The reason why elite schools visit is because High Tech High has something that the prep schools in places like Greenwich, CT, Lake Forest, IL,  Scarsdale, NY and Mercer Island, WA, do not. The school is a melting pot that attracts affluent students and an even larger number of students of color, many of whom have parents who did not go to college.

In higher-ed circles, there has been a great deal of debate about the efforts of elite schools to attract minority students. Curiously, it’s private, less selective colleges, which don’t enjoy large endowments, that underwrite the education of more of these students. In my book, The College Solution, I quote the president of St. Lawrence University, who had this to say about the phenomenon:

“The wealthiest colleges and universities – those that can best afford the financial aid necessary to enroll a large number of low-income students — in fact enroll the smallest percentage of such students.”

Actually, Columbia does a better job than most in attracting these kids. Yesterday afternoon Johnson bragged that 17% of Columbia’s students receive federal Pell Grants, which is the proxy used to measure the number of low-income students.  US News’ recent ranking of the top national universities by economic diversity bears Johnson out.  Columbia has more Pell Grant recipients than any other private college. It beats out University of Southern California by one percentage point. On the flip side, candidates for the hall of shame would certainly include Washington University in St. Louis (7%) and the University of Virginia (8%).

By far, the two universities with the most Pell Grant recipients is UCLA (35%) and UC Berkeley (32%).

You can find a handy list of top national universities and their Pell Grant percentages by visiting a New York Times blog post in The New York Times entitled, Poor Students at Rich Colleges.

Lynn O’Shaughnessy is the author of The College Solution and the college blogger at CBSMoneyWatch.com.

The college charges no tuition and only accepts low-income teenagers. Every student graduates with no debt. Not surprisingly, the school is mobbed every year with applicants.

Berea is dedicated to accomplishing what a lot of elite schools with multi-billion-dollar endowments give lip service to doing: providing promising teenagers from disadvantaged families a free college education.

Schools like Harvard, Yale and other elites have gotten kudos for providing free college educations for poor students, but the praise is misplaced. Why? Because most elite schools admit very few of these kids. The proxy used to measure how many lower-income students attend a school is the percentage who receive federal Pell Grants, which are usually awarded to families making less than $40,000 a year. According to the Education Trust’s figures, the percentage of students at Harvard and Princeton’s who receive Pell Grants is 8.4% and 8.5%. In comparison, 38.1% of UCLA’s students receive Pell Grants. At Berea, 81% of the students qualify for Pell Grants.

In discussing this phenomenon in my book, The College Solution, I quote the president of St. Lawrence University in Canton, NY, who made this observation about the stinginess of the nation’s mightiest universities. Here’s what he said:

“The wealthiest colleges and universities — those that can best afford the financial aid necessary to enroll a large number of low-income students — in fact enroll the smallest percentage of such students.”

Maybe some day the higher ed big boys will be shamed into doing the right thing.

Further Reading:

Watch Out for That Financial Aid Surprise

Will Saving for College Penalize My Chances for Financial Aid?