Introduction
Next time you find yourself in a class full of students, I implore you to take a look around the room and observe the diversity and various backgrounds that inhabit that space. Understanding certain privileges and how these can negatively impact marginalized groups’ access to higher education is a big bite out of the apple, but it is necessary when assessing how we can all improve and move forward together, as a society. There exist certain privileges that can negatively impact an individual’s pursuit of higher education. It’s an unfortunate truth that some children are born into better odds that they will graduate from college than others, thus the playing field isn’t always fair; one underprivilege leads to the next, creating a ripple effect throughout that child’s whole life. This page serves as an educational resource, and focuses on three main points that affect these odds: racial systems, socioeconomic class, and geographic privilege.
Racial Systems
In order to approach this goliath issue, we must first take a look at some basic statistics. According to research done by the US Department of Education, a generalized observation can be made that the rate of progress has varied between different racial groups. Those statistics show us that when it comes to undergraduate enrollment rates, in 2016, the highest rate of enrollment for all undergraduates was achieved by Asian populations (58%), contrasted by Black populations at 36%, in addition to the undergraduate enrollment percentages for White populations (42%) and Hispanic (38%). Between 2000 and 2016, undergraduate enrollment rates of Hispanic
populations more than doubled (134% increase over the 16-year time span). In 2010, graduation rates measured within a 6-year timeframe were highest among Asian populations, with 74% of students graduating. This can be compared with White populations at 64%, Hispanic populations at 54%, and Black populations at 40% (Figure 1). When it comes to financial aid, in 2015-2016, the demographic of students who received the most federal loans were Black populations (71%), versus their Asian counterparts who received the least amount of loans (31%) (De Brey et al, vi). I have integrated these numbers into Figure 1 below for easy assessment, but keep in mind the variability in years this data was collected from; this merely serves to visualize the statistical observations made. It can be noted here that the percentage of federal loans received by each demographic are inversely proportional to enrollment rates and graduation rates.
In order to cross-reference the given information given, we should then assess the median household incomes across these different racial demographics. I have created Figure 2 (to the left) in order to visualize all this information as we maul through it. In 2015, the median household income for White families was $68,785. For Black families, the median income was $41,935, which was 39% less than their White counterparts (Guzman 5,7). It should be noted here that from 2005-2015, median incomes for White households experienced an average of $2,000 increase, whereas Black households did not experience any increase whatsoever (Guzman 5,7). The median income for Asian households was $88,204, and for Hispanic households, that median income was $51,811 (Guzman 9,11). That ranks, in order from highest median income to lowest: Asian, White, Hispanic, then Black households. When comparing this data to the dataset above, we observe that the median household income is proportional to undergraduate enrollment rates and graduation rates, and inversely proportionate to federal loans received.
We have to consider that no establishment these days, nor any law in place, will explicitly state “Hey, we are racist and xenophobic!” It takes an in-depth analysis at how things are affecting, influencing, and impacting the processes around them (i.e. the ripple effect), which in turn may create a chain of events that cause serious implications for minority groups. In other words, it’s less about one specific cell, and more about the functioning body as a whole. But where does one even begin to confront such a zeitgeist? Analyzing the data from above, we concur that Black students from households with lower median incomes may have to take out more federal loans than their fellow students from other demographics, as the numbers have shown us. Ultimately, this places Black students at a higher risk of debt upon graduation, or in other words, a ripple effect. (Riviera).
Socioeconomic Class
In order to understand how we are going to analyze this information further, we must first understand how certain socioeconomic groups are defined or categorized. The United States Census Bureau has listed the poverty threshold for a family of four, in 2023, at a total household income of $30,900. Wikipedia defines “Low Socioeconomic Status”, or “Low SES”, as having “low education attainment, low income, or entry-level jobs (or no job at all)”. With all that being said, the US Census Bureau states that “students from the top household income quartile are 8 times more likely to obtain a bachelor’s degree by age 24 as compared to individuals from the lowest family income quartile.” The American Psychological Association, or APA, goes on to further state that social class has been shown to be a significant factor in influencing career aspirations, trajectory, and achievement. Somewhere along the line, there are unseen factors that are effecting the educational achievements of individuals from lower socioeconomic backgrounds.
“Inequalities in higher education are particularly suited to be understood from a life course perspective, as they constitute the culmination of long-term processes of accumulation of advantage and disadvantage beginning at birth, or even prior to birth” (Tomaszewski et al., 133). The life course approach has been defined as the intersection between socioeconomic status, and educational inequality. A theory built upon this approach is Fishkin’s Theory of Opportunity Pluralism, which involves a renaissance of how we think about “equality of opportunity” by taking a deep look at how these opportunities are created, distributed, and controlled (Tomaszweski et al., 133). Fishkin also refers to an analogy called “bottlenecks”, since an individual may have to reach a very specific point in time, in the hope that they may reach opportunities that exist on the other side. Sounds a lot like a ripple effect that could positively influence an individual, simply just by being somewhere at the right time. This alone can create an inequality, since getting to aforementioned “point in time” may require money or personal connections. Fishkin refers to higher education itself as a “bottleneck,” since it is “the narrow place” that regulates access to labor market outcomes. So if these universities exist as a “bottleneck,” an individual may not ever gain access to a specific opportunity… not because they didn’t deserve it, but rather they were not physically present to hear about it in the first place. This here is what we call geographic privilege.
