The College Access Debate: Class Considerations And College Preparation

Abstract

The college access debate in America remains an important one. Affirmative action policies and practices continue to occupy a significant sub-component of the overall college access discussion. Recent legal debates and policy changes pertaining to affirmative action have encouraged analysis surrounding the overall viability and fairness of these policies. This article describes the current parameters and arguments surrounding the college access debate in America in relation to affirmative action practices and makes suggestions as to how these practices can be improved. Three major aims of the article are to articulate the shortcomings of affirmative action practices in their current forms, to investigate the potential benefits of considering students’ social-class backgrounds when making affirmative action admissions decisions at institutions of higher education, and to ultimately point out that college access factors prior to and following the admissions process, such as college preparation and the degree of support mechanisms in place after matriculation, are potentially more important to the access debate than affirmative action considerations. This article concludes that all students can significantly benefit from exposure to higher education and that affirmative action policies should address social class in some capacity or be abandoned.