<p>Hunt:
1. My H and I work in quite different fields. He does not go to my social events and I don't go to his. Nothing to do with "elite education" as our degrees are from the same institutions. It's about interests. We learned early on that we are bored to tears by the job talks that pass for conversation in each other's groups of colleagues. Oh, he can talk to the plumber and I cannot. It's not snobbery on my part, just total lack of knowledge about what makes machines work or not. But I could talk to our painter. No knowledge of mechanics required.</p>
<p>2.I don't know whether expectations are a function of the kind of education one receives. More likely, college graduates expect to be able to maintain the standards of living they are accustomed to at home, regardless of the institution they attend or the major they chose. They did not live through the lean years in their parents' lives when the latter were first starting out.</p>
<p>"Thank you, marmat. That is * what I was "just saying." It's mini, not you (apparently) who asserts that the middle-class at P is negligible."</p>
<p>I NEVER said anything of the sort. In fact, just the opposite. I cited data - current data - about YALE, and noted, explicitly, not once but twice, that the efforts at Princeton resulted in a different picture. I further pointed out that Princeton was making such efforts (and spending a lot of money to do so) because, for whatever reason (and having nothing to do with my personal opinion), they must have perceived a limitation related to their previous admissions/financial aid policies. (The data at Princeton would still likely indicate that well less than 30% of the student body comes from U.S. families in the middle and upper middle income quintiles - $43k-$100k, but well up from where they were 8 years ago.)</p>
<p>Whether they should be lauded for this, or Yale should be chastized for their own lack of effort (at least as indicated by the data) is a matter of opinion. My own is that it is their money, and they can do what they want with it.</p>
<p>mini, on many previous threads you have stated that P has a negligible middle class in its student body. I will concede that in this thread you have seemed to begin changing your tune with respect to that. However, I still see you using data rather loosely, for example, here:</p>
<p>"The data at Princeton would still likely indicate that well less than 30% of the student body comes from U.S. families in the middle and upper middle income quintiles -"</p>
<p>It's these kinds of statements -- 'likely,' 'indicate' -- that I object to as statements of fact.</p>
<p>"We learned early on that we are bored to tears by the job talks that pass for conversation in each other's groups of colleagues."</p>
<p>I've had the same experience, but it is also my experience that people who had a broader liberal arts education tend to maintain broader interests later, even if they are in specialized professions. I've seen this both in law and medicine. Of course, it doesn't have only to do with education; some people are totally focused on their work because that's just how they are.</p>
<p>"It's these kinds of statements -- 'likely,' 'indicate' -- that I object to as statements of fact."</p>
<p>Well, as it turns out, Princeton posts most of this data. All you have to do is look it up. At the gross level, it is very simple. Simply take the percentage of full-paying customers, the percentage of Pell Grant recipients, add together, subtract from 100%, and you have the actual percentage of all students receiving financial aid who are not Pell Grantees (incomes roughly $43k-$180k. Then you can go to the Princeton website, and find out what percentage of the student body receiving financial aid comes from families earning more than $100k. (No adjustment made for international students, whose income status or "quintile" we know nothing about.)</p>
<p>This is not rocket science, and if you were truly interested, you could do it yourself. (The fact that you haven't suggests strongly to me that you are not.)</p>
<p>The more important question, which relates to the subject matter at hand, is why Princeton felt it so important to change their admissions/financial aid policies. From an educational perspective, did they feel their students were missing out on something?</p>
<p>^More likely than not, Princeton felt like it was missing out. Many students students who excel in math and science have parents who work in research, academia, and engineering, making them likely to be in the middle and upper middle income brackets.</p>
<p>As I've written before, I think the "no-loan" policy was directed at these upper quintile students (top 20% but not top 3% - incomes $100k-$180k), because at least some were heading off to Vanderbilt and the like with large merit awards (and the fact that this could happen increasingly in the future). But the changes in aid for those below the top 20% is not well-explained this way. I think that the Pres. felt the student body was lacking the benefits of a more socio-economically diverse class (and noted, like I did, that Princeton was less diverse in 2002 than it was in 1980). I think her emphasis on the new residential colleges is also directed at helping students increasingly reap the benefits of that diversity.</p>
<p>Whether that happens in practice remains to be seen.</p>
<p>"if you were truly interested, you could do it yourself. (The fact that you haven't suggests strongly to me that you are not.)"</p>
<p>LOL, no kidding. ;) You're clearly the one so interested, although I've never understood why. On the one hand, you claim it doesn't matter to you, but for a couple of years you've consumed considerable keystrokes over this, as if it's quite meaningful to you -- or more importantly, should be meaningful to P applicants & their parents. It just isn't. (Sorry to disappoint you.) I'm sure there are many students who believe, often correctly so, that they might not fit in socially to any Elite -- be that an Ivy, an LAC, even a public Elite. But there are thousands of applicants who care an awful lot less about the issue than you seem to.</p>
<p>Hunt:
We BOTH had the best liberal arts education. We can talk music, philosophy, literature, current even--and we do. But somehow a lot of social chitchat is professional gossip or does not require a college degree ("and how are your kids? Can you recommend a landscape gardener?" and the like).
