Equality of Opportunity The Role of Class in

Admissions

Business Week Article

• “One volatile issue he faced was the potential for a backlash from affluent parents worried that their high-performing kids might be displaced by poor students with less glittering résumés and lower test scores. To head off such concerns, Marx wants to expand overall admission by 120 or so slots to be reserved for low-income students. Such a move requires an aggressive campaign to raise hundreds of millions of dollars, but it also protects affluent kids from facing lower admissions odds.

At the same time, welcoming students who lower the school's 1420 SAT average also could jeopardize its No. 2 position in the U.S. News & World Report ranking of liberal-arts colleges -- making Amherst less attractive to affluent students.”

FEBRUARY 27, 2006 Campus Revolutionary Tony Marx has a radical plan to get more poor kids into top colleges, starting with Amherst

Reaction • Alumni Remark: “I too have a request: in light of President Tony Marx’s

plans to increase student enrollment by nearly 10 percent, to abandon the College’s commitment to need-blind admissions, and to accept applicants who have low test scores and inadequate K-12 preparation—all for the sake of a broad social experiment for which Amherst will be the proverbial guinea pig—please refuse to donate to the Annual Fund at the present time.”

• Alumni Remark: “Amherst’s admission process already bends backward for these students, where other colleges don’t, can’t and won’t. I’m one of those students. Amherst admitted me with a blemished and strange record, and no guarantee of academic success. I wrote my first academic paper ever in 1999, in the Pioneer Valley. My college application essay was my first essay in English. This summer I will advance to PhD candidacy, and begin work on a book-length dissertation. Admitting me to Amherst was a calculated risk: I knew people with backgrounds similar to mine who didn’t do well at Amherst. Furthermore, though I proved academically capable, I’ve seen people who looked great on paper falter and fail, for a variety of reasons that no admission process could not have easily foreseen: academic burnout, depression, immaturity, etc. It’s always a risk, but Amherst is exceptionally good at this kind of risk taking and management. Failures are minimized and have not affected its record so far.”

Questions

• What is Amherst Admission’s Office doing to increase the socioeconomic diversity on campus?

• Is there a proposed increase in the number of students that will be admitted to Amherst? If so, how many?

• Is the College abandoning need-blind admissions?

• Are students from disadvantaged backgrounds treated differently in the Admission process, if so, how and why?

• How much does it cost to increase the number of aided students at Amherst?

Forum Reaction

• Alumni: “[Name of Alum quoted before], you got into Amherst under regular admissions standards- so why are you heralding yourself as an example of new students who will be admitted under the new policy? Students like you already are admitted. Why "fix" an admissions plan that is not a problem, and to such drastic measures and consequences to the school, including but not limited to, larger classes, lower student-to-prof ratio, lowered SAT and GPA standards, and hundreds of millions of dollars of the endowment practically given away for no reason other than some socioeconomic philanthropy drive and the accompanied ego massage?”

Questions

• Has there been any change as to how these students are treated because of the recommendations in the CAP report?

• Have “standards” lowered after admitting more low income students in the class of 2010?

• If so, what impacts has this had for Amherst College?

• If not, where the worries of alumni unfounded?

Forum Reaction

• Alumni: “So, I got into Amherst need-blind, and then got full financial aid, because I did demonstrate need. Yay for me! But what about those students who didn't get a good public education and have tremendous potential that just can't be demonstrated? I want them to have access to an excellent college. Sure, they would get financial aid if they got into Amherst, but they wouldn't be able to get in right now. You say that there's no problem with admissions, but for those students there most definitely is. They know they can do well if they are finally given a chance. They've been punished with 12 years of mediocre schooling, so why punish them more and block them for realizing their potential? Just beyond their reach is full financial aid at Amherst, which they deserve and can use to the maximum, if they could just reach it...”

Questions

• How does the Admission’s office reach out to students from low-income backgrounds letting them know Amherst is a possibility?

• What percentage of Admission recruiting visits are to schools that are underrepresented or schools with high portions of underrepresented students?

Classist assumptions in

our campus dialogues?

Student Reactions

• “Setting aside the damage done to the students, there is a far greater question of the damage done to Amherst College as an institution by bringing in large numbers of unqualified students. If Amherst lowers its admissions standards, it might fall from the ranks of elite colleges which would drive away alumni donations and faculty. Additionally, one of the strongest arguments in favor of diversity is that it brings many different points of view to the classroom. Introducing new points of view, though, doesn’t matter if students are unable to properly articulate them.”- The Amherst Student, opinion section (Spring 2006)

• “There are two ways to achieve President Marx’s goal of bringing more lower-income students to Amherst: decrease the number of other types of students admitted or increase the total number of students in a class. Choosing the first option would mean sacrificing legacies, athletes or simply outstanding scholars.” The Amherst Student, opinion section (Spring 2006)

Student Reactions • “Current discourse focuses on admitting hypothetical low-

income students, and the pitfalls and perils we may encounter. Unfortunately for the alarmists on campus, I’ve got some bad news: We’re already here. Yes, you heard me. There are actual, real-live low-income students on campus right now. We go to class with you, sit next to you in Val and apparently enjoy all the rights and privileges bestowed upon typical College students. (If you’re not careful, we might start using your water fountains.) What’s even crazier, if you can believe it, is that some of us got in without “lowering standards” and are fully capable of “properly articulating” our viewpoints. Thus it comes as a bit of surprise to hear [Name of Student] contend that “outstanding scholar” and “low-income” are mutually exclusive concepts.”

– The Amherst Student, opinion section (Spring 2006)

Student Reactions

• “Rather than feeling undermined by my working-class background, I found the experience liberating. For me, college has become a leveler. Students of all backgrounds live in the same dorms, use the same facilities, and offered the same basic resources. The subject of class barely surfaced among my friends and peers during my first semester, unless I introduced the topic myself. Here, I’m not determined by the car that drops me off at school or the relative squalor of my home life. Instead, my intelligence and competence can speak for me.”- The Indicator (Spring 2006)

Questions• Can you identify classist assumptions in

these statements?

• If so, what are there?

• If not, how do you interpret the arguments made by the students quoted?

• Is Amherst a classless environment?

• Has the Business Week article and the reactions to it changed your view of class at Amherst?