In her recent column (“Tilting the playing field,” Sept. 17), Amelia Meyer seemed to have discovered a most unfortunate reality — rich people have opportunities available to them that poor people don’t. Specifically, students from wealthy families can afford to hire college consultants and hence be more likely to get into a good college.
However, the statistics Meyer cites have little to do with her point. Yes, more kids from wealthy families than from poorer families go to college. But, did all those families hire consultants? Have there been any “natural experiments” providing a sample of low-wealth and high-wealth students with counselors and seeing how their acceptance rates compared? Perhaps this is too involved for a newspaper columnist. But the following question is an elementary one: How do college entrance rates compare, among wealthy students, between those who hired a consultant and those who did not? Meyer asks neither question.
But even more important is the complete lack of clarity in Meyer’s analysis. She first suggests universities should discount the effect of a consultant on an application. Perhaps that is somehow possible. But to do that in a non-arbitrary fashion, one needs answers to the questions I ask above. Not pausing to ponder this quandary, Meyer then suggests that private college consultants (yes, those, whose effect should be discounted) have to be made available only to students who “need” them rather those who can afford them. How are we going to implement this? Pro bono work? More funding for the College Guides program? A law against rich people seeking consultants? All I wanted to see was a suggestion. Again, Meyer is silent.
This is an interesting topic which poses difficult challenges. As a reader, I had hoped to learn something more factual than my conjecture. I am no expert in this area, but, it seems, neither is Meyer. The difference is — I don’t write columns about it.
Vadim Elenev
CLAS IV
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