The percentage of “first-generation” students (the first in their families to attend college) at Harvard today is no higher than it was in 1960.
Book: The Tyranny of Merit
Some noteworthy data about higher education in America:
- The percentage of “first-generation” students (the first in their families to attend college) at Harvard today is no higher than it was in 1960.
- If you come from a rich family (top 1 percent), your chances of attending an Ivy League school are 77 times greater than if you come from a poor family (bottom 20 percent).
- At Ivy League colleges, Stanford, Duke, and other prestigious places, there are more students from the wealthiest 1 percent of families than from the entire bottom half of the country.
- At Yale and Princeton, only about one student in fifty comes from a poor family (bottom 20 percent).
- More than 70 percent of those who attend the hundred or so most competitive colleges in the United States come from the top quarter of the income scale; only 3 percent come from the bottom quarter.