[socalstanfan1]

[quote author=socalstanfan1 link=topic=11950.msg116605#msg116605 date=1428882148]
[quote author=akCard link=topic=11950.msg116599#msg116599 date=1428875423]
Someone found a downside to the widely-publicized, recent modifications Stanford made to its tuition waiver program

http://www.theatlantic.com/education/arc...ws/390090/

Maybe I came across this article at exactly the wrong time but the story just incensed me with its incorrect title (it's a waiver program, not a giveaway) and the highly dubious, specious, spurious logic pretzels that were used to come to the conclusion that waiving tuition (and possibly more) for economically-disadvantaged but highly qualified students is a bad, bad, bad thing to do.

From my perspective, the only real downside I can see to waiving tuition is ... WHYOHWHY wasn't this program around when I was at Stanford??? I left school with $30K in loans *and still didn't finish!* I know I shouldn't live life carrying around regrets but this is one I just cannot let go.

I was about to post this when it occurred to me that perhaps there *is* a downside to this program. I finally scored a nice outside scholarship for my last year at school, only to be surprised come tax time that I owed taxes on it because the IRS considered the scholarship money as income.

Have just read that article and just want to add a couple of points. The jist of the argument, as I read it, is: can we consider a family making $124,000 "economically disadvantaged"? Not that every family receiving a waiver makes that amount, of course, is at the top end of income-based waiver program, but I think this is the main issue. And I don't think the author considers programs to assist the disadvantaged a bad thing, (in fact, stating that the real problem is not the private schools, but the lack of adequate resources given to pubic schools at the K-12 level, resources which would help give more kids the opportunity to qualify for academically elite institutions) He even terms the goals of such waiver programs "noble" and notes the "generosity" of the institutions involved. I think the headline writer, to some degree, does a disservice to what I take to be the main point of the article: the need for better K-12 education generally.

[/quote]

I think we're reading two different articles because right off the bat, the author clearly says it's not a good idea for people of diverse backgrounds to be at the same school: "...Stanford’s tuition waiver—as well as those at other highly selective colleges—should be cause for concern for anyone who believes that it’s important for both disadvantaged students to gain access to top schools and well-off students to interact with people from other backgrounds. A key problem with this approach to correcting income inequality is that the scale of its impact outside and, most notably, inside the universities is fairly small. Tuition waivers alone cannot level a educational playing field so heavily pitched to the advantage of the wealthy, which is why relatively few people whose families make less than six figures annually attend Stanford."

He seems to be saying the tuition waivers granted to students who qualify for the program is barely a drop in the bucket big picture-wise, which won't fix anything at all, so ... why bother??

Lost in his rush to reach a poorly-reasoned conclusion that Stanford's waiver program is "not good news" because it doesn't help enough people is perhaps a very fundamental reason why so few students, even at a school with a small-ish undergraduate student body, benefit from the school's generosity: self-exclusion by the applicants and/or their families. Because the costs to attend elite schools such as Stanford, Harvard, et. al. is so well known, a student from a different background other than an affluent one might simply look at $50K+/year and think, "I can't afford that," and never even apply in the first place.

I'll agree that tuition waivers at Stanford alone will not fix this country's higher education iniquities but that fix has to start somewhere and at the very least Stanford is taking a step in the right direction.
[/quote]

Not sure if we are reading two different articles, or just focusing on different aspects of the same. He doesn't say it is a bad idea for people of diverse backgrounds to be at the same school. He is just not sure the waiver programs are achieving that goal. The argument that he "seems to be saying" why bother I just see differently. He notes that Stanford is much more economically diverse than it had been, that it is "understandably proud" of this fact, and the tone of the argument seems, to me at least, to be that the universities are really doing what they can, but it's not enough. I don't sense the same, fatalistic, why bother.

Sure, he says the fee waiver isn't going to address a lot of the ills of the education system and income inequality (begging the question of how much of the burden  of addressing this problem should really fall on any university admission policy). From a certain perspective, increasing the income level for which people can qualify for the fee waiver doesn't do anything additional to make a private education attainable for poor people (who were already covered under the earlier policy with the lower income threshold); it allows the university to widen the number of applicants available for the waiver, now including every family in the $100,00-125,000 range. Hardly "poor" or "underprivileged" by most people's definition.

My defense of the article hinges on this section, which I find to be the core of the argument. In describing the students who fall under the $100,000 (now $125,000) income level, but still meet the university admission requirements, the author presents this description of their educational background:

"these students tend to enjoy tremendous benefits growing up—among them opportunities to live in neighborhoods alongside like-minded families that have the resources to emphasize and invest in education, go to the best schools, hire tutors, and make the significant financial sacrifices needed to build an impressive extracurricular portfolio."

That is the section I tried to elaborate on when describing the difference between, say, a kid who attends an elite private HS and has private tutors and SAT courses (and whose family income may fall in that $125,000 range) and a kid coming from more dire circumstances.

Please don't misunderstand my position. I think the waiver program is great, and does make Stanford available to a wide range of people who otherwise would never be able to attain such an outstanding education. I also think your additional point, that people often rule themselves out of the application for Stanford because they assume it is beyond their financial means is a very, very important point. Stanford and the Ivies should, IMO, aggressively market the fact of their waiver program. I did not realize this point myself until seeing it here. But I think there is more than just self-selecting out of the process going on here.

IMO Stanford, Harvard, and all the institutions who make themselves accessible to top students of all income levels should be commended for their efforts, and for their awareness of themselves as institutions that play an important role in helping to form a good society. The bigger goal should be expanding the pool of qualified students who can apply for admission.

