Login
More than half of all college students in the U.S. are first-generation college students, according to recent findings from Forbes Advisor.
Sarah E. Whitley
First-generation college students – defined in the report as students whose parents are without four-year college degrees – make up 56% of the nation’s postsecondary students, the report found.
These students are distinct in other ways as well. They are more likely to come from low-income or minority backgrounds and more likely to be a parent, caregiver, veteran, or first-generation American. They are also less likely to use career-planning services and to engage in formal leadership roles, research with faculty, paid internships, and study abroad opportunities.
The publication also breaks down the demographic in terms of categories such as race, sex, immigration, and age.
Report authors found that, overall, historically marginalized groups were more heavily represented among first-gen students, with less than half of these students (46%) identifying as white – 61% of continuing-generation students identified as such. A quarter of the first-gen population identified as Hispanic, 18% as Black or African American, and 6% as Asian, according to data from the National Association of Student Personnel Administrators (NASPA).
And looking at specific racial and ethnic groups revealed stark numbers of first-gen students among certain communities. For instance, most Hispanic or Latino students (60%), Black or African American students (59%), and American Indian, Alaska Native, Native Hawaiian or Pacific Islander (54%) students were first-gen.
Meanwhile, for white students, only 36% were first-gen.
A solid portion (28%) of first-gen students are 30 or older. And, as of 2016, the majority of first-gen students are female (60%), compared to 52% of continuing-gen students, according to NASPA.
As for immigrant status, the report found that 10% of first-gen students are first-generation immigrants and 23% are second-gen – at least one parent is foreign-born.
Tracking by school type, first-gen students at nonprofit four-year schools enrolled more frequently at lower-cost, less-selective public schools, but support and outcomes are often better for the demographic at more selective ones, the report found.
Given that many in the first-gen student population come from disadvantaged backgrounds, future earnings are a significant consideration. According to the report, the effects of being first-gen doesn’t end after college. Income disparities between first-gen and continuing-gen students often persisted even after school.
Looking at heads of household with degrees as of 2019, those with bachelor's-graduate parents earned a median annual income of $135,800, but those with parents without degrees made a median $99,600, according to the Pew Research Center.
“As more institutions identify and support first-generation students, they are increasingly recognizing the substantial assets these individuals bring to campus: grit, ambition, fresh viewpoints that enhance the broader academic community,” said Sarah E. Whitley, vice president of NASPA initiative Center for First-Generation Student Success. “We must ensure that we’re putting the same effort into supporting first-generation students on campus as we do getting them to campus. This is how we can change outcomes for these students – helping them to graduate and gain success after graduation.”
University says about 20% of final-year students will face delays if industrial action continues
More than 1,000 final year students at Durham University could be left without a degree this summer because of the marking boycott disrupting universities across the UK.
Durham, one of 145 universities affected by the industrial action over pay and working conditions called by the University and College Union (UCU), said about 20% of its 5,300 final year students would “at the moment, face delays in receiving all their marks and final classifications”.
Continue reading...Ministers are ultimately responsible for weakening the arts and humanities. They are taking the country backwards
The announcement that the University of East Anglia is to cut 31 arts and humanities posts – out of a total of 36 academic job cuts – has rightly prompted anger as well as dismay. UEA became a literary flagship among the new universities that opened in the 1960s. This year is its 60th birthday, and since 1970 it has been home to one of the most famous creative writing courses in the world: founded by the novelists Malcolm Bradbury and Angus Wilson, its students have included Anne Enright, Ian McEwan and the Nobel laureate Kazuo Ishiguro.
There is shock, among alumni and observers, that the financial problems of the UK’s higher education sector now threaten such prestigious institutions. Once celebrated for their innovative approaches, 1960s campus universities were where different kinds of courses were developed. Creative writing is one example; media, development and women’s studies are others. In cutting the arts and humanities in these universities, managers and policymakers are turning back the clock – at a time when, arguably, there has never been a greater need for courageous innovation. Any idea that the risks are limited to the post-1992 universities should be junked.
Continue reading...Small number could attend graduation but later be told they have failed as pay dispute affects assessments at 145 universities
Tens of thousands of university students are being left in limbo without their final degree results this summer, including some who could attend graduation ceremonies only to be told later that they have failed.
About a third of the UK’s 500,000 final-year undergraduates are thought to have been affected by the marking and assessment boycott at 145 universities, part of the pay dispute between the University and College Union (UCU) and employers that has strained relations between staff, students and management.
