{"id":2512,"date":"2018-09-28T14:26:53","date_gmt":"2018-09-28T18:26:53","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/nacacadmitted.wpengine.com\/wordpress\/?p=2512"},"modified":"2018-09-29T08:18:09","modified_gmt":"2018-09-29T12:18:09","slug":"kristof-education-escalator-broken-for-too-many-students","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/admitted.nacacnet.org\/wordpress\/index.php\/2018\/09\/28\/kristof-education-escalator-broken-for-too-many-students\/","title":{"rendered":"Kristof: Education \u2018Escalator\u2019 Broken for Too Many Students"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/a>New York Times<\/em> columnist Nicholas Kristof believes in the power of education.<\/p>\n

From early childhood through adulthood, few other institutions hold the power to transform lives so completely. Yet as the gap between the haves and have-nots grows wider in America, more and more families struggle to tap into those benefits, Kristof told attendees Friday during the keynote address at NACAC\u2019s 74th <\/sup>National Conference<\/a> in Salt Lake City.<\/p>\n

\u201cColleges are a great public good, and yet too often, that public good is largely reserved for kids of the modern educational aristocracy,\u201d Kristoff told the roughly 6,000 attendees at this year\u2019s annual gathering of college admission professionals. \u201c…At 25 institutions around the country, including five Ivy League institutions, more kids come from families in the top 1 percent than from the bottom 60 percent \u2014 that is a failure of that public good. We can do better.\u201d<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

The divide is especially concerning given the challenges faced by our country, Kristof said. Wages for the working class have been essentially stagnant since 1970. And for the first time in half a century, life expectancy has fallen for two years in a row. Access to higher education could help address those issues, yet a large chunk of the American population remains locked out.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe best escalator out of poverty and disadvantage is the education escalator,\u201d Kristof, a two-time Pulitzer Prize winner and author of several books, told attendees. \u201cBut for those who most need it, the escalator is often broken.\u201d<\/p>\n

Kristof\u2019s next book will take a close look at who\u2019s being left behind in the new economy. For the project \u2014 which will be co-written with his wife, Sheryl WuDunn \u2014 Kristof is chronicling the life experiences of classmates and neighbors in his hometown of Yamhill, Oregon.<\/p>\n

The book will touch on the human cost of poverty. He estimates that about a quarter of the people he rode the school bus with as a student in the 1970s have already passed away from drugs, alcohol, suicide, accidents, or obesity-related illnesses \u2014 patterns he says are in danger of repeating themselves among the next generation of students.<\/p>\n

Counselors and college admission professionals have an important role to play in helping to combat those issues, Kristof said.<\/p>\n

\u201cYou\u2019re really on the front lines of these issues,\u201d he told attendees. \u201cFor so many issues of inequality and social justice that I write about, the best approach is the education toolbox.\u201d<\/p>\n

Read a Q&A with Kristof in the most recent edition of NACAC\u2019s Journal of College Admission<\/em><\/a>.<\/p>\n

Admitted writer\/editor Mary Stegmeir welcomes additional comments and story ideas at\u00a0<\/em>mstegmeir@nacacnet.org.\u00a0<\/em><\/a><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

New York Times columnist Nicholas Kristof believes in the power of education. From early childhood through adulthood, few other institutions hold the power to transform lives so completely. Yet as the gap between the haves and have-nots grows wider in America, more and more families struggle to tap into those benefits, Kristof told attendees Friday … Continue reading Kristof: Education \u2018Escalator\u2019 Broken for Too Many Students<\/span> →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[19,6],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2512","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-nacac-national-conference","category-nacac-news"],"featured_image_src":null,"featured_image_src_square":null,"author_info":{"display_name":"Mary Stegmeir","author_link":"https:\/\/admitted.nacacnet.org\/wordpress\/index.php\/author\/mstegmeir\/"},"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/peWmJq-Ew","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/admitted.nacacnet.org\/wordpress\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2512","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/admitted.nacacnet.org\/wordpress\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/admitted.nacacnet.org\/wordpress\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/admitted.nacacnet.org\/wordpress\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/admitted.nacacnet.org\/wordpress\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2512"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/admitted.nacacnet.org\/wordpress\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2512\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/admitted.nacacnet.org\/wordpress\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2512"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/admitted.nacacnet.org\/wordpress\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2512"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/admitted.nacacnet.org\/wordpress\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2512"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}