Nomi Prins

Financing Higher Education vs. Intellectual Segregation

Inequality in America permeates too many avenues of life. Most obvious is financial inequality: wages, worker benefits, median salaries of average workers vs. CEO's (the former not keeping pace with inflation, the latter zooming way past it).

But, educational inequality is setting the stage for intellectual segregation. Why? Because not being able to afford a college education is vastly different from not being able to excel at one. Yet, we are increasingly becoming a country where rich white kids get to go to college and reap the benefits of a degree, while poor minorities can't.

This week, the Education Trust released a report examining the make-up of students at 50 major public universities. It showed something that Congress didn't get last year when they hacked the higher education budget by a third. (Yes, that's right; they voted to cut higher education by $14 billion, a full third of its funding, even though it is a mere 1% of the entire federal budget.)

Among other things, it showed a declining percentage of lower income students receiving federal Pell Grants. It also showed that university aid grants decreased by 13 percent for families with annual incomes of $20,000 or less, but increased by 406 percent for those earning more than $100,000, between 1995 and 2003. The argument is that grants are merit based: but it's certainly easier to concentrate on good grades when you’re not worried about having a roof over your head.

College enrollment is projected to increase by 14% over the next decade, 80% of that increase will be minorities, and one in five will be below the poverty line. Yet, graduate rates for minorities after six years of college are below average compared to whites. Why? Affordability: not only of paying tuition (which has increased by 40% on average since 2000), but of balancing other life expenses.

I am writing this blog from Austin where I did a bookstore event for JACKED last night and am staying with family for Thanksgiving. For me, this city is apropos of the report's timing. My student ID chapter centered on a group of Texas University students, all first generation Latina Americans. All were working multiple jobs and receiving a combination of scholarships and aid. One had to leave school because the money her job provided simply took priority, not because she wasn't doing well at her classes. Another cited studies being compromised by work hours relative to other students (the ones who could afford "$200 designers jeans").

More and more this is the distinguishing factor of students entering or remaining in college: not the demands of education itself, but its affordability. Democrats should immediately revisit this issue as they revisit the budget. Without reversing the trend, college will become a privilege for rich white kids, not a way to even the playing field of opportunity. It's time to make education more available for more poor and minorities, period.

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Posted at 2:46 PM, Nov 22, 2006 in
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