Gifted Issues Discussion homepage Forums General Discussion Rising scholarship funds to rising college costs

Okay, it's idle curiosity at this point at I have two rising 6th graders. However, I cannot but marvel as the changing landscape. It is truly astonishing how tuition has more than quadruple at certain colleges over the last three decades. However, the astronomical rise in college costs has been endlessly debated already. What struck me today is actually the crazy rise in "scholarship" funds. In our district, the seniors received $150 million dollars in scholarship funds last year, which translates to over $20,000 per graduate. Obviously, many students did not receive any scholarships and some students receives hundreds of thousands in scholarship funding. In any case, $150 million is huge for just one school district. Obviously, a good portion of that funding is not awarded by specific colleges. However, even taking that into account, I cannot help but be struck with the thought that much of that "scholarship" would not be necessary or feasible were it not for the crazy price tags at even the typical college. What are your thoughts?

You are just now realizing this?

Ok -- where's the money ? The main scholarship sources I know of are
(1) National Merit
(2) full and partial scholarships awarded by colleges (sometimes to National Merit finalists)
(3) state-based scholarships, such as Georgia's Hope Scholarship.
(4) sports scholarships
(5) ROTC

If lots of students in your town are getting scholarships from sources other than these, I'd be interested to hear about them. It is cynical but not incorrect to observe that many merit scholarships and financial aid plans offered by colleges could also be described as price discrimination.

If my children get scholarships, great, but I know that the amount of merit scholarship money available to students at the most selective colleges is pretty meager.

Yeah - I am slow on the uptake!

I did know generally that scholarship funds have been rising. I just did not realized that it was so crazy high. I went to one of the top high schools in our state and our class did not get anywhere near that kind of scholarship amount per graduate.

Hmmm-- well, my question is first and foremost-- what exactly does that figure REALLY represent?



My guess is that it represents all the $$ that was OFFERED to students as grants/scholarships/tuition discounting/monetary awards. In other words, everything but loans or family contribution, or "unmet need."

From ALL schools, including those that the student opted not to attend.

If you look at that figure for even a single student like my DD (who isn't an extreme example by any means, since she applied to so few schools, and we have apparently got about "zero" family financial need)-- that figure is easily into the six-figure range.

If you look at the dollar amount that she is actually going to use, however, it's much more modest, but still more than most students going ANYWHERE are offered-- ~50K.

My DD's class was awarded several hundred thousand. There were 280 of them, and maybe 2/3rds of them are actually going to colleges where such awards would be made. Now, I know for a fact that some of the students in that class who are middle-class were offered very little in the way of merit aid, in spite of being, well-- pretty darned meritorious, IMO. These are kids that any TigerParent would be pleased by, basically-- and they were most certainly not offered tons of $$-- other than at private colleges, where the formula seems to roughly be that the award amount for super-rock-star academics is A = d(T), where T is the base tuition rate, and d is any value between 0.05 and 0.40, depending upon the institution.

Now, you can see that A is a pretty large value as X approaches infinity, no matter what value d possesses (in light of the stated range). Yes, I'm being cheeky, but you get the idea.

So that's why I'm saying that I strongly suspect that the figure mentioned is rolling together all of the $ that seniors were OFFERED. Big difference. Kids apply to plenty of "reach" institutions that there is NO way that they can actually afford, and they often hope that the institution will kick in a large award as a pleasant surprise. Not-so-much, though.

For example, here-- UVA (fine school, right?) has out-of-state tuition at about 40K right now. Average award based on non-need-based MERIT? 10K. Now, realize that the 40K figure is only TUITION-- cost of 1yr is actually estimated at 53K for an out-of-state student.

That's pretty typical, in our (recent) experience.

Other scholarship funds may include those which families contribute to, sometimes unknowingly, such as team membership fees, tickets to homecoming dance, admission to various school events and activities (concerts, plays, honors night dinner), and club fundraisers... all of which may subsidize local commemorative scholarships, named scholarships, and foundation scholarships.

In the broadest sense, all financial aid (whether merit or need-based) can be considered scholarships, including loans.

That's a good question. Unfortunately, they did not provide a breakdown or even all the sources. The ones that you listed were certainly the obvious ones that came to my mind as well. I do know that a ton of kids in our district received awards from Scholastic Arts and Writing. There are also kids who got scholarships through their parents' employers, which can be significant if they worked for some of the private universities. I believe that there are also many small awards like the $1000 awards from Carson Scholars Fund as well as more local community based awards.

Exactly-- and those awards are "real" enough-- but I don't think that is how you get up to a figure like that reported million-plus value-- unless you're in a HUGE urban district. I'll be honest here: my DD is entering college next fall, and even in a pretty high-performing district, I can't believe a figure like 20K per student.

Not unless ALL of them are attending private colleges or on athletic scholarships at public ones, which also seems hard to believe.

I know plenty of kids in that MG tier, who are academic performers (that is, they are "good" but not "extraordinary" students)-- and they have been awarded a big fat NOTHING at public institutions, and a big fat 20-30% tuition "discount" at private ones-- which sounds awesome as it's about a 20K award in some instances-- until you think about the fact that it still leaves another 30-40K annually that has to be paid for.

