As Princeton, and other universities, expand their efforts to diversify their student bodies, increasing attention is given to first-generation college students and those from disadvantaged backgrounds. Resulting in large part from 1998 changes to financial aid policies, Princeton has seen a significant increase in the number of students from poor families: “Although less than half of undergraduates were on financial aid throughout the 20th century, nearly two thirds of them were by 2010” (A brief history of Princeton admissions). Still, the median family income at Princeton is $186,000 and a full 72% of students come from the top 20% of US earners.
While increasing access to the university for students from lower socioeconomic backgrounds is critical for increasing the diversity of college campuses, the legacy of wealth at institutions of higher education doesn’t disappear when poor students come to campus. In their book, Paying for the Party, Elizabeth A. Armstrong and Laura T. Hamilton argue that “students from similar class backgrounds share financial, cultural, and social resources, as well as lived experiences, that shape their orientations to college and the agendas they can readily pursue.” For poor students on college campuses, the financial, cultural, and social orientations that shape the college experience are often so different from their own, that they experience “culture shock,” a lack of ownership over the college experience, and what Anthony Jack calls Assimilation Blues, a “feeling of alienation that poor people feel in places that are supposed to provide a way out of poverty” (The Privileged Poor, 53).
Creating inclusive cultures for poor students on college campuses requires widespread cultural shifts and additional institutional support and Princeton has taken significant steps to ease the transition to Princeton for low income and first generation students. In 2015, Princeton created the Scholars Institute Fellows Program to support first-generation and lower-income students at Princeton. The program runs an intensive summer program for incoming freshmen (the Freshman Scholars Institute) that introduces students to campus resources, creates robust communities and social supports, and introduces key skills in advance of the school year in addition to providing ongoing support. In addition to these institutional programs, there are several things faculty can do to decrease the barriers poor students experience in the classroom.
First Steps:
In his book, The Privileged Poor: How Elite Colleges are Failing Disadvantaged Students, Anthony Jack gives several suggestions for creating an inclusive environment for poor students.
- College is not a “golden ticket” out of poverty. “Too often we think about those youth who make it out of distressed communities and into college--especially elite colleges--as having already won.” However, it is critical to remember that leaving poverty can be an emotionally taxing experience for students. Being admitted to an elite college does not mean that students can or “will take advantage of all the connections and resources they have access to on campus.”
- Students enter college on unequal ground. It is easy to “think of students who advocate for themselves as simply individuals who are more engaged, more invested in their education, and perhaps, more deserving of support,” however, it may be that those students who are not “engaged” simply don’t know how to go about taking a more active role in their courses. Course policies that require students to take initiative without explaining how to do so may inadvertently amplify the differences between students on a daily basis.
- Stop rewarding insider knowledge. “University faculty and staff need to assess all of the tasks we perform each day and ask ourselves whether these are helping our students or hindering them.” Commonly used words like “syllabus, liberal arts, prerequisite, internship, fellowship, and credit” can be foreign and alienating to some students. “Something as simple as professors describing the purpose of office hours in the first class of the semester could be a step on the way toward making explicit the tacit expectations that permeate so many facets of college life.”
- Feelings of exclusion may extend beyond the college setting. “If students believe that the college recruited them, promised them an academically challenging yet socially enriching experience, and then intentionally made them feel like outsiders when they arrived,” they may opt out of the very professions and post-graduate opportunities that can facilitate their upward mobility. Creating inclusive environments in the classroom can go a long way to communicate to poor students that elite opportunities are indeed for people “like them.”
Key Resource:
- The Privileged Poor: How Elite Colleges are Failing Disadvantaged Students (2019) by Anthony Jack.