Campuses Paved With Gold

??Some colleges are magnets for students from wealthy families leads today's newsletter. Here are excerpts from Next.?Sign up here.

??? But first, mark your calendars for the "Next Office Hour" October 5 at 2 p.m. ET/11 a.m. PT.

Our topic of conversation: ?? ?? AI, which is all the rage (and a lot of hype) right now in higher ed (and elsewhere)...we’re going to examine how to use AI on the administrative side of colleges and improve student pathways through higher ed.

• I’ll be joined by Mary Strain , a leader for Artificial Intelligence and Machine Learning Services at Amazon Web Services (AWS) , Timothy M. Renick , Executive Director of the National Institute for Student Success at Georgia State University , and Erica Wagner, PhD , Vice Provost of Student Success at Portland State University .

?? Register for free here (and to get an on-demand recording afterwards).

In a recent newsletter, I wrote about the curse of the full-payers: how they have become a rarer commodity over the last decade—"the result of declining household incomes in the U.S., increasing sticker prices at colleges, and more families simply saying No to paying full price even when they can.”

We get another view of this trend through data released in late July by economists at Harvard’s Opportunity Insights project. That study was a look at who gets into the nation’s top colleges, using a unique combination of tax records, college enrollment records, SAT scores, and admissions data.

Much of media coverage of the study focused on something we already knew: that the wealthy get into the Ivy League and so-called Ivy Plus schools at a higher rate than everyone else with the same SAT/ACT scores.

But the study also included data on dozens of other schools beyond the Ivy League. Open Campus put together this cool interactive graphic to show how students enroll at different rates at specific colleges based on their income—even when they have similar test scores.

As I clicked around the graphic, what I found interesting was that when it comes to the pool of potential full payers, there are stark enrollment differences between the very wealthy (top 1% in the study earn more than $611,000 annually) and the uber wealthy (the .01%, which are a good bit higher).

A few are like Bowdoin College, where wealthy families are way more likely to be enrolling than the middle class and where it’s almost a straight line up from the merely rich to the very rich.?

?Here is Santa Clara University in California:?

Then there are places like American University, which struggle to attract rich families at the same rate as the merely well off:

And then there are the public flagship universities, like the University of Alabama, which are magnets for out-of-state wealthy students:

Take a spin around the Open Campus interactive and let me know what you find that’s interesting or strikes you. Then add your comments below or drop a message to me at [email protected]. I might include some of your thoughts in a future newsletter.

?? The Future U. podcast returns next week

Before Season 7 of the Future U. podcast kicks off next week, I wanted to share some episodes you might have missed from this past season before the long Labor Day weekend:

Season 6: Final Report. Michael Horn and I look back on the past season and the stories we’ve covered, from college rankings and affirmative action to religion and student mental health. We picked our favorite episode and make predictions for what’s next.

What We're Missing When It Comes to Colleges and AI. Chat GPT and other AI tools have put the future of education on the front page yet again. But beyond large language models, what else can AI do in education? And should we worry about students cheating themselves out of an education—or will that education just fundamentally change? We pose these questions and more to computer science experts Charles Isbell, who has since moved from Georgia Tech to the University of Wisconsin, and Michael Littman of Brown University.

Future U. Live from NAIS. At the National Association of Independent Schools (NAIS) annual meeting last February, Debra Wilson, the incoming president of the NAIS, flipped the script and interviewed me and Michael about key takeaways from the pandemic for schools and higher education, how mental health plays into students’ transition to college, and how colleges can encourage more students to enter the teaching profession.

College in Prison. Some 1.5 million people are in state and federal prisons in the United States, but for more than two decades they haven’t been eligible for federal Pell Grants. That changed on July 1, offering an opportunity for incarcerated people and colleges alike. We talked with a scholar in prison education and a formerly incarcerated student who went on to earn his degree about providing meaningful rehabilitation through a college education.?

For my U.S. readers, enjoy your Labor Day weekend, and until next time, Cheers — Jeff??

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