preview

Underprivileged, Outmatched

Decent Essays

C4C Daniel Payne
Dr. Pugh
ENGL 111
16 Sep 2015
Underprivileged, Unsupported, and Eventually Outmatched
I am a lower-middle class American airman who, after three dedicated years of servitude—three years of continued training and procured worldly experience—has finally decided to attend college in an attempt to better myself. However, my feverish uncertainty and flourishing self-doubt stemming from my lack of classroom-based schooling has caused me to muse to myself. “Am I supposed to be here”, I inquire internally. “If I was mentally and financially prepared when I graduated high school, I most likely wouldn’t have taken up arms so swiftly; I would more than likely be a junior now—possibly thinking of which internships I would be able to take. …show more content…

Whereas Sabrina Tavernise, a journalist for The New York Times, would say that this delayed pursuit of higher education is more of a result of my parents not being of the upper echelon of financial individuals, hindering me from attending or even completing college. Where I agree with Freedman’s notion that most top colleges’ reliance on their current business model is preventing their financial support of low-income and middle-income students, I also agree with Tavernise’s claim that education is not achieving its intended purpose and is transforming from a great equalizer of the classes for underprivileged students who had a knack for learning to another gap in the playing fields of society that we find today. As such, I consider that it is the transition of the financial affliction from schools to the students that is causing a reduction in colleges’ support of students, particularly low-income students, resulting in an ever-growing gap between the privileged and …show more content…

Freedman’s take on this is that not only are those in admissions role cognizant of the gap between the low-income students and the more privileged, but they also, in a way, chastise them for not being able to afford such schooling without assistance. In his writing, Freedman cites a 2011 survey by Inside Higher Ed which discovered that, “…about 35 percent of admissions directors at 4-year institutions, particularly public colleges, had increased their efforts to target ‘full pay’ students” (Freedman). This conveys that schools are becoming more reliant on the inequality in the system, causing those who cannot pay for their education in full to fend for

Get Access