[socalstanfan1]

[quote author=socalstanfan1 link=topic=11950.msg116605#msg116605 date=1428882148]
[quote author=akCard link=topic=11950.msg116599#msg116599 date=1428875423]
Someone found a downside to the widely-publicized, recent modifications Stanford made to its tuition waiver program

http://www.theatlantic.com/education/arc...ws/390090/

Maybe I came across this article at exactly the wrong time but the story just incensed me with its incorrect title (it's a waiver program, not a giveaway) and the highly dubious, specious, spurious logic pretzels that were used to come to the conclusion that waiving tuition (and possibly more) for economically-disadvantaged but highly qualified students is a bad, bad, bad thing to do.

From my perspective, the only real downside I can see to waiving tuition is ... WHYOHWHY wasn't this program around when I was at Stanford??? I left school with $30K in loans *and still didn't finish!* I know I shouldn't live life carrying around regrets but this is one I just cannot let go.

I was about to post this when it occurred to me that perhaps there *is* a downside to this program. I finally scored a nice outside scholarship for my last year at school, only to be surprised come tax time that I owed taxes on it because the IRS considered the scholarship money as income.

Have just read that article and just want to add a couple of points. The jist of the argument, as I read it, is: can we consider a family making $124,000 "economically disadvantaged"? Not that every family receiving a waiver makes that amount, of course, is at the top end of income-based waiver program, but I think this is the main issue. And I don't think the author considers programs to assist the disadvantaged a bad thing, (in fact, stating that the real problem is not the private schools, but the lack of adequate resources given to pubic schools at the K-12 level, resources which would help give more kids the opportunity to qualify for academically elite institutions) He even terms the goals of such waiver programs "noble" and notes the "generosity" of the institutions involved. I think the headline writer, to some degree, does a disservice to what I take to be the main point of the article: the need for better K-12 education generally.

[/quote]

I think we're reading two different articles because right off the bat, the author clearly says it's not a good idea for people of diverse backgrounds to be at the same school: "...Stanford’s tuition waiver—as well as those at other highly selective colleges—should be cause for concern for anyone who believes that it’s important for both disadvantaged students to gain access to top schools and well-off students to interact with people from other backgrounds. A key problem with this approach to correcting income inequality is that the scale of its impact outside and, most notably, inside the universities is fairly small. Tuition waivers alone cannot level a educational playing field so heavily pitched to the advantage of the wealthy, which is why relatively few people whose families make less than six figures annually attend Stanford."

He seems to be saying the tuition waivers granted to students who qualify for the program is barely a drop in the bucket big picture-wise, which won't fix anything at all, so ... why bother??

Lost in his rush to reach a poorly-reasoned conclusion that Stanford's waiver program is "not good news" because it doesn't help enough people is perhaps a very fundamental reason why so few students, even at a school with a small-ish undergraduate student body, benefit from the school's generosity: self-exclusion by the applicants and/or their families. Because the costs to attend elite schools such as Stanford, Harvard, et. al. is so well known, a student from a different background other than an affluent one might simply look at $50K+/year and think, "I can't afford that," and never even apply in the first place.

I'll agree that tuition waivers at Stanford alone will not fix this country's higher education iniquities but that fix has to start somewhere and at the very least Stanford is taking a step in the right direction.
[/quote]

Not sure if we are reading two different articles, or just focusing on different aspects of the same. He doesn't say it is a bad idea for people of diverse backgrounds to be at the same school. He is just not sure the waiver programs are achieving that goal. The argument that he "seems to be saying" why bother I just see differently. He notes that Stanford is much more economically diverse than it had been, that it is "understandably proud" of this fact, and the tone of the argument seems, to me at least, to be that the universities are really doing what they can, but it's not enough. I don't sense the same, fatalistic, why bother.

Sure, he says the fee waiver isn't going to address a lot of the ills of the education system and income inequality (begging the question of how much of the burden  of addressing this problem should really fall on any university admission policy). From a certain perspective, increasing the income level for which people can qualify for the fee waiver doesn't do anything additional to make a private education attainable for poor people (who were already covered under the earlier policy with the lower income threshold); it allows the university to widen the number of applicants available for the waiver, now including every family in the $100,00-125,000 range. Hardly "poor" or "underprivileged" by most people's definition.

My defense of the article hinges on this section, which I find to be the core of the argument. In describing the students who fall under the $100,000 (now $125,000) income level, but still meet the university admission requirements, the author presents this description of their educational background:

"these students tend to enjoy tremendous benefits growing up—among them opportunities to live in neighborhoods alongside like-minded families that have the resources to emphasize and invest in education, go to the best schools, hire tutors, and make the significant financial sacrifices needed to build an impressive extracurricular portfolio."

That is the section I tried to elaborate on when describing the difference between, say, a kid who attends an elite private HS and has private tutors and SAT courses (and whose family income may fall in that $125,000 range) and a kid coming from more dire circumstances.

Please don't misunderstand my position. I think the waiver program is great, and does make Stanford available to a wide range of people who otherwise would never be able to attain such an outstanding education. I also think your additional point, that people often rule themselves out of the application for Stanford because they assume it is beyond their financial means is a very, very important point. Stanford and the Ivies should, IMO, aggressively market the fact of their waiver program. I did not realize this point myself until seeing it here. But I think there is more than just self-selecting out of the process going on here.

IMO Stanford, Harvard, and all the institutions who make themselves accessible to top students of all income levels should be commended for their efforts, and for their awareness of themselves as institutions that play an important role in helping to form a good society. The bigger goal should be expanding the pool of qualified students who can apply for admission.