That means that those awards might be real, but they still don't do ANYTHING like making the college affordable.

Even one or two Questbridge scholars, though, can really amp the number-- those are often tier one/elite schools with pricetags to match, and those are low-income FULL RIDE scholarships based on merit. So those awards really are 250K or more. DD knows 2 Questbridge scholars-- and we also know which institutions they are at. One of those awards is worth an estimated 265K, and the other is worth 280K.

Those are the ONLY merit scholarships like that of which I am aware, and as noted, they aren't even available to anyone whose household income qualifies as "middle class."

Yes, I am sure that the district is including all offered scholarships, some of which obviously could not be used if the graduate chooses not to attend the scholarship source.

On the other hand, several hundred thousands in a class of 280 ($1,000 to $2,000 per graduate) is a bit lower than I would have expected but as you pointed out the demographics could be a contributing factor.

On further reflection, I do know that the local high school makes a lot of effort in helping all kids, not just top students, apply for scholarships from all possible sources.

That reminds me that our middle school PTA apparently uses some of the funds that it raises to award small scholarships to deserving alums.

I would be shocked if the district included loans as scholarships. Our district is not perfect, but I can't imagine that they would do something quite so slimy.

We are in the suburbs but it's a pretty diverse population because the district is large (about 7000 graduates). We do have some super stars with international and national awards/recognition and multiple elite college acceptances. Then there are the poor kids who do end up with full rides to elite colleges. However, another big difference stems from the strong program aimed at kids who start freshman year in the middle range academically. Apparently, some of those kids end up with a ton of scholarship money. These kids have to work super hard throughout the four years and jump through multiple hoops to get to that place.

In gathering data for the scholarship reporting, the institution may ask families to disclose all award offers, both merit and needs-based, which their graduating senior has received.

If loans are part of the awards a college/university is offering a student, these student loan amounts may get reported along with grants, merit scholarships, work-study, etc, in the award offer.

Another factor driving these numbers that hasn't been brought up is the sleight-of-hand merit award that isn't a discount at all. For example, a tuition of $40k one year might change to $45k the next year, with many $3k merit awards given by the institution to qualified applicants (where "qualified" equals "just about everyone they accept who wasn't getting a full ride for other reasons").

The institution that does this not only sees more revenue per student, but they also drive higher demand, because students and parents are enamored of winning the scholarship "prize."

Well, that and reporting is optional-- not all families disclose financial awards to the school. Figure that maybe 1 in 3 or 4 don't offer up the information to begin with. So the real number would include those students, and presumably be 10-30% higher.

Our school effectively has two tiers of students-- the rock star types (mostly MG and up), and then the kids who really struggled in standard placements, for whom the school is one of last resort. Nobody can take the GED here until they turn 18.


DD applied for pretty much anything it seemed like she was qualified for, as well-- and honestly, if you are not a minority or a member of some special group (corporate kid, disabled, etc.) in some way, there ISN'T much out there. By that I mean that there just isn't a lot in terms of dollar amounts. Most of those kinds of scholarships are 200-$1000. You'd have to average 10 or 15 of those (and remember, there is a HUGE pool of kids applying for some of those because there aren't a lot of scholarships open to kids without some special hook/angle)-- to even get up into 10K award territory. Recall, also, that award amounts (even for "merit" aid) at someplace like UVA-- going with my earlier example-- only cut your "unmet need" by 10-50%, depending upon your actual household expenses and income. You could be looking at your child needing to come up with some 25 of those small scholarships in order to make the private college affordable. The other dirty secret is this-- take a peek at how many of those small scholarships are: a) renewable, and/or b) available to anyone with non-freshman standing. Most highly ABLE kids go into college with at least a few credits already under their belts, and some of them as many as a couple of years' worth. That means that as matriculating students, they are ineligible already for those "entering freshmen" awards-- even though (crazily) this is basically the kind of thing that it TAKES, now, to be earning merit awards of any kind anywhere.



DD applied for (and was awarded) a few of those, btw. The amount of work involved in applying to those is enormous. Full dossier/resume, and additional idiosyncratic material on top of it. An essay, or something else... sometimes an interview too.

High school kids who are in the high achiever ranks get there and stay there by being incredibly BUSY people. There aren't enough hours in the day, basically.

I don't mean to sound like Debbie Downer here, but I seriously caution anyone to think that a non-minority, non-2e, non-disadvantaged high school senior IS going to be able to count on much more than 1-2% coverage from sources like that. Not unless you're really LUCKY and you happen to stumble upon a corporate source or something. Those scholarship amounts haven't changed while tuition has quadrupled, and every year more students are vying for the dollars.

There's also the possibility that awards will cut "need" aid. As a graduating senior, I got an award from a local foundation. When my college found out about it, they just cut my grant (NOT my loan). I called the foundation and told them not to give me the award again the next year, and why. They appreciated that.

Seriously, that is one obnoxious practice.



