One of the more disturbing aspects of the "first-gen" designation is that some universities count any student who is the first generation to attend university IN THE UNITED STATES. So a family may have attended Oxford or Cambridge or McGill for generations, but if Junior comes here, he is first-gen -- even with a grandfather in the House of Lords. (And yes, these people donate much more than the true first-gen.)
The student lists parents' occupations on the CommonApp. Ergo, if Chantelle's mom is a lawyer, but she says she's a first-gen, if anyone actually compares the two sections, the discrepancy will raise an eyebrow.
“A relative who went to college could explain what office hours were, what a registrar was, what a minor was, how to drop a class, how to write a professor, what a prerequisite meant, how to read a transcript. The institution did not have to pay anyone to do this work.”
I don’t remember anyone ever specifically explaining these things to me. They are kind of obvious are they not?
Like navigating an airport you have never been to before, is it really that difficult? It is slightly stressful and sometimes a little confusing but not actually difficult. Are first gen college students so impaired that they can’t navigate slightly new environments?
This is true. When I went to college in the '60's, almost every student on many campuses was first-gen, because our parents were born in the 1920's and 30's, when very few enrolled in college. We asked each other, or the RA, about these things.
It's not just first gen students; it's likely a large plurality of all students these days.
I don't think there's harm in having clear explanations available, but I do think there needs to be some more responsibility on students to make a legitimate effort to look for answers first.
Outstanding. Coming from a corporate background, this reminds me a little of customer lifetime value. IOW how much is expected from a customer to spend from first to last transaction. A college educated parent is a multi-transactional customer and will be evaluating what they’re getting, just as you’ve described. In business, you WANT that customer feedback and it is, or should be, a great narrative and reference point for advertising and additional market capture. Your essay should be (like others you’ve written) a wake up call.
"The silence of every other student population is the measure of how badly the institution needs to keep those who see quality slipping to keep quiet."
It's a bit like an Emperor's New Clothes conundrum.
What stayed with me in this piece is the sense that comparison has become something institutions no longer know how to welcome.
That is what gives the essay its force. The most threatening student is not threatening because of misconduct, but because they arrive carrying memory, a living point of comparison the institution did not create and cannot fully manage. Once a family has been through college before, it brings with it a sense of cost, rigor, faculty access, administrative burden, and what the degree was once expected to mean. That kind of memory turns disappointment into something harder to contain, because it is no longer vague frustration. It is comparison.
What makes the piece especially strong is the way it shows how a moral story can also become a managerial one. The deeper issue is not whether first-generation students deserve support, of course they do. It is whether one category can become symbolically luminous partly because other students, especially those who can recognize decline when they see it, have to remain harder to read in public for the larger story to keep working.
The biggest driver of rising tuition costs over the past 20 years has been the tremendous growth of “student services.” When I first attended college in the 1970s, my family was my student support system.
My wife is from a very blue-collar family, and they always just started working out of high school instead of going to college. Therefore, she was a first-generation college student. But never in nearly 30 years of knowing her has she ever called herself by this designation. You do a great job of explaining here how that label has been commodified in a way that never existed before.
My father was a first-gen college student, starting out as an English major at Brooklyn College. He soon switched to electrical engineering at Brooklyn Polytechnic, and had a career designing radar systems for the Defense Department. He insisted that I study philosophy at Columbia, to read widely in Western and non-Western sources, in small seminar classes. He felt his education had been too vocational, too packaged. He told me to study something vocational later on, in grad school, which I did. His advice was priceless.
There's some good points here, but I want to push back on the idea that many of the issues mentioned stem from "First Generation" students and families.
The broader shift to a customer service model of education seems driven by parents who brought unrealistic expectations of what a school should do for a student. The syllabi changed to become legal documents because the parents filed lawsuits; I doubt it's first-gen parents doing the filing. The bureaucratic expansion came in part from student, admin, and consultant demand, but also from parents seeking more named resources and entertainment for students. The focus on FirstGen students may be part of that, but much seems to have been part of the admissions bidding wars for the "cooler" and "more fun" college experience.
That said, I agree that there is potentially latent demand for more of an old-school version of higher education that's currently not being provided at many places, though I wonder if people are willing to actually willing to choose and pay for it in practice (how is St. John's doing?). I also think that schools should be more willing to reach out and listen to parents and alumni on a number of issues instead of viewing them as annoying groups that must be satisfied lest they post too much on the school's Facebook page.
