Admit-deny is when "schools deliberately underfund financially needy students in order to discourage them from enrolling," according to Stephen Burd of the New America Foundation. Acceptance letters usually come with an explanation of how much financial assistance you'll get based on your financial need and academic record -- and, right now, two-thirds of private colleges and one-third of public schools are deliberately offering poor students less than they need so they don't attend. Why? To deal with budget problems: Colleges need money, and the easiest way to get money is to bring in more rich kids who can pay full tuition, and the easiest way to get more rich kids is to tell more poor kids to fuck off. Exacerbating the problem, college tuitions have been steadily climbing, more than doubling across the board since 1982, after you account for inflation.
"But all the college applications say they're 'need-blind'!" Sure, and that pudding container says "instant," but I don't have any pudding when I open it up, do I? Turns out "need-blind" is sort of a myth. Colleges can work that way only if they have endless financial resources, and there aren't too many colleges like that.
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You are unlikely to see this on a budget report.
Colleges are one big gear in the machine of income inequality: They both need it to function (because without the wealth gap, there wouldn't be enough rich kids to keep colleges afloat) and they keep it functioning (if colleges were less selective, the upper-crust wouldn't have the leg up they need to stay the upper-crust).
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