Yes. I remember looking for scholarship aid and being appalled at how specific it all was:

• This award is for residents of [insert county, state]
• This award is for people who are from [insert church/civic group]
• This award is for [insert sex or ethnic group] who have overcome [insert specific challenge that was overcome]

Etc. etc. Really, after a while, I was expecting to see grants for people with size 5 feet and toe syndactyly (left side only), as in, The Bumelia Hallux Family Foundation has been giving back to the left-side-toe-syndactyly community since 1928. Almost everything I found was incredibly narrow (except for the toes, I guess), and HowlerKarma seems to be saying that nothing has changed.

I'd like to see more merit aid, with for example National Merit scholarships being larger than $2500 http://www.nationalmerit.org/faq_scholarship.php . But that's not politically correct, because merit as defined by grades and especially test scores is positively correlated with SES. Too much of it goes to students who don't "need" it, according to a FAFSA calculation or something similar.

Right-- and while I probably would argue that in a perfect world, some of that kind of thinking is probably justified, the ultimate problem here is that it has created a gap that is moved UP the income scale-- so yes, poorer families still face a lot of barriers-- BUT-- if they can overcome them, there is great financial support for higher ed...

that is NOT true any longer for middle class children. If you are in the 70th~98th percentile in income, you can expect absolutely NOTHING "need-based" whatsoever. All that you can qualify for is merit-based aid.

You can also expect that you'll be competing for dollar amounts which are unchanged since the 80's with children whose SES means that THEY are the pampered, primped, and hothoused (not to mention 'whipped') children of Tiger Parents, and are therefore far more well-suited to the task of out-competing in this particular game.

Sucks to be you, (or your parents) basically. Because your family can't afford to build orphanages in Algeria or wherever, but you also don't need food stamps.

When your EFC is estimated to be 60-70% of your household's annual gross income, and when YOU know that your household expenses actually consume something like 85-90% of it... what CAN you do with that but laugh? It's madness, but good luck telling anyone in higher ed that particular fact. Tell it to the hand.

This is why our strategy was to consider what we could actually write checks for, and then go from there. (And no, don't be silly-- that value is nowhere near what colleges seem to think that it is.)

NO aid was assumed, because mostly that's going to be correct. It certainly would be after the first year.

In response to this there are a few colleges that are "flattening" their fee structure, and officially lowering tuition. Particularly the one my daughter is attending.

My DD was "awarded" a scholarship to attend with her acceptance package as was probably virtually everyone that they wanted to attend. This wasn't really receiving any money as much as a discount on tuition. It's a bit frustrating that is labeled as awards and aids, because you never see any money.

The school decided last year to help their marketing to have one lower fee structure and in the long run eliminate all such merit based scholarships. Quite a surprise to get a letter last year to hear the tuition was going down by 20%. Not surprisingly my daughter scholarship has been eliminated and the new cost for this year is only very slightly less that what we were paying last year. ($800 or so.) This is supposedly a marketing decision on their part, trying to attract stronger students with a simpler lower tuition costs. Supposedly the school isn't taking in any less money this way. Just getting rid of the somewhat confusing awarding of scholarships.

This is just a guess on my part, but I'd suspect it also lowers some of the administrative costs associated with tracking all the scholarships - I used to work in the financial aid office at my university, and there's a ton of overhead involved with all the different awards/loans/etc.

polarbear

Would you share more information on this program, its expectations, and rigor?

Would you share your source of this information? Also what scholarships and amounts?

That is a negative way of putting it. "Tiger Parents" may refer to hothousing parents in general, but I think it also carries an ethnic connotation. At the math camps and after-school programs such as Russian School of Math that my children attend, there are indeed more Asians (both East Asian and South Asian) than whites, and the white children disproportionately have immigrant parents. The math studied is harder than that taught in the public schools. Is this "pampering"? Or is it sustained hard work leading to success?

There is a large disconnect between what is reported for scholarships awarded and what will actually be used by the students. Our newspaper publishes the scholarships for local students, but you can see that many of them are mutually exclusive.

For example, one of this year's local students was awarded $12,107 nonresident waiver for Utah State University, $9000/yr renewable from the University of Arizona, $8500/yr renewable from Baylor University, $3000/yr FLC Merit Scholarship, $2500/yr renewable CSU Alliance Partnership award, $2000 FLC First Generation, $7500/yr renewable Bausch & Lomb Honorary Science Award, and $6000 in miscellaneous scholarships from local banks and organizations.

It says she is going to Utah State, so Arizona, FLC and Baylor money is out the window. I *think* the CSU Alliance thing is something among certain colleges that trade money around, so she may be able to use that -- I'm not close enough yet to have made a study of that one. But that's a lot adding to the total reported scholarships for our local schools, and much of it won't be used.

Of course it's pampering. Tuition at those schools around here starts at $1,000 annually for a very basic package and goes up to $3,000. The kids may be tigered and working hard (hard enough to give them long-term misery in some cases). However, compared to kids whose parents don't have an extra $2,000 for after-school enrichment, which is most parents, yes, they are absolutely pampered in the way that HowlerKarma was referring to.