Geographic Privilege
Geographic privilege, simply put, is the privilege one gains access to by being geographically nearby to educational institutes, whether it’s public schooling, a university, or even a museum or learning center. They have these resources at their fingertips and may have even grown up around these opportunities, and have grown accustomed to being surrounded by (generally) educated people. Beamer and Steinbaum state in their research, that for-profit institutions tend to target communities and areas that have historically been excluded from traditional education, on the basis of race and class. Beamer et al. have put together a geographic map, reflecting local enrollment concentration based on each individual county in the United States. This is a helpful tool to use when examining and observing “market power,” or rather, where for-profit universities are targeting. Over 50% of college students enrolled in a four-year public college had done so close to their home (Beamer et al), despite what all those 90s rom-coms may have had us believe.
So how does geographic privilege restrict access and education, you might ask? If a student in rural Alabama had always dreamt of being an archaeologist, but the community college 30 minutes away (as her only local option) doesn’t offer this program. Instead, she settles for biology, or perhaps something adjacent. Three years into the program, she isn’t as inspired as she once was and decides to focus on work instead, since it’s not what she wanted to do in the first place. This is a dramatic, albeit realistic, scenario at how inequality can be created by geographic privilege, and how that ripple effect takes place.
Figure 1 to the left is a dataset reflecting some of the numbers that Beamer et al. have put together. On the y-axis, we have “number of zips” (referring to populated zip codes). On the x-axis, we have 4 different datasets, each reflecting either “all schools,” “public schools”, “private non-profit”, and “private for-profit”. The SCI concentration type (re: the legend) increases as it moves darker in blue; meaning the darker blue it is, the higher concentration of schools there are in the area within a 45-minute drive. Purple means that there is just one school nearby. It should be noted here that the educational institute most accessible to zip codes with low institutional concentration is the “Private For-Profit” sector. The highest occurring educational system on this chart would be public schools in highly concentrated amounts, which puts an emphasis on how funding is dispersed from county to county as well. This number comes out to be 40.8 million Americans that live in areas with access to only one public higher education institute.
An Example of Geographic Privilege
Let’s take a look at one of the lowest educationally-funded counties in the United States: McDowell County, West Virginia. There is a 77.5% high school graduation rate, with only 6.6% of those gaining an undergraduate degree (US Census Bureau). The western half of this county is what Beamer et al. have deemed an “educational desert,” meaning there is no university within a 45-minute drive. The eastern half isn’t much better, with 80% of the county only having access to one university (Beamer et al). To go deeper into the statistics, the median household income is $28,235, with 37.6% of the county living at or below the poverty line (US Census Bureau). The mean-travel time to get to work for the labor force is an average of 33.1 minutes, which means being employed is dependent upon having reliable transportation; thus only 25.2% of the population is part of the labor force (US Census Bureau). If being in an economic situation where one doesn’t own a car, this creates a ripple effect among many fields, including getting to drive to work or school. With all this being said… imagine the geographic privilege of being born here, versus being born in Washington DC, with a very high concentration of universities, plus public transportation to get you there. There is privilege and inequality in this scenario when comparing the two regions. Simply put, Washington DC has 116 schools within 68.3 square miles, whereas McDowell County, WV has 10 schools within 533.5 square miles.
The Issues at Hand
Despite there being federal aid out there to assist students in need, not many colleges are actually doing much “helping.” Mamie Lynch, author of “Priced Out: How the Wrong Financial-Aid Policies Hurt Low-Income Students”, has done some research and makes the claim that there are only five institutions that demonstrate real, “key” success for low-income students (2011). This success was measured in three key areas: they enroll a proportion of low-income students that is (at least) as high as the national average, they ask these students to pay a portion of their family income that is no more than what a middle-class student would pay (proportionately), and they offer all students a 1-in-2 chance at graduation. Lynch has made it a point that it is “noteworthy, that none of the highly profitable, for-profit college companies, well-endowed public flagships, or private nonprofits appear amongst this list of five.” Since the 1980s, college tuition has increased at four times the rate of inflation (Lynch 1), which has put a tremendous strain on all students and families- especially those who have a lower median household income. Many of these families have been forced to rely on federal aid, which puts them in a considerable amount of debt.
How Can We Make Change?
No law or institution will deliberately say “Hey, I’m racist!” It takes a special initiative to want to notice where there is inequality. Noticing where inequalities exist is a privilege, in and of itself, because we have access to the information that educated us on the matter. Many individuals do not have this privilege. It is up to us to first educate ourselves, recognize when one action or institution is negatively affecting other notions around it. From there, we can work together on creating a world where there no longer exist such inequalities, especially in the pursuit of higher education. Real change starts with education, and the next step is to VOTE responsibly.
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