Continue reading...Most university students supporting themselves say it is negatively affecting their studies, survey finds
The cost of living crisis is forcing more university students to take on more hours in their part-time jobs, with most saying that supporting themselves is affecting their studies, according to a new study.
More than half of the 10,000 students surveyed by the Higher Education Policy Institute (Hepi) said they did paid work during term time, with most saying they were using their wages to support their studies.
Continue reading...The fine art of self-promotion is more vital than ever – and crafting a personal statement is apt training for modern life
“I didn’t have the time to write you a short letter, so I’m writing you a long one instead,” Mark Twain is supposed to have written on a postcard to his friend. Good writers have always known that distilling one’s thoughts into a limited space takes effort and skill. (Bad writers sprinkle around lots of footnotes and pretend they’re not included in the word count.) So it must be immensely frustrating to whittle your life story and all your aspirations into about 600 words, only to find that the recipient has merely skim-read them. That’s the experience of students writing a UK university application personal statement – limited to 4,000 characters – which harassed admissions staff now only spend about two minutes reading.
I sympathise with the students, who are obliged to waffle on about all the hobbies they’re expected to be beavering away at while simultaneously studying for A-levels and probably holding down a part-time job. But perhaps universities are teaching them a valuable, if brutal lesson. Two minutes’ attention from a time-pressed stranger is a luxury that they will seldom enjoy in adulthood. It’s also more than enough time to read 600 words. So, if they can’t sell themselves in a short essay, how are they ever going to get anyone to open their emails, read their Tinder profiles, or pay attention to their strongly worded complaint to the British Airways customer services team? At what age is it appropriate to learn that everyone else is just too busy to listen to you selling yourself?
Katy Guest is a writer, reviewer and editor
Continue reading...Graduates now owe an average amount of £45,000, Student Loans Company figures have revealed
Outstanding student loans in England have surpassed £200bn for the first time – 20 years earlier than previous government forecasts, as the number of students at universities continues to outstrip expectations.
The Student Loans Company (SLC), which administers tuition and maintenance loans in England, said that the balance of government-backed loans reached £205bn in the current academic year, including £19bn worth of new loans to undergraduates. The figure has doubled in just six years. It reached more than £100bn in 2016-17 after the coalition government decided to increase undergraduate tuition fees from £3,600 a year to £9,000 in 2012.
Continue reading...Over the past few months, in the lead-up to the publication of my book, I’ve used this space to share brief excerpts. Now the book is out! If you want a copy, you can order it from the University of Michigan website (or other popular book ordering places!). In case you haven’t decided whether this book would be a good addition to your library, here’s a brief overview.
I wrote Thriving as a Graduate Writer because I believe graduate students can reframe their experience of academic writing. We all know that writing is at the heart of the academic enterprise. It is both how we communicate and how we are assessed. That combination can be brutal for any writer, and it’s particularly fraught for graduate writers, who must learn disciplinary writing practices while being judged on their early efforts. Recognizing these challenges is valuable; graduate students are better off knowing that their difficulties with academic writing are entirely legitimate. This recognition, however, is only the first step. The next step must be to find ways to ameliorate those challenges.
In the book, I offer a discussion of principles, strategies, and habits that I think can help. (The table of contents can be found below, so you can see the breakdown of this material.) The principles point to a way of thinking about academic writing. Since writing takes up so much time and energy, it is worth exploring foundational ideas that can ground a writing practice: writing as thinking; writing as revision; writing as reader awareness; writing as authorial responsibility. Those principles lead into concrete strategies that can transform the experience of creating and revising an academic text. The heart of this book is the five chapters that unpack these approaches to working with text: managing structure; managing sentences; managing punctuation patterns; managing momentum; and building a revision process. The final element of the book is the consideration of writing habits. Even with a solid approach to academic writing and range of useful strategies to hand, we all still need to find ways to get writing done. Graduate writers, in particular, need exposure to writing productivity advice that is rooted in their unique experience of academic writing. This chapter provides a range of strategies to help build a consistent and sustainable writing routine: prioritizing writing; setting goals; finding community; developing writing awareness; and grounding productivity in writing expertise.
This book is a short (only 226 pages!) self-study text. You can read through the whole book—in whatever way works for you—and then use it as a reference. The manner in which you refer back to the book will depend on what you currently need to concentrate on. Most readers will benefit from returning to two chapters: Establishing a Revision Process (Chapter Eight) and Developing Sustainable Writing Habits (Chapter Nine). Those chapters are organized around charts that are distributed throughout the chapter (and that appear again at the back of the book). Since every writer has their own challenges and their own optimal writing process, I urge readers to take those charts and rework them—on an ongoing basis—to suit their needs. In addition to the charts, you will also find other resources at the end of the book: guides to using the book in a graduate writing course or graduate writing group and brief account of the blogs and books that I most recommend to graduate writers.