I find this so fascinating. I’m at least a 4th generation college grad, for both undergraduate and graduate school (that’s as far back as I know). I didn’t realize the first gen thing had become such a big deal. But then I finished grad school in the 20-teens.
If this interpretation is correct, then the implications for colleges are going to get worse in the coming years. Let's say the average age of first birth of the mother of a current 18 year old was 30yoa. (That's what AI tells me.) Which means that mother was 22yoa in 2000 -- or earlier if the current 18 year old is not their first child. Which means that mother was still in the upslope period when costs were rising, costs were being shifted to students and their families, and loan balances were rising. All of these shifted back in a positive direction starting around 2016. But students attending college around 2005-2015 got the worst of this trend. The first children of the women who attended college in that period are not to college yet.
This all seems short sighted to me in that today's first gen graduates will eventually be parents and will have years of working experience to inform whether college proved worthwhile economically, whether they were prepared to compete against other college graduates in their careers, etc. In 20 years there won't be as many first gens because way more parents will have degrees. So schools that are delivering a poor product today can expect to die in the next few decades while schools that deliver excellence can anticipate repeat customers.
Rising parental educational attainment may gradually increase scrutiny of college value, but first-gen demand will remain substantial. It is continuously regenerated by the fact that 60% of U.S. adults 25+ do not have a bachelor’s degree; educational attainment reproduces unevenly; and immigration continually adds ambitious non-degree households. Further, having worked investigatively in a for-profit uni chain, I can affirm beyond doubt that institutional quality does not self-correct quickly in a subsidy-heavy credential market.
Excellent Sheep: The Miseducation of the American Elite and the Way to a Meaningful Life
by William Deresiewicz. The Assault on American Excellence
by Anthony T. Kronman. Academically Adrift: Limited Learning on College Campusesby Richard Arum and Josipa Roksa, The Breakdown of Higher Education: How It Happened, the Damage It Does, and What Can Be Done by John M. Ellis. I have a looong list.
One of the more disturbing aspects of the "first-gen" designation is that some universities count any student who is the first generation to attend university IN THE UNITED STATES. So a family may have attended Oxford or Cambridge or McGill for generations, but if Junior comes here, he is first-gen -- even with a grandfather in the House of Lords. (And yes, these people donate much more than the true first-gen.)
The increasing stakes of being classified as "FirstGen" have led to quite the expansion of the definition in some people's minds.
It's also very simple to do: most of the time it's just ticking a box. Who's going to follow up?
The student lists parents' occupations on the CommonApp. Ergo, if Chantelle's mom is a lawyer, but she says she's a first-gen, if anyone actually compares the two sections, the discrepancy will raise an eyebrow.
Apply directly to most schools & they don't ask that. Chantelle's mom is a welfare queen. Don't play like that.
“A relative who went to college could explain what office hours were, what a registrar was, what a minor was, how to drop a class, how to write a professor, what a prerequisite meant, how to read a transcript. The institution did not have to pay anyone to do this work.”
I don’t remember anyone ever specifically explaining these things to me. They are kind of obvious are they not?
Like navigating an airport you have never been to before, is it really that difficult? It is slightly stressful and sometimes a little confusing but not actually difficult. Are first gen college students so impaired that they can’t navigate slightly new environments?
This is true. When I went to college in the '60's, almost every student on many campuses was first-gen, because our parents were born in the 1920's and 30's, when very few enrolled in college. We asked each other, or the RA, about these things.
It's not just first gen students; it's likely a large plurality of all students these days.
I don't think there's harm in having clear explanations available, but I do think there needs to be some more responsibility on students to make a legitimate effort to look for answers first.
I never ever blame the students. It is the system that is letting them down.
Outstanding. Coming from a corporate background, this reminds me a little of customer lifetime value. IOW how much is expected from a customer to spend from first to last transaction. A college educated parent is a multi-transactional customer and will be evaluating what they’re getting, just as you’ve described. In business, you WANT that customer feedback and it is, or should be, a great narrative and reference point for advertising and additional market capture. Your essay should be (like others you’ve written) a wake up call.
Thank you yes!
"The silence of every other student population is the measure of how badly the institution needs to keep those who see quality slipping to keep quiet."
It's a bit like an Emperor's New Clothes conundrum.
What stayed with me in this piece is the sense that comparison has become something institutions no longer know how to welcome.
That is what gives the essay its force. The most threatening student is not threatening because of misconduct, but because they arrive carrying memory, a living point of comparison the institution did not create and cannot fully manage. Once a family has been through college before, it brings with it a sense of cost, rigor, faculty access, administrative burden, and what the degree was once expected to mean. That kind of memory turns disappointment into something harder to contain, because it is no longer vague frustration. It is comparison.
