More information on Educational Disparities in the US

This summer I will be working with WEAP, an organization that hopes to train and empower women living in poverty. Aside from this, WEAP advocates for equal human rights and access to the constituents of Oakland. Building on the work the WEAP does and the knowledge that I have personally acquired, I strongly argue that pursuing a higher education is a great avenue to break to cycle of many impoverished communities like that of Oakland. Furthermore, I found an interesting article focusing on the decrease of acceptance rates for Universities of California due to budget cuts. In other words, it has become more competitive for students to attain acceptance to an institution of higher education because our economy’s lack of revenue. To help the UC system continue to financially function, UC regents have decided to increase the amount of out-of-state students instead of admitting California residents because they pay higher tuition (CA residents $28,000-$30,000 compared to out-of-state students $50,000-$55,000).

This is problematic and specifically affects communities with limited resources and little transparency to attaining a higher education. In other words, it greatly affects the students coming from communities like Oakland. I will use the example of UC Berkeley and its infamous promise of being a “diverse campus”. Statistics in the other hand, show that minorities in Berkeley are vastly underrepresented. Latinas/Latinos at Cal constitute about 7% of the population while only about 3% and Black. This is not taking into consideration that minorities are the majority in the state of California, but these students are not seen in the higher realm of education. Furthermore I argue that if admissions are reduced, this hurts the already small numbers of minority students at these universities. Because Oakland is compromised of mostly minorities, it affects the general rates of students acquiring a higher education and hence making it harder to break the cycle of poverty for many families.

http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la-me-uc-admissions-20130419,0,252956.story