I suspect that most of those kids also have stable lives in comfortable homes and lots of nutritious food. They probably have plenty of new clothing, toys, and electronic equipment. Many or most of them probably get to go on nice vacations every year.

So yes, from that perspective, they're pampered (and primped and hothoused).

Nautigal's post is what I was getting at-- only she's put it much more succinctly than I did, by using an example.


Bostonian, put it this way-- it's pretty darned hard to earn a music scholarship if all your parents can afford (or know to do) is public school strings/band. No private lessons, no professional-quality instruments.... probably no competitions (travel and $) all add up to a high school student who has almost no hope of competing for a scholarship with a student who has been prodded into a standard of performance (via lessons, a SAHP pushing, etc.) that allows for competition wins. KWIM?

So yeah-- in that instance, there are probably a LOT of kids who are that capable. They just don't have TigerParents. And no, I do not mean that term as any kind of ethnic commentary. Frankly, I see far more of this sort of thing locally from UMC Caucasian families than I do from immigrant families of any ethnicity. And yes, my family is considered "honorary Asian" by most people who know us-- but it's not because we're TigerParents, per se, but because we are pretty strict about boundaries, and we set pretty high expectations, and we follow more or less Confucian idealogy-- but only because that seems more or less right and proper to us.

We are not spending thousands annually on music teachers, tutors, etc. etc. the way that some of our peers in our community do. Can my kid compete with theirs? Well, yes-- but only because she happens to be PG. If she were HG instead, their bright-to-MG kids would probably look "better" than her by virtue of all that endless prepping.

Silicon Valley was built on the backs of electrical engineers.

$2,000 a year?

2K is a lot if you're earning the median ($51K in 2012). It's even more than a lot if you're below the median.

It's a lot in my mind and our household income is theoretically enough to make it "fine" as a discretionary expense item. I'm also convinced that 2K annually is rather at the low end of things when you're discussing genuine-- er-- brinksmanship.

Some of the folks that we know, it's more along the lines of 1-3K monthly. Not kidding.

Some of those parents work doing manicures and pedicures. They will spend the money on math programs but do without so their kids accel and don't have to do the same. It is all about priorities with immigrants.

I see it as sustained hard work leading to success... although not necessarily to being a recipient of college scholarships.

Families often choose summer camps, online programs, or resources and support for independent study to provide their students with appropriate learning experiences and the challenge of curriculum and pacing to match their readiness and ability. Parents provide such opportunities, often at great sacrifice, because many schools are working toward statistically uniform achievement among all students, therefore are not interested in providing advanced academic opportunities which may widen the "achievement gap" or "excellence gap".

In not providing the curriculum and pacing appropriate for these students, schools may provide a lack of mental stimulation which sets in motion brain-based changes which may lead to underachievement and difficulty learning new material when it may be presented years later.

Best practices may be those in which a school strives to provide the appropriate level of curriculum and pacing for students during the regular school day, not just for students entering high school as C students (as mentioned by the OP, if I understood correctly), but also for those who may have already mastered much of the grade-level material and need other curriculum/pacing to continue their development.

Working to increase opportunity may serve the gifted community better than labeling students as "pampered" whether they are C students having in-school support which has been reported as leading to tons of scholarship money, or whether they are students seeking advanced academics who attend academic camps/classes on their own time.

I'd need to see statistics on this claim. What percentage is "some?"

Most of the people around here who send their kids to the Russian Math School and suchlike are tech workers or other professionals. I know this because they're classmates of my kids at private schools and I talk to them. I also see their work badges (a Kumon abuts our local grocery store, and I take one of my kids to the Mathnasium). They also drive expensive cars. Half or more are immigrants.

$2000 a year isn't a lot. Let see I take my son to music lessons ($32 a pop) and Aikido (cheep at $80 per month -- he attends ~2 twice a week). And that adds up quickly. And that is over the $2K a year even saying he doesn't goes to music lesson every week. And that doesn't include summer camps, or the amount I donate to the schools.

And he doesn't do a lot of activites compared to a lot of kids I know. A lot of kids do a lot more, or do a lot more expensive things. Yes, I know a lot of parents can't afford even that.

What difference does it make what the percentage is?


We have a mix of both here (high income, middle income and low income) all sending their kids to after-school enrichment. I don't know the exact percentages, but I do know parents from each SES sending their kids to these types of programs and the motivation is pretty much the same no matter what the SES - they are either sending their children because they see an opportunity for learning above and beyond what the children are receiving in school and because they perceive that opportunity to be worthy of the investment in time/money. None of the parents I know would qualify as "tiger" parents who are pushing their children beyond their children's ability, they are simply parents who value education and see it as a means to an end. For some of the parents, that end is "catching up" their children who have fallen behind in regular school and aren't receiving the extra help they need because their children don't qualify for it. For others the goal is adding on extra enrichment that just isn't present in a curriculum aimed squarely at the bottom-half-of-average (in our area). I'd say that quite a few of the parents who send their kids to these enrichment programs are immigrants who purposely worked hard and studied hard to get here to the US. They see education here as the key to success and they are giving their children everything they can to help them find the key, to give them a better life. I don't see that as triggering or pampering in any way, shape, or form - that's simply parenting in the way that fits a family the best.

