@Pizzagirl Really? How will some of these things ever get “better” if the folks at the top don’t make it happen and, instead, continue to look out for their own simple interests? Isn’t just doing your thing and paying your taxes going to lead to furthering the status quo…or worse?
I feel like I’m feeding a troll here, but: what you consider an “obvious answer” comes off as a patronizing attitude towards these low SES students, as if they are mere tokens whose use value must be properly exploited by the institution. Otherwise, these universities are wasting their “gelt” on an unsustainable social engineering experiment. I rather doubt that Harvard would agree. Nor would Stanford – to raise an example not addressed directly in the article, but who has nonetheless raised their qualifying full-need income dramatically this year.
These students are gifted, diligent human beings, many of whom have the first chance in their family to attend a high-caliber research university. The admissions committees at the institutions in question generally look for students who are going to become self-determined, talented leaders in their respective, chosen fields. The percentage of students who are admitted to these places is so small now such that they are very unlikely to choose any student without the requisite capability to succeed – whether they are poor, rich, or in-between.
The purpose of the article is to shed light on the implementation of the SES programs: these institutions have not yet created infrastructures that integrate and support these students as successfully as they might. It is not to suggest that Harvard is in the business of placing demands on how low SES students contribute to society.
I think people are confusing kids who don’t have extra spending money at college with those in the article who are poor and lack experiences. Kids who have parents who are on CC are miles ahead of the kids in the article. They may not have been to Europe or ridden a horse or gone to space camp, but they have at least one parent who knows how to use the computer, who can read in English, who has a bank account. My kids are in the ‘no money for beer, eat in the dining hall’ group and never went to 8 weeks of summer camp in New Hampshire, but they did go to girl scout camp, have been on airplanes, have cell phones with data plans and have computers. I can help them planning classes and with their taxes. I can suggest topics for papers. I can help them deal with paperwork or a problem with a roommate or professor because I’ve been to college.
We’ve had some pretty lean years and I was talking to my daughter about it recently. She said she didn’t know we were poor when we were. She and her sister went to Catholic school, wore the same uniform as everyone else, got to be in the choir and girl scouts and other activities that other kids were in. We just didn’t go on vacation or to full price movies or host birthday parties at Chuck E. Cheese’s. We used the library for books and computers and went to free concerts in the park. But I knew how to do all those things. I also turned down the opportunity for my kids to be the scholarship students at a Country Day school. I didn’t want them to be the poor kids in a very wealthy environment. The school would have included them in everything, but socially we couldn’t have kept up with the camps and birthday parties and enrichment classes. Even paying for them to join sports teams would have been a struggle for me. I babysat for some kids who attended this school and remember them complaining they’d gone no where for spring break - just to their condo in Aspen! All the other kids had gone to Hawaii or Europe or, well, just somewhere better than skiing in Aspen (I’ll admit, the condo wasn’t fancy). These kids were not spoiled at all, not nearly as wealthy as their classmates, but still way ahead of your average Joe as far as opportunities. All three went to Ivies or LACs in New England without BMWs but with plenty of life experiences despite the disappointing spring break in Aspen.
@rhandco “A problem” refers to increasing unwanted attention and pressure. At some point, I suppose it becomes “harassment” by some definitions I’ve seen.
Thrift store shopping is in among my daughter’s well-to-do full-pay boarding school crowd.
Unless someone has literally grown up 100% insular - inner city, never on a field trip, never in a suburb, never in a car, never in a public place frequented by many people from many walks of life, I cannot believe for a moment that someone “poor” or even “POOR” would not have had to deal with “unwanted attention and pressure” in the past.
Would this be from the set of friends, or from professors or administrators?
And when you read about the programs that are getting underway at Columbia University, don’t you think that going on the radio and announcing the state of affairs (kids not getting medicine they need, kids selling themselves to “get by”) is drawing unwanted attention and pressure to at least some of the homeless student population there?
