Do You Know a High-Achieving Student Kept From College Because of Money? | Hacker News Reader

Do You Know a High-Achieving Student Kept From College Because of Money?

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10 pointstokenadult11 comments

No, but I know many medium-achieving students who could have contributed a lot more productively to society if they'd had the chance and the money to attend college.

By focusing on only the high-end (and the low-end) we ignore what makes America a great place to be.

The gifted will find a way. The untalented and those lacking willpower usually won't, no matter what.

Everyone else needs a little help, help that actually matters.

I wonder how much students who are poor look in high school like medium-achieving students when they would really be high-achieving students if they were in a more resource-rich environment.

See

http://www.ams.org/notices/200502/fea-kenschaft.pdf

for an example of what I am concerned about.

"a great many gifted and motivated young people are excluded from college for no other reason than their ability to pay, and we have failed seriously to confront the problem."

I can only think of two people who came somehwat closeclose to this description, and they were weighed down by family obligations, not paying for college per se.

I almost find it hard to believe in America that someone would be kept out of college by the price of admission. Many grants and scholarships are need based or partially need based, not to mention that many of the rest are achievement based so the "High Achieving Student" discussed here would qualify for those as well. Also, student loans are generally not hard to get.

Finally, if they could not finance it in other ways this "High Achieving" student they could join the military. If you are active duty, 100% of tuition is paid and your salary will easily handle books. The Gaurd programs differ by state, but they pay most tuition. Also, if you accept a commitment ROTC will pay.

If you need to support a family (such as having a child while still in high school or being the primary caregiver for a sister after your parents died) that might be a nearly insurmountable barrier, but aside from that I find it hard to believe a "High Achiever" would not be able to get into college for purely financial reasons.

I can only think of two people who came somewhat close to this description

I can think of quite a few of my contemporaries, and some young people a little older than my oldest child, who had to trade down in quality of university among all universities who admitted them because they couldn't afford to go to the best university at which they were admitted.

I can't think of examples of exactly what Jay Mathews is asking about, but I think he biases his question by assuming that poor students with low grades in high school are not "motivated." They may simply be disliked by their teachers.

I can understand that. I know many people who decided to go a step down in prestige (quality of university education can be tricky, but I think most people will agree on the level of prestige of an institution at least roughly), my wife and I both included.

But not being able to afford an elite private school is very different from not being able to afford a university education.

I dropped out of MIT due to money -- I'd received no financial aid and no other assistance, and couldn't get loans (since I was under 18); I tried working and consulting to pay, but ended up about $50k behind in "late tuition payments". I had turned down full honors scholarships to other schools, mainly because I really wanted to go to MIT.

Luckily this was 1998 and I left to go start a crypto ecash startup in the Caribbean, first of several startups. I think 1 semester in a top school, then dropping out to do startups, might be a better education than enduring 4 years without really doing anything special. That said, I wish I had been able to complete a degree; I am 30 now and sometimes think about ether going back full-time to MIT, or doing a UK MBA, or taking classes at another school and then either finishing there or returning to MIT.

In retrospect, ROTC might have been the best option, but there were a few specific reasons I didn't do it at the time.

Not directly. There are situations (at every top-notch institution, I think) of sorts that all the candidates are excellent achievers, no matter what measure.

Then there is a problem how to differentiate between them further.

This is where the concept of "fit" comes in, where the recruiting board tries to enrich the "social experince" of this particular microsociety. For example, thinking is, a group of physics graduate students living in the dorms may enjoy a little improvised cello performance by one of them. This happened to my friend. He had a very strong application but, no doubt equally strong, cellist was choosen. My friend had to work part time for the greatest part of the year to afford undergraduate studies at all and it never occured to him that a cello, or any other extracurricular activity (for which he wouldn't have time anyways) was that important to be a well-rounded physicist.

Sorry for this grammar. Hurts my own forgiving eyes.

Money considerations may influence kids long before we bother to measure whether they're high-achieving or not.

This organization seeks to help just these kind -- poor but brilliant students.

http://ffe.org/programs/eligibility-criteria.php

Yes, but they were not in a public school, but rather a small private school. Mostly A's with a couple B's. Not too tragic though, as he has a better job now with more room for growth than most of his peers that did get their BA's.

It's all about drive. If you have drive, you will succeed regardless of you formal education. A motivated person will not remain ignorant, even though they may not have the certification to prove it.

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