Overall, this book aims to inspire graduate writers to think differently about the nature of writing and then offers concrete strategies for managing both their writing and their writing routines. It was a labour of love to craft the writing advice that I offer everyday—here and in the classroom—into a more coherent and enduring form. I hope it gives you the capacity to approach this indispensable part of academic life with more confidence and more enjoyment. I look forward to hearing what you think!
Thriving as a Graduate Writer is now available from the University of Michigan Press. To order your copy, visit the book page. Order online and save 30% with discount code UMS23!
rcayley
At institutions like Cornell University, first-year applicants are not required to submit SAT or ACT scores.
Universities are preparing for the possible end of race-conscious affirmative action.
If you’re a regular reader of this blog, you will know that I’ve spent the last few years working on a book about graduate writing. That process is now drawing to a close: Thriving as a Graduate Writer will be published in June! Between now and then, I’m going to use this space to share brief excerpts. In addition to my discussion of principles, strategies, and habits for effective academic writing, the book has short ‘asides’ that allowed me to engage with topics outside that main narrative. Over the next four months, I’ll share my favourites of those asides. As always, I’d love to hear what you think!
Conservatism of Expectations
It’s hard to talk about meeting reader expectations as a graduate writer without attending to the conservative implications of prioritizing established expectations. Rather than conform to expectations that feel allied to outdated and inequitable systems, some graduate writers may wish to write differently, in ways that confront or subvert the norms of standard research communication. Resisting those expectations can take many forms: normalizing World Englishes; refusing white supremacy in language; understanding subjectivity in research imagination; drawing upon Indigenous research epistemologies; integrating multimodal research into doctoral theses. Any one of those endeavors could easily be hampered by the replicative nature of doctoral education. And writing in a manner that requires adherence to existing academic practices can be demoralizing; making changes to those practices is central to why some people undertake graduate work. As a result, some writers may choose to discount those norms during graduate work. It’s worth noting that some writers may share those critical commitments while being uninterested in challenging existing norms. Despite wishing change to happen, these writers may feel that their academic work is already unfairly scrutinized or that it isn’t their job to transform academic writing practices. What’s more, some writers in this situation may feel particularly anxious to gain access to a hidden curriculum that others seem to assimilate more easily. Given that range of attitudes and pressures, I think there is value in laying out established conventions in a way that leaves the writer the freedom to choose their own path. Certainly, working around norms—or making norms work for you—is easiest when those norms are well understood. I don’t want the ideas contained within this book to be an impediment to writing in ways that support the work that feels urgent to you; instead, I hope they can be deployed in the service of the academic work that you want to do in the way you want to do it.
Thriving as a Graduate Writer will be available in early June from the University of Michigan Press. To pre-order your copy, visit the book page. Order online and save 30% with discount code UMS23!
rcayley
Book Cover showing title: Thriving as a Graduate Writer
Richard D. Kahlenberg, whose hero is Robert Kennedy, wants to build a multiracial progressive coalition.
Article tags
Earlham College senior Marisol Cora-Cruz has been selected as one of 42 U.S. undergraduates for the Watson Fellowship for the 2023-24 academic year, making her the 44th person from Earlham to be chosen.Marisol Cora Cruz
The fellowship – from the Thomas J. Watson Foundation – gives those selected a $40,000 stipend for independent international travel and research.
For Cora-Cruz, her project is “Understanding Maternal Healthcare Around the World.”
Cora-Cruz said the project will entail an exploration of access and quality of maternal healthcare and social impacts of care delivery in countries with different healthcare models, Bolivia, England, and Germany.
“Quality of life is a human right. It means having all the necessary components to live a healthy, peaceful, and long life without extraneous barriers, including having access to quality healthcare,” said Cora-Cruz, a senior neuroscience major. “This level of care requires evidence-based, people-oriented and safe services to be delivered in a timely, integrated and efficient manner at the disposition of all individuals.”
String Theory Schools (STS), an education management nonprofit group, is looking to help Philadelphia’s educational system through a $1 billion offer to fix up the city’s schools and build new ones.Dr. Jason Corosanite
STS Co-founder Dr. Jason Corosanite recently made the announcement at a mayoral forum on education, innovation, and technology, saying that he was committed to the dollar amount.
