Roosevelt | A Seat in the Lecture Hall: Increasing socioeconomic diversity in higher education from the ground floor

By DANNY BLISS AND TRACY STEELE
2/15/07

This past October, hundreds of students, educators and university administrators converged at Yale for a series of lectures and discussions addressing one of the most flagrant manifestations of inequity in America today: the lack of socioeconomic diversity on our nation’s university and college campuses.

The numbers speak for themselves. According to former Princeton President William Bowen, if American families are divided into quartiles by income, 75% of students at the nation’s 146 most selective institutions of higher education hail from the top quartile; while a mere 3% are from the bottom.

Put quite simply, the average American college student is 25 times more likely to be “rich” than “poor.”

The causes of this staggering statistic are complex. We do know, however, that low income students have the least qualified teachers throughout their educational careers. For example, in California alone, more than a quarter of teachers at schools that have the

highest population of low income students — those in which more than 75% of their students qualify for free or reduced lunch — lack full teaching credentials. The consequences of this situation are clear: According to recent research by nationally renowned Stanford Education Prof. Linda Darling-Hammond, “Among the strongest predictors of student failure on the state tests were the proportion of uncertified teachers and a measure of teacher shortage.”

Admissions and financial aid policies such as need-blind admissions, graduated tuition adjustments based on family income and affirmative action — some of which have become standard at our nation’s most selective universities — serve only as Band-Aids to this problem. The overwhelming conclusion of the attendees to the Yale conference was that these measures are all in vain unless we can make significant progress in improving the first 13 years of education experienced by their intended beneficiaries. More concisely, as Century Foundation Fellow Richard Kahlenberg stated, “We cannot increase socioeconomic diversity in higher education in this country without increasing the quality of K-12 education in our most socioeconomically impoverished neighborhoods and cities.”

Placing our focus and collective efforts toward the preparation and retention of highly qualified teachers to work in our neediest schools ensures a more sustainable solution. We must focus on better preparing a great many students for college, rather than on creating incentives for a select few.

Unfortunately, the unequal distribution of well-qualified teachers has worsened since the 1990s. Improvements in K-12 public education through recent legislation such as No Child Left Behind take important steps in the right direction by holding all students, regardless of socioeconomic status, accountable for high levels of academic achievement and requiring that all students have access to fully certified teachers. However, these new laws have been established without proper support, and have not yet achieved significant results. Case in point: By the end of the last school year, all 50 states were required to have highly qualified teachers in core academic subject areas. Not a single state managed to fulfill this requirement.

In order to bring our most troubled schools up to speed, we must provide incentives for the most qualified, energetic, and passionate teachers to work in them. This, of course, is a daunting task because the schools most in need of qualified teachers usually lack the administrative and financial resources to compete for and retain these teachers. One possible incentive that could be offered to attract top teachers to struggling schools is that of educational loan forgiveness, through federal programs like Pell Grants. Federal Pell Grants not only provide funding to undergraduates with financial need, but can also be put toward easing the financial burden imposed upon graduates of top teacher certification programs who want to work in schools that are struggling.

Pell Grant increases are already being discussed at the federal level. In October 2006, then-House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi spoke at Georgetown, pledging to restore Pell Grant funding — which the current administration cut by $12.5 billion this fiscal year — to previous levels should the Democrats retake the House of Representatives. Last week, President Bush and the Department of Education proposed an increase in Pell Grant funding for the 2008 fiscal year.

The joint effort of top universities and the federal government is required to assure an increase of socioeconomic diversity at colleges nationwide. Some top universities have also created internal initiatives to address this issue through support of K-12 education. A perfect example of such an effort is the recently announced Stanford Challenge, in which Stanford President John Hennessy pledged $125 million to improving K-12 education. We must apply continued pressure on our University officials, the president’s administration, and Congress to increase Pell Grant funding and other initiatives. The future equity of society depends on it.

Danny Bliss is a senior majoring in history, and Tracy Steele is a Ph.D student in the School of Education. This is the first in a series of bi-weekly Op-Eds from students in the Roosevelt Institution.