more available for others who need it.</p>

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<p>edad,</p>

<p>The post was actually non-judgemental because of the reason you cite . . . it is a hard problem. The interesting thing is how DePaul has implemented enrollment management to further their missions "to educate the underprivileged".</p>

<p>In the past I have looked at the gross increase in tuition at all the schools. What would be more interesting would be to see the net increase or even decrease in tuition at schools. Or alternatively, the increase in "revenue" to the schools. I bet that mini and others have this information or at least a few illustrative examples.</p>