I also know, having friends who are immigrants, that it's not always easy to come to the US and find work at the professional level you were working in previously in your country of origin, unless you were brought over to the US *by* a company who needed you or unless you came to the US on a student visa and graduated from college here. There's a good chance that some of the immigrants who are in low-paying jobs and sacrificing salaries for education for their children are people who would have been working as engineers, professors, medical professionals, architects etc back in their home countries - but they all saw something to strive for in coming here, and they all have hopes that their children will have good options going into college and careers. Bottom line is, most of us parents all want the same thing for our children - health, happiness, a bit of a challenge intellectually, and an opportunity for an adulthood that is filled with stability, possibilities and love

polarbear

The claim is that hard work is resulting in advantages to the kids. My counterpoint is that parental ability to pay has a lot to do with it (hence, pampering/primping/hothousing).

I have no doubt that there some people who send their kids to academic tutoring centers of one kind or another have incomes that are low compared to the average in that particular group. But that doesn't make them truly low-income. Truly low-income people don't have that kind of money, full stop. And they can't take time off work to drive their kids to these places.

Let's not lose sight of HowlerKarma's original point, which was that a lot of the kids competing for merit-based scholarship money are generally pretty privileged kids.

Of course, I am not in a position to rule out incompetence on the part of the district and stupidity on the part of the students/parents but I would be rather surprised based on my past experience.

Actually, that was kind of what I was envisioning when I started this new thread. Lots of kids with good grades but nowhere near the top are getting scholarship money.

These ideas can be reconciled. Some affluent parents pay people to make their children work harder than they otherwise would, as occurs when I send a child to a math camp or afterschool program. It's strange to call it "pampering". Does anyone say that the Williams sisters became great tennis players because their father "pampered" them from an early age?

Well, I am sure that the competition is usually fierce enough that you would want to do a cost-benefit analysis accounting for probability as well. Perhaps the odds are somewhat improved for the applicants due to the many kids opting out of applying.

Since we are not currently undergoing this process, I really don't have an opinion as to the feasibility of gaining a significant contribution from these miscellaneous sources. Interestingly, one of the upcoming DYS seminars is about scholarship funds and will be conducted by a recent graduate who received significant scholarship funding. I didn't sign up as my kids are still so young and spaces are limited but perhaps I will go read some of it when Davidson opens it after the seminar concludes.

LOL. I suppose it's a question of perspective. Personally, I don't have a problem with most narrow targeted scholarships. After all, we want people to make charitable contributions so it makes sense that they should have a right to control to whom their money goes.

Things must have changed. I seem to recall that at least some National Merit Scholars used to get more substantial awards.

There's no question that a significant portion of the middle-class is in danger of being squeezed out of the college track altogether.

On the other hand, I am not so sure that the "pampered, primped, and hothoused (not to mention "whipped") children of Tiger Parents" as you have described above would necessarily bother applying for many of these small scholarships.

Hurray for one institution that is opting out of this fake scholarship craze and thereby saving students money.

It's a national program named AVID that is implemented by individual districts. I really don't have any information to share as it isn't a program that would apply to my kids or any kids on this forum for that matter.

They still do-- it's often institution specific $$ on TOP of what NMSC provides.

Exactly! As a practical matter (timing, marketing, etc), it makes sense for the district to include all awards. That is why I mentioned that some graduates were probably getting six figures while many graduates were getting zero to average out to about $20,000 per graduate.

ITA. That has been my experience as well.

ITA. Clearly many parents can't spare $2,000 on extracurriculars for their kids. However, each instrumental music lesson costs between $30 to $60, which with weekly lessons would total $1,560 to $3,120 for one instrument for a single child each year.

Arguably, the kids who get music lessons are privileged but I would also say that it is a fairly typical middle-class expenditure as well. Are there any teens on this board with note-worthy musical competence/achievement whose parents haven't spent thousands on music lessons? Arguably, this is possible if the parents happen to have the expertise themselves but that would still be privilege although in a different form.

I am not an expert but I have saved quite a bit of money teaching my kids instrumental music at the earlier stages. As for math, I haven't spent more than a couple of hundred dollars total for my DS11 and DD11 combined and that was for a few AOPS textbooks and a couple of months of ALEKS subscriptions. There have been many instances in the past when other parents have demonstrated shock upon hearing that my kids did not have another music teacher or have never enrolled in Kumon or other math tutoring centers, etc. However, I am the first to admit that my kids are privileged so therefore would fall under the "pampered, primed" category as discussed by other posters although I am not sure that I can claim "hot-housed" since it's unnecessary as my kids tend auto-didactic so I will have to stick with the more accurate "privileged" terminology.

Anyhow, that was a convoluted way of pointing out that it may not be a question of outside expenditures but parental expertise and time commitment go a long way. Are the kids less privileged just because the checkbook is unnecessary in some instances?