What makes the piece especially strong is the way it shows how a moral story can also become a managerial one. The deeper issue is not whether first-generation students deserve support, of course they do. It is whether one category can become symbolically luminous partly because other students, especially those who can recognize decline when they see it, have to remain harder to read in public for the larger story to keep working.
Thank you -- institutions really don't listen.
The biggest driver of rising tuition costs over the past 20 years has been the tremendous growth of “student services.” When I first attended college in the 1970s, my family was my student support system.
My wife is from a very blue-collar family, and they always just started working out of high school instead of going to college. Therefore, she was a first-generation college student. But never in nearly 30 years of knowing her has she ever called herself by this designation. You do a great job of explaining here how that label has been commodified in a way that never existed before.
My father was a first-gen college student, starting out as an English major at Brooklyn College. He soon switched to electrical engineering at Brooklyn Polytechnic, and had a career designing radar systems for the Defense Department. He insisted that I study philosophy at Columbia, to read widely in Western and non-Western sources, in small seminar classes. He felt his education had been too vocational, too packaged. He told me to study something vocational later on, in grad school, which I did. His advice was priceless.
There's some good points here, but I want to push back on the idea that many of the issues mentioned stem from "First Generation" students and families.
The broader shift to a customer service model of education seems driven by parents who brought unrealistic expectations of what a school should do for a student. The syllabi changed to become legal documents because the parents filed lawsuits; I doubt it's first-gen parents doing the filing. The bureaucratic expansion came in part from student, admin, and consultant demand, but also from parents seeking more named resources and entertainment for students. The focus on FirstGen students may be part of that, but much seems to have been part of the admissions bidding wars for the "cooler" and "more fun" college experience.
That said, I agree that there is potentially latent demand for more of an old-school version of higher education that's currently not being provided at many places, though I wonder if people are willing to actually willing to choose and pay for it in practice (how is St. John's doing?). I also think that schools should be more willing to reach out and listen to parents and alumni on a number of issues instead of viewing them as annoying groups that must be satisfied lest they post too much on the school's Facebook page.
Parents often complain for good reason. If a university expands a syllabus because a parent complained, was the parent really listened to?
I find this so fascinating. I’m at least a 4th generation college grad, for both undergraduate and graduate school (that’s as far back as I know). I didn’t realize the first gen thing had become such a big deal. But then I finished grad school in the 20-teens.
If this interpretation is correct, then the implications for colleges are going to get worse in the coming years. Let's say the average age of first birth of the mother of a current 18 year old was 30yoa. (That's what AI tells me.) Which means that mother was 22yoa in 2000 -- or earlier if the current 18 year old is not their first child. Which means that mother was still in the upslope period when costs were rising, costs were being shifted to students and their families, and loan balances were rising. All of these shifted back in a positive direction starting around 2016. But students attending college around 2005-2015 got the worst of this trend. The first children of the women who attended college in that period are not to college yet.
100% thank you!
This all seems short sighted to me in that today's first gen graduates will eventually be parents and will have years of working experience to inform whether college proved worthwhile economically, whether they were prepared to compete against other college graduates in their careers, etc. In 20 years there won't be as many first gens because way more parents will have degrees. So schools that are delivering a poor product today can expect to die in the next few decades while schools that deliver excellence can anticipate repeat customers.
Rising parental educational attainment may gradually increase scrutiny of college value, but first-gen demand will remain substantial. It is continuously regenerated by the fact that 60% of U.S. adults 25+ do not have a bachelor’s degree; educational attainment reproduces unevenly; and immigration continually adds ambitious non-degree households. Further, having worked investigatively in a for-profit uni chain, I can affirm beyond doubt that institutional quality does not self-correct quickly in a subsidy-heavy credential market.
insightful! great read, thank you
Is Thelin's history the one to read? I need to get a better sense of the big picture.
Not really. Only on endowments. Which "big picture" are you interested in?
A history of American higher education. I recently purchased Marsden's book, but it may be too focused on religious institutions.
Excellent Sheep: The Miseducation of the American Elite and the Way to a Meaningful Life
by William Deresiewicz. The Assault on American Excellence
by Anthony T. Kronman. Academically Adrift: Limited Learning on College Campusesby Richard Arum and Josipa Roksa, The Breakdown of Higher Education: How It Happened, the Damage It Does, and What Can Be Done by John M. Ellis. I have a looong list.
Thank you! Deresiewicz is amazing.