Wash. U. should be more available
It is common knowledge that kids from disadvantaged high schools are disproportionately represented at elite universities. And while financial restraints are a major reason for this, with all the scholarships available, money is not always the main issue for kids from poor areas applying to elite schools. The problem is that nobody ever gives them any information or help in the process. Schools like Wash. U. do not actively reach out to inform kids in particular zip codes about the opportunities available to them and as a result miss out on a lot of brilliant, talented kids.
Wash. U. has always prided itself on its reputation as a school that encourages diversity— diversity of race, diversity of religion, diversity of sexual orientation and diversity of beliefs. I remember that every campus tour I took, every admissions pamphlet I read and every faculty member I talked to during the admissions process mentioned Wash. U.’s diversity. And once I came to Wash. U., I realized that they were telling the truth—Wash. U. is indeed a pretty diverse place, definitely more so than my high school was.
However, when I went home for Christmas break, I realized that Wash. U.’s self-proclaimed love for diversity does not necessarily extend to every part of the United States. Over break I talked with a good friend of mine from home who is going through the college admissions process right now. My friend goes to a very low-income public high school in a very rural part of Alabama, my home state. He’s valedictorian, captain of the track team and class president of a class where only around one in 10 kids will graduate from a four-year college. Over the summer, he mentioned that he wanted to apply to some selective out-of-state colleges to see if he could get a scholarship.
I told him to give Wash. U. a look, so he mentioned it to his guidance counselor. His guidance counselor had never heard of Wash. U. Neither had his principal. No one in his school system or town could direct him to any scholarships to apply for at Wash. U. Wash. U. was just never presented to him as an option.
My friend wound up getting a full scholarship to a different school and is doing fine, but his story made me realize something about Wash. U. and the ultra-elite college admissions process as a whole. Even with all of the financial aid and scholarships available today, elite colleges like Wash. U. are simply not presented as an option to high-achieving kids in many low-income high schools. There are definitely exceptions to this rule to be found, but for the most part, the typical Wash. U. student, no matter what his or her ethnic or cultural background, came from a relatively respectable high school.
I am not trying to say that Wash. U. needs to lower tuition or increase scholarship opportunities—plenty of people have said that already. Wash. U. simply needs to be more proactive in promoting itself in places other than prep schools. There are plenty of students in rural or inner city high schools who would be excellent candidates for admission at Wash. U., and Wash. U. offers enough financial aid to make this a possibility. The disconnect is in information—many people just do not realize that elite schools like Wash. U. could be an option for them and do not even apply.
My guidance counsellor didn’t know about Wash U either and told me to apply to AL, FL, or MI schools because that’s where 95% of my high school’s graduates went. I’m sure our college graduation rate was equivalent to your friend’s or worse. I graduated from Wash U several years ago because I did the research. And I’m not sure how it is now, but when I applied, literally every high school student got a Wash U info packet. It was a total joke my year, that Wash U was all about the publicity. Interesting to see if things have really changed.
I think we need an organization, comparable to Teach for America, that enlists the newly graduated to work as guidance counselors in under served districts because there are way too many overworked (or in some cases, stupid and out of touch) guidance counselors out there.
“Wash. U. simply needs to be more proactive in promoting itself in places other than prep schools. There are plenty of students in rural or inner city high schools who would be excellent candidates for admission at Wash. U., and Wash. U. offers enough financial aid to make this a possibility. The disconnect is in information—many people just do not realize that elite schools like Wash. U. could be an option for them and do not even apply.”
I agree, My alma mater, The University of Chicago, had a very successful program called the Grass Roots Talent Search Scholarship, which funded my education and three of my brothers. One of their admissions officers had taken the Empire Builder train from Chicago to Seattle talking up the school to all the high school guidance counselors in the early sixties, and they had maintained the relationship. We Montanans all knew about The University of Chicago and we knew about their generous financial aid and welcoming atmosphere. Nobody had ever heard of Washington University in St Louis, because nobody I knew had ever received a catalog or brochure in the mail. This has changed somewhat in the last decade or so. I saw somebody wearing a Wash U t-shirt the last time I was back home in Havre, Montana, and one of my students was from Havre (though he was a professor’s son). It’s a good start buf much more should be done to recruit and welcome a more economically diverse student body.
Jerome Bauer, who also posts under the transparent pseudonym shevek and has never posted anonymously or under any other pseudonym