My father had to live in the YMCA after he graduated college on the GI Bill. It was very very cheap, but very unsafe. About ten years after that, he was able to buy a 3 bedroom house. College is the path to success, if the student can stick it out.
I agree with what others said - you have to have a sense of pride that doesn’t come from money, and you also need to realize that someone with more money than you is no better - and no worse - than you are.
The idea that “some of the other girls DISCOVERED” that the students shops at thrift stores makes me very doubtful that “the other girls” are worth any time or attention. Poor them, what a tragedy if one of their group didn’t fit “the mold”. Perhaps some of them are hiding financial woes and trying to put on a brave face.
I was able to go to Spring Break at a friend’s house one year in college. Her parents put up eight college kids, for free, in a ranch house with three bedrooms, most of us sleeping in the living room in sleeping bags. I was thankful for the opportunity. No one asked about why we couldn’t afford to go somewhere fancy for spring break, our friend was nice enough to offer up her house. There are many decent people at Ivies and other top schools.
It just feels to me like that student needs to reach out for some mentoring, if she really thinks she has to put on a facade to be accepted at a “top school”. To me, if I found out a friend in college was shopping at thrift stores, I’d think she was smart.
“problem” refers to increasing unwanted attention and pressure. At some point, I suppose it becomes “harassment” by some definitions I’ve seen."
I’ll buy that in middle school, kids make fun of another kid who doesn’t have the “right” jacket, shoes, etc. I’m less inclined to buy it at the college level.
Goodness gracious. My daughter is full pay at an Ivy and she shops at thrift stores. Why is that a problem?
I never said this student was “poor” or “POOR”, only that she shopped at thrift stores.
@2018dad That’s a good question.
@JustOneDad,
I’d rephrases 2018 Dad’s question as, “In what way is that a problem?”
@Pizzagirl I’m pretty sure that the terms “unwanted attention and pressure” are applicable to all ages. Who likes things that are “unwanted”?
True. My daughter and her friends also shop online @ niftythrifty.
Justonedad, stop being coy. Just answer the question.
I think some of them do indirectly which is a whole different story.
“Thrift store shopping is in among my daughter’s well-to-do full-pay boarding school crowd.”
“True. My daughter and her friends also shop online @ niftythrifty.”
Big difference between wanting to do so and having to out of necessity.
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I agree, but I was responding to the notion that a kid would get flak from her peers for shopping at a thrift shop.
An unaddressed issue is the stratifying effects of forming groups based on SES. My impression is that these colleges are continually trying to obliterate them, at least for the upper SES students. From a sociological standpoint, is it in these students’ best interests to form groups/alliances that limit them to others who share their same limited experiences?
The odd thing is that you can also get flak from your peers if you purchase something from a high end store. That whole “check your privilege” can make students feel uncomfortable as well. I tell my D who is away at school to say she “forgets” when someone asks her where she got a particular item, unless she knows that person really well. You never know what the response will be.
In general, I advise my kids to steer clear of conversations that relate to money.
PG,
Actually, depending on the given campus culture or environment one happens to be in, people snobbing off of other people on basis of fashion and material displays does happen beyond middle school, into college, and well into adulthood.
I’ve personally experienced this a few times while walking around the NYU campus and other NYU alums I’ve known have remarked about the "fashion obsessedness of a critical mass of well-off NYU students and those trying to emulate them.
Another thing to keep in mind is that while folks like you and yours truly could care less what other people think of our clothing choices, many others cannot and expecting them to do so by telling them to “get over it” is not only unhelpful, but smacks of victim-blaming when the actual deserving target of opprobrium is the one making the negative judgmental remark about one’s fashion choices or materialistic displays or lack thereof in the first place.
A bit of empathy should make one realize we can’t expect everyone to have the same wherewithal to shake off such negative judgmental remarks.*
- I actually find their remarks amusing in the same light as a tiny kitten puffing him/herself up and acting as if he/she is a large tiger/lion ready to devour me. Such a cute little fashionista, you. :D
** The irony of an ENTJ asking a fellow NTJ to be cognizant of such factors isn’t lost on him.