I also don't see any real contradiction either. Parental ability to pay (and I would add parental ability to provide tutoring or otherwise impart knowledge) is one component that results in advantages to these kids but their own hard work is also a necessary component.

I believe that HowlerKarma's original point was that the high level of what she called pampering/primping/houthousing is a major contributing factor to increasing the costs of college for kids who don't have the benefits that the upper middle class does. HowlerKarma, correct me if I'm wrong.

The un-primped kids have to compete with the resources of the parents of the upper middle class, and they simply can't succeed in that competition, regardless of how capable they may actually be. The wealthier kids need the merit scholarships the LEAST yet are at a significant advantage in getting them precisely because of parental resources. This leaves the middle class kids with LOANS.

This is about growing inequality folks, not internal drive.

I don't agree with how the word "privileged" is used nowadays, for reasons explained by economist David Henderson below. Step #1 in the process of discounting the achievements of my children and therefore justifying discrimination against them and resentment towards them and me is to label them "privileged".

The Real Meaning of Privileged

I thought that HowlerKarma was referring to miscellaneous minor scholarships for which it is a pain to apply but from which she would not expect more than 1-2% contribution toward college costs.

My thought was that most kids in the extreme range would not bother with these minor scholarships. Then again, I am not sure that I know what upper middle class means to everyone or how broadly that category can be defined.

On the growing inequality issue, I do see that.

Nobody here has said that we should discriminate against your kids. Stop segueing the argument. That tactic is too obvious to fool people here.

The point is that many scholarships, as currently awarded, are more likely to go to students who don't need them. Hence, we have rising inequality, plus rising debt burden for students who may be very talented but who can't afford expensive resume boosters.

Well, that is the problem with many words in the modern lexicon. I guess I am leaning towards its denotation rather than its connotations. Perhaps, advantaged is a better word? I definitely see that my children, even if I spent no money on them, are clearly more advantaged than the general populace just by virtue of having educated parents who are committed to education.

Shouldn't you wait to see whether your kids achieve things first?

I would wait 20 years or so to see what happens.

I <3 JonLaw.

You have completely lost me on the first paragraph - what discrimination? What sequeing? ??? As to the second paragraph, of course, everyone is entitled to their opinion.

Bostonian's original message has been removed. Here it is:

I've never understood why anyone would call extra studying in an air-conditioned, well-lit environment "hard work," especially among the gifted cohort. Sure, it's work, because you'd rather be doing something else, but it's safe, comfortable, and quiet.

I chose to ascend the socioeconomic ladder primarily because I tried hard work, and found I didn't care for it.

Let's please keep the topic related to education.

Well, it's both things, actually.

Firstly, yes-- more advantaged students are actually winning the scholarship sweepstakes in ever larger numbers. I was deeply saddened, actually, by my DD's cohort, and what I observed in it. There were distinct groups of students there, and in our SES bracket, DD is unusual in that her parents are incredibly savvy about how to play the game. Many of my DD's (on paper, anyway) highly capable classmates came from homes which were similar in terms of SES advantage, but for whom the parents in those homes did not know the relative importance of making sure that the resume builds a coherent high-achiever portrait by senior year. THOSE kids wound up getting almost NOTHING in terms of scholarships. Seriously-- nothing. One in particular was a national merit commendee, graduated in the top 1%, had a couple of EC's demonstrating well-roundedness and task-persistence, and still only got a tuition waiver for about 10% of his annual costs at a public uni.


THAT is what it means now to be middle class with fairly typical, bright parents, but lack a "hook" that is a means to get scholarship $.

A reason to keep merit scholarships open to "rich" kids is to not punish them for their parents' wealth. Most "rich" kids have few assets to their name -- it's their parents who have the income and assets. There are rich parents like me who will pay for the college education of their children, but there are also rich parents who think, perhaps based on their own experiences when college was much cheaper, that college costs are the responsibility of the student.

You can regularly read on College Confidential about kids taking huge loans because colleges deem them rich while their parents are not willing to contribute what the colleges expect.

Yes-- and even back when I was a student, this was a significant problem. My own parents very much expected that I would "work my way" through college, and it was barely feasible then, and even so, my GPA jumped 0.5 my last year in college, when I finally said "I can't keep doing this" and quit my 40hr/week, minimum wage job in favor of loans.

I did have friends whose parents COULD pay (mine probably really couldn't have done much more than pay for textbooks and half of my tuition), but who REFUSED to do so for a variety of reasons.

It's complicated, and frankly-- the BEST scenario is one in which colleges rein in their own expenses to some degree, and realize that what the market will bear is not necessarily morally okay, nor "affordable" for all but the top 1% of households.

I asked based upon your previous post; If not relevant to this forum, why did you choose to introduce that program, and its students receiving "a ton of scholarship money" into the conversation?

What is your source for your expressed belief that AVID would not apply to any kids on this forum? From the AVID website, amongst their listed radio programs, I find "A National Authority’s Moral Imperative on Gifted Education".

