middle three quintiles of family income go to very selective schools, and less than 3% go
to elites or Ivys.^101
The American higher education system operates as a “caste system: it takes Americans
who grew up in different social strata and it widens the divisions between them,”
concludes public policy expert Suzanne Mettler.^102 It’s easier for elite kids to get into
selective schools because parents’ social networks give them access to the people who
matter and because elite kids can do the unpaid internships and community service
selective colleges now expect to see on their applications. It’s also just easier to get in,
period. A child from the professional elite is three times more likely to be admitted to a
selective private institution than a lower-class white with similar qualifications.^103
At a more basic level, working-class kids not only may not know how to get into elite
schools; often they don’t even understand that there’s a big difference between going to
Amherst and Michigan State. Indeed, they may have never heard of Amherst. One class
migrant who ended up attending Brown wrote that her guidance counselor didn’t have
much guidance to give: “He didn’t know much about Brown or any other schools I was
applying to, didn’t have any advice for applying, and didn’t look into it afterwards.” Her
younger sister, who ended up at Wellesley, fared little better: her counselor didn’t even
know where Wellesley was. She also remembers that their counselors would sometimes
actively discourage them and their friends from applying to top-tier schools. The attitude
was “You’ll never get in, that’s not for you, why’d you want to go there?” remembers
their cousin.
Part of this is geographical. Kids are more likely to hear about a college that is close by,
and fully 57% of selective colleges are in the Northeast or California.^104 So-called
education deserts, or communities in which there are either zero colleges or universities,
or only one community college nearby, are mostly situated in the rural areas of the
Midwest and Great Plains, where many white working-class kids live. In contrast,
professional-class kids often go to colleges far from home. Their families miss them, but
typically feel it would be inappropriate to complain. Not so with working-class families,
who expect their kids to remain in their families’ clique network throughout their lives.
(This is particularly true of Latinos, but also holds for many whites.)^105
Even if they’ve heard about selective schools, working-class kids of all races also know
they’re expensive. They may not know scholarships are available, or may be unable to
pay even application fees.
- Why Doesn’t the Working Class Get with It and Go to College?