<p>Everywhere I've been hearing that very low income households and very high income households typically get an edge in the admissiosn process. Usually the latter consists of legacies, large scale donors, etc... while the former is used to bring diversity. However, the financial aid policies of most elite and upper-tiered schools have been "need blind," where supposedly your income does not hurt your chances of getting in. Well if this is the case, then how do low income households gain an edge in admissions? Is there an income-based affirmative action policy thats similar to the race/ethnic-based chart?</p>
<p>They don't. Where did you hear this? At best it'll give you no boost whatsoever. At worst it'll dent your chances.</p>
<p>it does help a bit in admissions, but hurts in life...</p>
<p>Hm. well I have heard about it everywhere just like dontcha pointed out. Again, I don't know the reasons (or even if its true... there are indeed too may conflicting reports).</p>
<p>I would be ****ed if there was because I fall in neither of those categories...or the ethnic based one</p>
<p>Economic diversity is used by many schools. Probably, as much as anything else, is a by-product of raced based preference litigation as a method of getting around court prohibited preferences based on race or ethnicity at state supported schools such as Michigan. But there is much more to this admirable preference than I can recall at this time.The bit that I recall is that certain quotas are illegal, but that a preference can be used to evaluate candidates. Percent of instate students, for example, is a legal quota (a la Univ. of Virginia), while race based quotas are illegal.</p>
<p>Well, I don't know if "boost" is quite the right word for it. Being low income helps in that the college admissions officers will view your application in the context of your socioeconomic status. I'd imagine they'd be a bit more sympathetic or lenient with grades and test scores and what not because they realize that you were at a disadvantage. Obviously, the poor urban kid who ONLY gets a 2100 on the SAT is more impressive than the rich kid who got a 2300 through the help of a paid tutor. It's also hard to blame the poor kid for not going to feed poor kids in Africa.</p>
<p>define low income...</p>
<p>Low income I suppose would be > $37,000 for a two person household? (This is based on the NACAC fee waiver guidelines)</p>
<p>oops, i meant less than.</p>
<p>See </p>
<p><a href="http://www.hno.harvard.edu/gazette/2007/12.06/99-admissions.html%5B/url%5D">http://www.hno.harvard.edu/gazette/2007/12.06/99-admissions.html</a> </p>
<p>which I think is one response among many to </p>
<p><a href="http://www.businessweek.com/magazine/content/03_27/b3840045_mz007.htm%5B/url%5D">http://www.businessweek.com/magazine/content/03_27/b3840045_mz007.htm</a> </p>
<p>DEFINITELY if your family is economically disadvantaged but includes a student with good achievements, talk that up. The older link posted here suggests colleges haven't considered this issue enough in the past, but perhaps they are coming around to considering it more.</p>