<p>
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Not everybody is pleased with early decision programs. Several universities, including Princeton and Harvard, have ended their early decision programs on the grounds that they discriminate against lower-income students, who often lack access to the extensive advising resources that help their wealthier competitors prepare their applications."
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<p>I guess as much as that assumption works in favor of lower-income students, I think it's a little bit of a leap to assume "extensive" resources are always available to help "wealthier" competitors. Is there no middle class in college admissions? I mean, I know we're a shrinking minority perhaps as a group, but does this mean there will remain only a huge chasm where the middle class used to be?</p>
<p>Before answering the OP's question, I'd like to say that one should EXPECT a lot of wealth at a college which advertises it's COA as $61,466 annually. Secondly, I don't find that assembling 27% of the student body using ED to be abusive in the slightest. (My D and I visited one well-known LAC which took half of their freshman class from the ED pool.)</p>
<p>That said, an average middle class family -- Mom, Dad, two kids, average house/mortgage/income (for the community in which they happen to live) -- will face MAJOR sacrifices paying for two educations at private colleges. Hence the term "financial safety" has come to prominence.</p>
<p>On the other hand, how many inner-city school graduate have the necessary test scores to compete with the Columbia ED cohort? So I'll grant that "middle among those qualified to attend Columbia" will include a lot of families with high enough incomes to pay for a Columbia education. Mea culpa.</p>
<p>The middle class that suffers with private college costs includes those families who cannot pay for such college without planning and saving well before the costs are incurred. Those who are deemed too poor to be able to this have the possibiity of financial aid. Those who have the money on hand do not have to worry about it.</p>
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Secondly, I don't find that assembling 27% of the student body using ED to be abusive in the slightest.
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What would you say is abusive? 35%? 50%? 95%? While the wealthy in this country have no issues with having their kids committing to attend a wonderful school that costs $60K a year, many if not most in this country are not so fortunate. They'd prefer to make the decision after seeing the financial aid packages, cognizant that a school can say its meeting 100% of need even if that need is met mostly (even entirely) with loans that will saddle them and their child with debt for decades to come. </p>
<p>It's not abusive to award almost 1/3 of the places at Columbia to those who are children of the most fortunate in our society? Maybe we should abandon any pretense of our educational system being a leveler open to all based on merit, and just say that spots at top colleges are just another luxury for the wealthy.</p>
<p>When I was growing up- a while ago, middle class people did not attend expensive private colleges. In fact, in my suburban middle class town, young adults attended an out of state public university about 1/10 of the time, this was when you could count as a state resident, if you paid taxes and voted there, another 1/10 attended an instate private school, generally one affiliated with their church, 1/10ths attended an instate public school, - perhaps 2/10th went to a community college & everyone else went to work, including myself.</p>
<p>Now, 30 odd years later, I know people who have attended or paying for their children to attend elite schools & I expect they consider themselves middle class.</p>
<p>What I thought I was saying- was that our idea of "middle class" depends on our perspective.
I don't think anyone has agreed on " what is middle class".
Is it socio-economic group?
What income?
What education level"
As far as I can tell- on CC, middle class in terms of income could be anywhere from $50, 000 a year, to $300,000. It just depends on where you sit on that scale.</p>
<p>Colleges that are upward of $30,000 for tuition, seem to have generous need based aid & also seem to meet 100% of need. So how is coming up with your EFC, unaffordable for " middle class"?</p>
<p>Class expectations change from generation to generation. In my mother's generation, girls who were wealthy and smart attended Barnard; smart, middle class girls attended Hunter (a highly-regarded public women's college). Most of the middle class students in my graduating class enrolled at SUNY school, often with the aid of a Regents Scholarship. </p>
<p>Elite schools are elite for a reason - - primarily because they have historically enrolled the well-heeled. Heck, many dorms at residential women's colleges still have "maids quarters" - - smaller rooms, now assigned to freshmen - - and some wealthy girls still broard their horses at school.</p>
<p>Midlle class kids at elite schools is a fairly recent phenon. For those middle class families in the $50-100K range and who are eligible for need-based aid, the elite schools are affordable (no loans, generous grants, meeting 100% of need or paying no more than 15% of income). But for upper middle class families, especially those in urban areas where annual income of $200K for a family of four doesn't go nearly as far as one would think/hope and who may not qualify for need based finaid - - not so much. </p>
<p>But who said opportunity is limited to those who attend elite school? The real oppty is for low income and first-gen students for whom a degree - - most often NOT a degree from an elite LAC/uni - - is the first step towards the middle class.</p>
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<p>When I was growing up- a while ago, middle class people did not attend expensive private colleges.<<</p>
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<p>Definitely true where and when I grew up. Although I think that growing up out west definitely skewed folks toward the state schools. Private LACs didn't exist in my state.</p>
I agree that for a sub-set of these folks, applying after 2006 at a very few schools, this statement is/could be true.</p>
<p>It is also quite untrue for a large number of middle class families whose assets/source of income don't fit with the formula contained within Profile. Our own case may be instructive. We own a tiny cabin on a ranch. Not a good thing for FA. We have an un-saleable personal services business (small law practice) that makes money most years and another one that loses money some years (ranch). Not good for FA. (Artificial value of business one added in, assets of business two added in, depreciation of assets added back in, business losses added back in.) We have virtually all our retirement savings in non-qualified assets. Not good for FA. </p>
<p>The need-based aid formula works quite poorly for some folks, really well for others. Maybe not that many are as screwed as us, but when you are one of the fellas on the outside looking in at million dollar sheltered asset folks getting mega-aid.....it still seems to suck a little. But I could be wrong. ;)</p>
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When I was growing up- a while ago, middle class people did not attend expensive private colleges.
