Reply to dont be in the 60th to 99th percentile in income

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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]“A large new study, released Monday, shows that [u]it has not been because these children had more impressive grades on average or took harder classes.[/u] They tended to have higher SAT scores and finely honed résumés, and applied at a higher rate — but they were overrepresented even after accounting for those things.”[/quote]

this is about the 0.1%.  But to me that is not the interesting story.  the interesting story, which the author of the article mostly ignores (she has one sentence) is that the[b] 60-99% percentile is the loser.[/b][/quote]

:roll: Really? That's what you've taken from this. It's admission [b]rates[/b]. The majority of applicants are going to be in the 60-99th percentile income range. Of course they are going to be accepted at a lower rate...there are more of them. If you look up the composition of college campuses, though, I'm sure you'll find that they make up the majority of students.[/quote]

Exactly!  the majority of kids in the 5-50% range do not have T25 schools on their radar.  They grow up with a plan to attend CC then transfer to a state school (for affordability), and if really lucky attend all 4 years at a state school if they can afford it.  They are not obsessed with attending Elite schools, so they don't apply.    [/quote]

Except the article says they accounted for this, and these students are still disadvantaged:

Before this study, it was clear that colleges enrolled more rich students, but it was not known whether it was just because more applied. The new study showed that’s part of it: One-third of the difference in attendance rates was because middle-class students were somewhat less likely to apply or matriculate. But the bigger factor was that these colleges were more likely to accept the richest applicants.[/quote]

One of you is talking about poor students, and one of you is talking about middle class students.

Poor students face many more barriers that prevent them from applying to top schools, or to have the scores needed to get to top schools.  If they overcome those barriers, they are accepted at a slightly higher rate.  That isn't some kind of preference, it's a recognition that overcoming poverty and gathering the credentials to apply is, in itself, an achievement to be recognized, so accepting them at a higher rate makes as much sense as accepting other students who have special achievements at a higher rate.  Middle class and UMC students apply at higher rates, and so even though they are slightly less likely to be accepted than kids who have similar scores and the achievement of overcoming poverty, they are represented at a higher rate in the student body.

But rich kids are advantaged because they are rich, not because they did something particularly hard.  Also their advantage on application isn't balanced by low acceptance rates, because they are both more likely to get the credentials to apply AND more likely to get in once they have the credentials, they make up a large percentage of the class.

The idea that you can compare the two groups or that there's any connection between the two in terms of privilege is absurd.  [/quote]

You may disagree, but it’s not “absurd” to believe that it is appropriate to accept students based purely on their qualifications and not their income level. Your argument assumes that lower income, MC/UMC, and wealthy students fall into separate “buckets,” and that it’s appropriate to accept a higher % of lower income applicants because *your reasons* but not wealthy students because *the college’s reasons.*  That’s the problem with putting students in these buckets and setting up disparate acceptance criteria in the first place. Everyone is going to have different ideas about what is important and appropriate. [/quote]

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