Well, there's that difference in perspective again! I do believe that it is possible for children to work hard in academics, in music, etc. In that same sense, I would consider myself as having worked hard in my profession even though most of the time it is also "safe, comfortable, and quiet".

I mentioned that program in one of the posts only to account for that high $15 million figure, not to initiate a discussion regarding that program. I have not researched this program nor compiled data relating to it. I can only go by how our district implements this program and the information provided by our administrators. As I stated in my previous post, this program is for the academic middle ONLY in our district, not for the GT or honors/advanced population. My children would not be allowed to sign up for the classes in this program, etc. I may be wrong but I do assume that the parents on this forum have gifted kids or at least bright kids who would qualify for honors/advanced classes and therefore would be outside the scope of this program.

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Yes, I was curious as to how much of that "high $15 million figure" you are accounting for with this "ton of scholarship money"? Is this Merit Scholarships? Financial Need? Special Populations?

A significant number of forum posts seem to be about gifted children experiencing achievement at the academic middle, and seeking remedies for underachievement.

By your description, it sounds exclusive/elitist. Might some children feel bad if they cannot access this opportunity?

The AVID website describes advanced classes. Statistics boast of the number of AVID students taking AP exams! The website also mentions Summer STEM classes in Math and Science (reminiscent of summer classes described up-thread, whose participants were labeled as pampered and privileged... a negative connotation, seeming to discount both a child's need for advanced academics and a child's hard work in the class to yield a level of academic achievement).

Not sure why we should aid wealthy parents because they have a philosophy, rather than aiding bright students who overcome significant obstacles to obtain their educations.


Yes, because the price is too high. That's the real problem, and members of every SES should be able to get behind pushing to solve it, because members of every strata would benefit.

Right, it's all about perspective.

For example, writing a research paper for school can be hard. But it's even harder when you don't have regular access to the internet or a computer. It's harder still when the area where you can work is loud and full of distractions. And it's harder yet when you haven't had enough to eat that day.

For someone who has no experience with any of that, their idea of "hard" is going to be somewhat distorted.

And that's just for academic pursuits. A 10-hour shift waiting tables or working on a road crew is an orders of magnitude different kind of "hard."

Would you explain why you mention aiding parents vs aiding students? Some may say that regardless of philosophy/obstacles, a scholarship primarily aids the student, and secondarily may aid the parents/family?

As a side note, a broad range of parental philosophies can be an obstacle for a student, ranging from very uninvolved parents who may not read to or converse with their young children, to overly involved pushy tiger parents or helicopter parents.

Agreed! As a side note, some may seek to solve this for their child only (for example competitive edge for scholarship), some may seek to solve this by infusing money into scholarship funds, some may seek to solve this by getting on boards and/or bringing about changes in a college/university tuition/scholarship policy. At the root may be a wide range of viewpoints on thoughts of redistribution, sustainability, equal opportunity, equity, and the enduring question of what is just. There may be a broad range of right answers... initiatives which help motivate students toward internal locus of control and self-sufficiency, while bringing out the best in people.

For families whose child/ren are not in the Davidson Young Scholar (DYS) program: It is my understanding that seminar information is made available to the general public, without fee or registration so access is not an issue. Resource-rich content is found on the Davidson Database, under Tips for Parents. Past scholarship seminars summarized here.

Right. The current situation simply seems to bring out the worst in a lot of people-- greed, self-promotion, callous indifference, and out-and-out selfishness.

I think this is difficult to truly understand on an emotional level until you are actually living it with your own child/their cohort.

It's very much like an amplification of the phenomenon that so many of us are already familiar with by the time our children are preschoolers-- the one where you don't talk about ______ with other parents, or they give you THAT look. Or the obnoxious parents that want everyone to treat Little Lord/Lady Fauntleroy as the budding genius that s/he obviously is when s/he meets developmental milestones days ahead of schedule due to endless parental "oversight" and "assistance."

An awful lot of the kids in the top 10% of their high school classes are in that latter group. It's one long arc through childhood. THOSE are TigerKids. Some of them are bright, and some of them are MG, but very very few of them are more than that. It's just that mom and dad careful engineer things so that they LOOK as though they could well be HG. It's pretty evident that they aren't, when you meet them in person, but man they can sure look like HG/EG on paper. This is the cohort that is featured in films like "Race to Nowhere." They REALLY don't like EG/PG kids, believe me. Because they know that those kids can do things that the MG ones can't possibly actually do. Of course, some of them aren't above doing it for their kids and lying about it. I wish that I were kidding. Truly.

My impression is that the rate of increase in scholarship funds has grown at about the rate of overall inflation, and that college costs have grown at about the rate of healthcare in the US (several times the rate of inflation). So the gap between the two things has been widening since the 1980's, making the current competitive atmosphere all the more fierce-- and toxic.

Reducing college costs is the only larger solution, I fear. The problem is a fairly significant one, though, when you dig into what is driving those cost increases. There are a lot of structural problems to solve there.

To clarify, the seminars are not made available to the public, but the handouts often are, such as the scholarship handout you linked. DITD may post some materials for the upcoming seminar after it happens, but the seminar discussions will not be released.