"We can go as fast or as slow as the communities want, but we have the ability, I don't think the limitation is on the money-side,” Corosanite told Diverse, adding that the $1 billion amount was flexible, based on the needs and requests of the school communities. “It's really about the communities that want to build schools."
The School District of Philadelphia’s (SDP) older facilities have “aged components that are beyond their service life, obsolete or no longer energy efficient,” according to a 2017 SDP Facility Condition Assessment. The report also documented 11,480 deficiencies worth $4.5 billion.
STS currently manages two charter schools, the Philadelphia Performing Arts Charter School (K-12) and the Philadelphia Charter School for the Arts & Sciences at H.R. Edmunds (K-8). The schools are tuition-free and offer a wide-range of programming in the arts and sciences, including vocal and instrumental music, ballet, visual arts, and technology.
The two schools – they span four campuses right now – also employ a majors-based approach to education that allows students to choose what their specific academic pursuit and focus will be, said Anthony Miller, chief of climate and culture at Philadelphia Performing Arts.
“When you major in something, you do better overall,” Miller said. “We are one of the few schools in middle and high school that offers majors-based programming for students. So you can come and study anything from instrumental music to vocal music to fine arts or digital arts to robotics. We have a host of majors that students can choose here, and they can focus on that major for four to eight years. And we've seen successful results because of this model. They're more excited to be high-performers in their academic classes because they're pursuing something they're passionate about."
Miller is also focused on STS’s diversity efforts when it comes to student population. STS’s Vine Street campus (grades 6-12) has a total enrollment of 1,379, of which 38.9% identified as Black or African American, 32.6% as White, 11.2% as Asian, and 8.3% as Hispanic..
“We want our students to go here and get a sense of how the world works,” Miller said. “And a part of that means ensuring a population that looks like the world or looks like America."
If school communities decide to take String Theory up on its offer to help, then the organization will devote resources into building new String Theory charter schools or renovate pre-existing schools into ones with String Theory programming, Corosanite said.
Anthony Miller
But STS’s offer has not been taken as of yet, Corosanite said, primarily attributing the lack of interest to “local politics” and claiming there has been a “moratorium on charter schools” for approximately the last 8-10 years.
STS is looking to expand, Corosanite said. It’s now just a matter of where they do so, a decision that may hinge on the upcoming mayoral election in November. In Philadelphia, the mayor appoints the school board of Philadelphia, which then has final say over charter schools, Corosanite added.
Philadelphia currently has 83 charter schools, according to the SDP website.
"My preference is to [duplicate ourselves and build more schools] in Philadelphia,” Corosanite said. “We're facing a mayoral election. So the onus for us coming out now is to say, 'Hey, the city's going to have a choice and we think that who they choose as mayor … is going to make a difference.'
Governmental leaders from across the U.S. have inquired about getting STS in their districts, Corosanite said.
“We're at a point where we've waited and held back on school expansions as much as we can,” Corosanite said. “It's kind of a last hurrah for do we continue to do this here or do we do this in Miami? Do we do it in Nashville? Do we do it in Oakland?"
A graduate student in philosophy has the responsibility of organizing a graduate student conference hosted by their department, and has some questions, starting with:
1. “Why put on a graduate student conference? What should the purpose of a graduate conference be?“
(modification of a photo by Simon C. May)
They write, “One possible answer is that it provides a low stakes opportunity for grad students to practice presenting and commenting. And the student presenters can get valuable feedback on their work.” But the student hase questions about how to address various issues:
2. “I don’t quite know how I should balance the needs and interests of the two main stakeholders: student presenters from other schools and the grad students at our school.”
3. “Which papers should we accept for the conference? The obvious answer is to accept the best papers. But there are competing goals. For example, I want the presenters to benefit from the conference. Our conference will have a (faculty) keynote speaker. So it seems there’s a reason to prioritize papers by graduate students that suggest they’d benefit the most from the keynote speaker’s presence.”
4. “I want to be inclusive of the diverse interests the audience (i.e. grad students at our department) might have. Not everyone is interested in the main theme of the conference, and I’d feel bad having them sit through the whole conference feeling bored. How many of the accepted papers should be ‘off-theme’?”
5. “Should location be taken in the consideration, by preferring students closer to our department since the travel cost would be lower?”
6. “Which parts of the conference do presenters and keynote speaker find the most value in?”
7. “How should I pick the conference theme? How narrow or broad should it be?”
8. “How can I get the grad students in my own department to be more invested in helping with the conference and making it good?”
They add: “In general, I want to hear from people who have attended and/or organized grad conferences. I want to know what they like and dislike about grad conferences, and how such conferences can be made better.”
Readers?
FreshRSS