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Comment by anotherarray | Hacker News Reader

What about the other 99% of talented students that couldn't afford these schools?

These schools are actually some of the most affordable in the country due to their extremely generous financial aid. Poor families pay nothing and even middle class families have minimal contributions. (For example, all of the elite universities I was accepted to cost less than my state school would have.)

Now if only poor people could get educational equality in the 13 years prior to college :-/

Eh, it's hardly impossible. My parents have qualified for food stamps at times yet I still had a pretty decent education.

Being the exception doesn't exclude the fact that poor kids are at disadvantage of gaining admissions to Ivies. A student from Phillips Exeter Academy has a much higher chance of being accepted vs a very smart but poor kid from a rural America high school.

As an example of this comment's point, one of the problems where I grew up is that when you told the guidance counselor you wanted to go to MIT she said, basically, don't bother.

She probably said that because of all the people pushing the narrative that elite schools are only for rich kids. Spreading this myth dissuades thousands of qualified students from applying to top schools where they would get a great education for free.

>These schools are actually some of the most affordable in the country due to their extremely generous financial aid. Poor families pay nothing and even middle class families have minimal contributions.

Except they do not lower the admissions requirements for poor kid that attended sub-par secondary schools. These are the exact kids that would be excluded admissions (in most cases) because third rate secondary school prep does not compare to the prep a student obtains at Phillips Exeter Academy.

I don't know if we should advocate lowering standards of admissions.

Which supports my point poor kids getting into Harvard are at a disavagantage. These poor rural secondary schools don't give excellent college prep for their students, even bright ones. So these bright students risk having lower SAT scores (not matching their potential) & thus would not be admitted.

Offering free tuition sound great until you realize these poor kids would have to have access to the same resources as kids in better positions to be on an even playing field. Except they aren't, but they are still judged the same. Due to that many poor kids are rejected.

Yes. Neither of my parents went to college, and my mother dropped out of high school. I didn't know what the SAT or ACT really was, and never studied in high school because I didn't know how. My family did ok, but I had 0 chance of ever going to a great school. I ended up going to a mid-tier university and have a good job (I got in because I transferred) but getting into a great school would have changed my life so much more. It makes me sad to think about it. Had I had parents who knew what was going on, they could have pushed me toward after school activities, or knew that I actually needed to buy an instrument to be part of the school band, or that I should take the ACT/SAT prep courses. But of course I didn't. Being a white male doesn't help either.

I attended MIT during a time of perceived reduced standards of admissions (IMO; I'm not sure it was an overt and public thing) for some under-represented populations.

I saw some good outcomes from that (friends I met there graduated and became successful who might not have gotten in otherwise), but I also some people come in un or under prepared and wash out, which in my mind is undoubtedly a worse outcome for them than "merely" not being accepted, attending another school and succeeding there.

Elite schools could expand their student bodies considerably and have the average student be just as qualified as the average student was 30 years ago

You're also forgetting there are also talented students outside of the United States.

We do office hours in cities that anyone is welcome to sign up for. We're also going to be opening up signups for the MOOC shortly that anyone anywhere is welcome to participate in.

Through need based financial aid, these schools are very affordable for many of those students.

The marketing departments at these schools have done wonders. People whose families have modest incomes of 100-150k annually are going to pay a very large sum of money to attend these schools. It is only the very poor and very wealthy who do not have issues funding their education at one of these schools.

Except that the median household income in the US is ~55k. There is very likely a middle range of people too wealthy to get financial aid, but not wealthy enough to easily afford it, but calling it 99% is laughable.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Household_income_in_the_United...

Stanford takes care of tuition for families under $125k of assets, but even that means the upper middle classes will spend tons because they'll fall out of that range.

Exactly, less than 125k in assets is absolutely nothing. The reality is that a married couple consisting of two working professionals will not qualify for any of these reduced tuition schemes.

It would help if they also considered whether that income was from one or two people, and divided it by the number of kids so larger families with parents working multiple jobs aren't penalized.

assets and income are two different things.

But correlated. A two-parent, four-income, six-child family in a house just big enough to hold everyone might have $125k in assets, but in no way would they be able to help their kids pay for school, especially the older kids.

They can probably pay for some of the kid's food (because they have been up until now, possibly more efficiently than a college meal plan, but in any case, the household expenses go down when the 18 year old moves out). Some of that money can go to college costs.

I assume GGP was posting the "at no cost" threshold and that doesn't mean that $125,001 in assets and you get no help.

It's been a long time since I appli d for financial aid, but I do recall that other kids in college (though perhaps not college-bound) was definitely a factor in financial aid calculations.

Once you get in. Unfortunately, it's often extremely expensive to build the resume required for getting into these schools in the first place.

It's more expensive in terms of opportunity than money. Sure, an expensive SAT tutor will help but lower class kids usually have to work or take care of a substantial amount of chores in the household. That takes time away from the activities that get them into top schools.

That's really the problem. Sure, its cheap and they have great financial aid, but they don't pay for the tutors and the "life changing" experiences in Africa the rich kids have.

This just ain't reality. Most kids don't get in because they took a trip to Africa. Parents that pay a ton of money on making their kids the perfect college applicant generally get a bad deal and are a small minority.

It's not about paying to pad the application. There are legit methods of expanding your kid's world/mind. Those method generally cost more money than sitting in the house all summer watching tv.

Poor kids may not have a house to sit in and watch tv all day. They are at a major disadvantage and Ivies and other elite schools don't do a good job incorporating them into their schools due to their low sat scores and poor educational training, which is due to their poor socioeconomic status. You speak as if everyone is privileged and have the same opportunities but lazy.

I think we were actually agreeing. My point was that money can convey an educational advantage.

Child enrichment isn't limited to the wealthy. Kids join sports teams, boy scouts, church groups, etc, at all levels of society.

And when everyone does those exact same things, nobody stands out (unless you lack those activities, in which case you are hurt). Look at what a high school degree has become... or what a bachelors is becoming. Truly standing out takes money and/or rare opportunity.

That's just not a reality-derived statement. All it takes is time.

maybe you should start a scholarship fund for them....you know, be the change you want to see and all that.

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