Higher Education Recruiters Gear Efforts Toward Most Privileged Students in U.S.

College Fair” by COD Newsroom licensed under CC BY 2.0

Source: US News

According to a report from a recent analysis by researchers at UCLA and University of Arizona, some universities and colleges invest disproportionately large efforts into recruiting white, wealthy, out-of-state students.

Researchers analyzed data on 15 public research universities and their recruiting efforts at local high schools, and found that the majority of those schools invested a lot of time into recruiting out-of-state students, in many cases, conducting “twice as many” visits to students outside of the school’s state.

They also discovered that the universities were less likely to visit public high schools with high percentages of students of color and also less likely to visit students in low-income schools.

For in-state visits, recruiters from different schools varied in their strategies with some less likely to visit schools with students of color, and others targeting students of color.

Researchers wrote that the recruiting tendencies “contribute to a student composition where low-income students of color feel increasingly isolated amongst growing cohorts of affluent, predominantly white, out-of-state students.”

This comes as several studies have shown that the higher education system is geared toward supporting students from already advantaged backgrounds.

Read Full Story: US News

Education, News
Education, News