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That seems at odds with accounts I've hard of the situation many enjoyed up until the 60's or later; in 1970 a year at Stanford was $2400 according to International</a> Herald Tribune. Not cheap, but doable for many middle-class kids. So maybe they weren't going from your community, but they were going from others. And for the immediate post-WWII generation things were even better. For example
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The original GI bill was born out of necessity and fear. With millions of soldiers returning from the war, politicians were worried there would be mass unemployment and social unrest.</p>
<p>The legislation — which was to provide veterans with $500 a year (enough to pay for any university then) — was an attempt to delay their re-entry into the crowded labor market and to pacify the returning troops. At the time, some higher-education leaders questioned the wisdom of sending millions of battle-hardened veterans into the nation's classrooms. Others worried that colleges would be forced to lower their standards and admit unqualified veterans.</p>
<p>"Colleges and universities will find themselves converted into educational hobo jungles" by out-of-work veterans, warned Robert M. Hutchins, president of the University of Chicago, in an 1944 editorial in Collier's magazine. Still, after the bill passed, most colleges rushed to accommodate the new students. By the fall of 1947, the peak of their enrollment, veterans made up half of the student body at four-year institutions.</p>
<p>A majority of the 2.2-million veterans who attended colleges under the original GI bill enrolled at private institutions, with many of them going to Ivy League institutions and top liberal-arts colleges, says Keith W. Olson, a professor emeritus of history at the University of Maryland, who has written a book about the original bill. Even more veterans, about 4.9-million, enrolled in vocational and technical training. Cost</a>, Convenience Drive Veterans' College Choices - Chronicle.com
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What has changed are the costs and opportunities -- costs way up, opportunities down. Many people know someone of who went to college in the 60's or earlier and was able to pay for it thru a part-time job on campus. The part-time jobs paying $40-60K a year are hard to find ;)</p>
<p>I agree with emeraldkitty4. Back in the mid 60's few of us ever considered attending a private college. Most went off to the local community college or state college. I was among the few to venture out of state, travelling 550 miles to OSU-quite an exotic choice at the time. One friend went to Hobart, another Springfield, another Princeton and a third Notre Dame. That was about it.</p>
<p>And yes we were a solid middle class community with a large %age of students being the families of IBM'ers.</p>
<p>o'loog, if you don't mind sharing, what was the need based aid situation at OSU back in the day? Would your family (your back then family) have been able to send you in today's system, all things being equal? OOS at OSU today would not be affordable straight up for many , if any, middle class families (straight up meaning without merit aid awards). Neither would Michigan, Virginia, William and Mary, any of the Cali UC schools, ..........</p>
<p>To quote from Wikipedia's article on the American middle class:</p>
<p>"Everyone wants to believe they are middle class...But this eagerness...has led the definition to be stretched like a bungee cord — used to defend/attack/describe everything...The Drum Major Institute...places the range for middle class at individuals making between $25,000 and $100,000 a year. Ah yes, there's a group of people bound to run into each other while house-hunting."
—Dante Chinni[4]</p>
<p>Agreed your situation isn't the norm. We are far closer to it. At a middle income, we received very reasonable aid from Columbia. And that was before the recent aid changes which would have upped it. And from what i have read here, HYP's FA policies are even more generous now. H expects about 10% of income up to a 180000 level. </p>
<p>A kid from our very non-privileged, middle to lower middle class HS just got into H this week. I'm happy to see them look beyond both the privileged few and the cherry-picked lower SES to see the kid in the middle.</p>
<p>cur, havent see a post from you in a while. Need based aid at OSU in the mid 60's? I didnt have a clue and was offerred none. Since I was the first in our family to enroll in college, our family never knew that such aid existed. We just assummed that we would have to pay for tuition/room/board. How naive most families were back then. </p>
<p>I am not certain but I think OSS tuition was less than $2400 and I did take out student loans to pull my part of the weight. My dad was an IBM'er so the cost of college was doable. I did get a golf scholarship offer from SUNY-Fredonia but turned that down because I wanted to major in engineering.</p>