And anyway, a liberal arts education is not the same thing as an elite education.</p>
<p>"You're clearly the one so interested, although I've never understood why."</p>
<p>I would be interested in knowing that wherever MY KIDS attended college, they would be able to reap the benefits of diversity - which would mean that both there was significant diversity in the student body, and the college administration thought it important that this diversity was utilized to bring about respectful dialogue about race and class. (And yes, I do think this critical to a good education, often more critical than what goes on the classroom - I didn't care much for the essay provoking this conversation, but I do think the author's sentiments are in the right place.) But, thankfully, there are thousands of colleges out there, and so I really DON'T care what any single one of them does in this regard - if they decide to shortchange the education of their students, it's no skin off my teeth. If they are private, they can use their money any way they please, and so can I (even if there isn't much of it.)</p>
<p>As for Princeton, neither of my kids chose to attend as an undergraduate. My older one will be starting her Ph.D. work there this fall.</p>
<p>What the author of the article seemed to imply was elite meant
Ivy League and a few others. But there are hundreds of colleges that provide a liberal arts education.
Caltech or MIT are as much elite institutions as HYP, but they are not liberal arts institutions.</p>
<p>(For the record, I have a "tiger" on my new pre-owned 1995 Saturn. In another environment, it might give some people paws (sorry for the pun). Here, I don't think anyone notices.</p>
<p>
[quote]
Many students students who excel in math and science have parents who work in research, academia, and engineering, making them likely to be in the middle and upper middle income brackets.
[/quote]
</p>
<p>There is fallacy in concluding that a u. has a diverse 'class" of students based purely on an analysis of the student body's income distribution. Is the son of a Harvard-educated public defender of a different "class" than the son of high school educated millionaire clothing manufacturer? How about the daughter of a Vanderbilt-educated science teacher versus the daughter of a highly successful MacDonald's franchisee? Yes, one might own more "stuff" than the other, but is the first example more "disadvantaged" than the second? Based on their parents' incomes alone, can you conclude that they will bring a certain type of diversity to the campus? Without knowing more, I don't think you can.</p>
<p>
[quote]
Based on their parents' incomes alone, can you conclude that they will bring a certain type of diversity to the campus? Without knowing more, I don't think you can.
[/quote]
</p>
<p>I've been saying that, less well than you, for a while. Despite our income, my kid of uneducated parents is much more diverse to a top campus than her best friend who is African American with parents who are a principal and a corporate lawyer and went to top schools themselves.</p>
<p>You can most certainly conclude that they will be diverse as regards income, and what their parents are able to put on the table. I'm sure you would agree that the student from NYC who comes from a family earning the median income ($60k - with half earning below that) will come with a different set of experiences than one with $200k (and a house).</p>
<p>AND (as I expect you know full well), colleges these days pay particular attention to the diversity brought to campus by first-generation college students. </p>
<p>But diversity by itself offers little if it isn't the subject of honest and respectful dialogue.</p>
<p>
[quote]
I'm sure you would agree that the student from NYC who comes from a family earning the median income ($60k - with half earning below that) will come with a different set of experiences than one with $200k (and a house).
[/quote]
</p>
<p>That same child who five years ago made less than that median and didn't have a house is still the same child and brings a totally different experience than someone with an educated, affluent family. Just as the affluent child brings a different experience because she is black.</p>
<p>mini, I wonder why I would you would believe (as you imply in your large paragraph in post 170) that I <em>don't</em> care about "MY KIDS'" (mimicking your drama) experience of comfort/diversity in higher ed. It's just that I'm not required to accept as factual, your extrapolations, based on your idiosyncratic methodology, that she (or any P student of any graduating class) is <em>not</em> having such 'diverse' interactions. It's still very presumptuous of you to think that you know such things. You simply don't. Give it a rest.</p>