Or working two part-time jobs (say, one at Wal-Mart and one waiting tables) without benefits because you can't get a full-time job offering a single ten-hour shift. On top of that, you have to find child care, get to different places on time (but your car is acting up or the bus schedule makes it difficult), and deal with a medical problem you can't afford to fix. There's barely time to help your kids with homework, let alone ferry them to after-school enrichment programs that you can't afford anyway.

I think it's easy to lose perspective when you don't have to face these kinds of circumstances.

It's also easy to assume that lower-income people have low IQs and that their kids wouldn't get much out of the Russian Math School anyway. I recently spent some time with a large group of PG people, and they weren't all in a position to afford expensive extras. Being PG is no guarantee of earning a high income (it may work against it, in fact).

That is correct. "Seminar information... resource-rich content... summarized". Apologies if I confused anyone. Thank you for clarifying.

Well said. Giftedness and opportunity are two different things. Withholding appropriate academic instruction/stimulation from children* may lead to underachievement, brain-based changes, and pronounced lack of opportunity. Each child benefits from an education which "fits" their present state of development: A good fit does not restrict but offers a bit of room and flexibility for movement, stretching, and growth.

* Side note: Some parents may do this either intentionally or unintentionally (neglect to read to or talk with children; not understanding parenting; not addressing child's questions; not encouraging curiosity; not understanding typical development vs gifted; understanding giftedness to a degree but not wanting child to be gifted or stand out; not wanting to allow younger sibling to surpass older sibling; not wanting to allow child to surpass parents, etc.) Some schools may do this by benign neglect of the gifted or by trying to close the achievement gap or excellence gap by capping achievement of gifted and/or high-achieving pupils. Some in the gifted community may do this by artificially treating the number of seats in gifted programs or services as a finite, limited number to be competed over; by making psychologically damaging comments about high or low SES or cultural preference for hot-housing. At some point it would be lovely to have all children learning and growing academically/intellectually/emotionally.

Pretty sure that it isn't parents of gifted children who want limitations on the numbers of participants in anything.



TigerParents care about prestige. Good gifted parents care about appropriate learning environments, and (in general) are not so concerned about the terminology being used to describe them.

The issue there is that any learning environment that is appropriate for HG+ children immediately attains a certain prestige, making it a gatekeeping problem, which then turns it into yet another barrier for families who lack resources to overcome the gatekeeping mechanism.

I can't speak for them, but I assume that neither the GT nor the Honors track students would feel discrimination because the point of AVID in our district is to improve those students who couldn't qualify for the GT or honors tracks so that despite their "low beginnings" they end up taking an honors course or two or even an AP course by their Junior or Senior years.

Dude, I do get your point. It is relative. However, I have to say that there have been times working as a professional when I would have preferred to do menial labor BUT FOR the low pay, which I think is the main problem with menial jobs. I have had a couple of jobs waiting tables and while it can be tough physically, it didn't have the do or die (not literally) stress that I experienced in my profession. Although perhaps waitressing doesn't count because the tips were great and I was very young (and in good shape) then.

I think the main problem with menial jobs is the menial treatment. The pay is just insult to injury.

For instance, I once had the misfortune to overhear a woman at the next table berate our young waiter because apparently it's his fault that the English language does not contain a proper plural form of the word "you," and this man chose to use the locally-accepted colloquial form, "you guys." Apparently, a good waiter travels back to the 1750s and asks Mr. Webster to address this oversight with a gender-neutral form, and keeps the drinks full.

And sometimes menial labor adds injury to injury, too.

Having performed in more professional settings where there were literally lives on the line, I have to say I actually like that kind of pressure, because it means you're doing something important. Nowadays, I have to settle for the fact that there are only billions of dollars on the line. Ho hum.

I think the low pay is a huge part of the point. Some people have no choice but to take those jobs and to try to survive on what they pay. Sure, office jobs can create horrible stress. But it's not the same league as the stress that people experience when they have to decide between paying the rent and buying a necessary medicine.

Some may say that is an interesting re-framing of the question, as the original focus was related to "a ton of scholarship money" you stated is awarded to these students... by participation in a program which you describe as excluding gifted students. You did not describe any similar support programs/services leading to provision of scholarships to gifted, therefore both the support services and "a ton of scholarship money" seem to provide advantage or privilege to the AVID students? Might some of the gifted students feel badly that they are denied access to the program which you describe as providing leading to "a ton of scholarship money"?

Additionally some may say it is wise not to assume.

I think people have become ruder and meaner. There is less cordiality, even in a professional setting. Then there are the crazies. . .

When I was younger, I enjoyed the respect and sometimes even felt proud that people trusted me to make decisions for them. Maybe I burned out as I have gotten older, but it sometimes became a burden to come up with the right answers, knowing that you can really mess up someone's life.

Oh, I won't argue with that. Were it not for our professional pay and the accompanying (relatively) good health insurance benefits, we could never have afforded hundreds of thousands in medical costs for my oldest.

I think this thread has run its course.