The Editorial Board has praised the University in the past for its financial aid policy. This praise is well earned. Giving full, no-loan financial aid to every student whose family’s income is under $60,000 has been groundbreaking. This has undoubtedly made Princeton a very attractive choice for thousands of students. Further, it has granted Princeton graduates greater freedom in choosing a variety of less-remunerative postgraduate fields free from the often crushing pressures of student debt. The policy is a triumph not only for the University’s stated goal of economic diversity, but also for national social mobility.
In order to adequately assess the success of our efforts to increase the socioeconomic diversity of the student body and in order to effectively discuss future modifications to our efforts, it is necessary that we possess accurate and clear measurements about the current state of affairs. As reported today in the ‘Prince,’ though, when reporting statistics on the socioeconomic composition of the undergraduate student body, the University considers all students whose families earn less than $60,000 per year to be from a low-income background. While this figure is the cutoff employed by the University in determining whether financial aid will cover all of a student’s expenses, $60,000 a year is very different from common definitions of “low income”: the US Department of Education, for example, defines low income as $33,525 (150% of the poverty level) for a family of four.
The University is generous in using the $60,000 cutoff to calculate financial aid. This generosity is helpful in recruiting a diverse student body. However, defining low income as $60,000 gives a misleading picture of the composition of the student body because an income of $60,000 is so much higher than our ordinary conception of low income. The University’s current definition treats families making under $60,000 as a monolithic category, when in fact a student coming from a family making $33,525 has likely led a very different life than a student coming from a family making $60,000. Our measurements of diversity ought to correspond with students’ life experience as much as possible, but one is not low income in America by virtue of one’s ability to qualify for full financial aid at Princeton.
On campus, we learn from each other as much as we do from our lessons; we benefit from our classmates’ life experiences. Accurate numbers are available about various important measures of diversity on campus — gender, geography or ethnic background. The same should be available for socioeconomic diversity; unclear measurements will not help us achieve diversity. Furthermore, by inflating the definition of low income, the University appears out of touch with the national reality. This is particularly harmful at a time of heightened public resentment toward wealth inequality. Diversity is a principled aspiration. We have no reason to believe that we’re lacking in comparison to our peer institutions, but there is much progress to be made. Better information will make progress possible and lead to a better Princeton for all of us.
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