Unequal Colleges in the Age of Disparity
For decades, leaders in higher education have voiced their intention to expand college education to include disadvantaged groups. Colleges have embraced and defended public policies that push back against discrimination and make college more affordable. And yet, as the economist Charles Clotfelter shows, America’s system of undergraduate education was unequal in 1970 and is even more so today.

In Unequal Colleges in the Age of Disparity, Clotfelter presents quantitative comparisons across selective and less selective colleges from the 1970s to the present, in exploration of three themes: diversity, competition, and inequality. Diversity shows itself in the variety of colleges’ objectives but also in the disparity of the material and human resources at their disposal. Competition operates through both the supply and the demand sides of the market, with college admissions becoming more meritocratic even as the most desirable colleges choose to contend fiercely for top-tier students rather than accommodate rising numbers of qualified applicants. Clotfelter shows that exclusive colleges have also benefited disproportionately from America’s growing income inequality. As their endowments have ballooned, their students have become more academically advantaged, owing in part to the extraordinary steps affluent families take to groom their children for college admission.

Clotfelter finds that despite a revolution in civil rights, billions spent on financial aid, and the commitment of colleges to greater equality, stratification has grown starker. Top colleges cater largely to children of elites.

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Unequal Colleges in the Age of Disparity
For decades, leaders in higher education have voiced their intention to expand college education to include disadvantaged groups. Colleges have embraced and defended public policies that push back against discrimination and make college more affordable. And yet, as the economist Charles Clotfelter shows, America’s system of undergraduate education was unequal in 1970 and is even more so today.

In Unequal Colleges in the Age of Disparity, Clotfelter presents quantitative comparisons across selective and less selective colleges from the 1970s to the present, in exploration of three themes: diversity, competition, and inequality. Diversity shows itself in the variety of colleges’ objectives but also in the disparity of the material and human resources at their disposal. Competition operates through both the supply and the demand sides of the market, with college admissions becoming more meritocratic even as the most desirable colleges choose to contend fiercely for top-tier students rather than accommodate rising numbers of qualified applicants. Clotfelter shows that exclusive colleges have also benefited disproportionately from America’s growing income inequality. As their endowments have ballooned, their students have become more academically advantaged, owing in part to the extraordinary steps affluent families take to groom their children for college admission.

Clotfelter finds that despite a revolution in civil rights, billions spent on financial aid, and the commitment of colleges to greater equality, stratification has grown starker. Top colleges cater largely to children of elites.

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Unequal Colleges in the Age of Disparity

Unequal Colleges in the Age of Disparity

by Charles T. Clotfelter
Unequal Colleges in the Age of Disparity

Unequal Colleges in the Age of Disparity

by Charles T. Clotfelter

Hardcover

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Overview

For decades, leaders in higher education have voiced their intention to expand college education to include disadvantaged groups. Colleges have embraced and defended public policies that push back against discrimination and make college more affordable. And yet, as the economist Charles Clotfelter shows, America’s system of undergraduate education was unequal in 1970 and is even more so today.

In Unequal Colleges in the Age of Disparity, Clotfelter presents quantitative comparisons across selective and less selective colleges from the 1970s to the present, in exploration of three themes: diversity, competition, and inequality. Diversity shows itself in the variety of colleges’ objectives but also in the disparity of the material and human resources at their disposal. Competition operates through both the supply and the demand sides of the market, with college admissions becoming more meritocratic even as the most desirable colleges choose to contend fiercely for top-tier students rather than accommodate rising numbers of qualified applicants. Clotfelter shows that exclusive colleges have also benefited disproportionately from America’s growing income inequality. As their endowments have ballooned, their students have become more academically advantaged, owing in part to the extraordinary steps affluent families take to groom their children for college admission.

Clotfelter finds that despite a revolution in civil rights, billions spent on financial aid, and the commitment of colleges to greater equality, stratification has grown starker. Top colleges cater largely to children of elites.


Product Details

ISBN-13: 9780674975712
Publisher: Harvard University Press
Publication date: 10/30/2017
Pages: 448
Product dimensions: 5.80(w) x 9.40(h) x 1.60(d)

About the Author

Charles T. Clotfelter is Z. Smith Reynolds Professor of Public Policy Studies at Duke University.

Table of Contents

Part I Context

1 Unequal Colleges 3

2 System, Industry, or Crazy Quilt? 15

3 Snapshot, Circa 1970 52

4 Outside Forces 76

Part II Supply

5 The Inequality Dividend 113

6 Zero-Sum Competition 147

7 Evolution in the Core Business 176

Part III Demand

8 Scholasric Segregation 207

9 Economic Stratification 228

10 Sorting by Seriousness 256

11 Sorting by Belief? 281

Part IV Consequences

12 Outcomes 305

13 Why It Matters 336

Appendix:

Table A.1 Shares by College Category of Total Undergraduate Enrollment in 1,157 Four-Year Institutions 357

Table A.2 The Dwindling Share of Places at Elite Colleges 359

Notes 361

References 409

Acknowledgments 425

Index 427

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