As we complete our celebration of Asian American and Pacific Islander Heritage Month, celebrating the common culture, language, and religion of Samoans, Koreans, Burmese, and Rajasthanis, here’s an ABC story that will warm the hearts of Asian American and Pacific Islander parents:
A high school senior who lived through homelessness much of his childhood was accepted to 65 colleges, and plans to attend an Ivy League school in the fall.
Note that if we believe The Son Also Rises: economics history with everyday applications we wouldn’t expect Lamont Newell to do as well as a 17-year-old with the same grades and same test scores (assuming that he took any tests; Columbia is permanently test-optional) who came from a successful (not homeless) family. Our society has chosen to invest in Mr. Newell, who won’t be paying or borrowing a dime for his education (“California teen who grew up homeless earns full ride to Ivy League school after 65 college acceptances”), rather than invest in an Asian 17-year-old whose parents worked like slaves to avoid homelessness and/or reliance on “public assistance” (i.e., taxpayers). If University of California economist Gregory Clark is correct, in other words, by lower admissions standards for those whose families are poor, the U.S. is doing the opposite of what investors in higher education would do if the goal were a return on investment.
(Why is it “society” rather than “Columbia” investing in Mr. Newell? At least half of Columbia’s money comes from taxpayers thanks to (1) Columbia’s tax-exempt nonprofit org status (investment returns aren’t taxed; half of every donation comes from taxpayers rather than the donor because the donor’s tax bill is reduced), (2) Columbia’s federal grants that yield massive overhead profits.)
Related:
Perhaps instead of a treehouse you could put a giant cardboard box in your backyard. Then your kids could write college admission essays about their experience “growing up in a cardboard box?”
They could write college essays about drawing constellations in the sky as they doze off, just as their Native American forebears used to do. Their childhood gazing through holes in the cardboard box, dreaming of a world where Red Giants, Yellow Dwarfs, and Black Holes live in harmony.
Columbia isn’t known as an industrial engineering powerhouse. Berkeley seems like it has a better program and in-state tuition is $13K (Columbia is $2700 per credit hour.) He probably won’t have enough time (or pocket money) in an engineering program to spend much time exploring NYC.
Now that he has chosen and been chosen, I hope he keeps receiving encouragement and is successful. America needs to build stuff itself again and improve its infrastructure. At least we aren’t subsidizing him to study French literature.