WORKFORCE
campusreview.com.au
Last
among
equals
It seems the students implicated in the
investigation, codenamed ‘Operation
Varsity Blues’ by the FBI, will be allowed
to finish their degrees with no penalties.
It serves as a reminder that the rich can rig
the system and potentially get away with it.
BIASED BEGINNINGS?
What a local and an international
scandal suggest about
education inequality.
By Loren Smith
R
ecently, the ABC’s chief economics
correspondent Emma Alberici was
doing some routine research via
Twitter when she stumbled into a furore.
Infamous for her supposed anti-Liberal bias,
she provoked the opposite kind of ire by
asking for people’s “stories about living on
the minimum wage”.
“Have you had to dip into your savings?”
she queried.
Cue outrage. “What savings?” practically
every commenter challenged, taking
Alberici’s tweet as proof of the smear that
the ABC is filled with out-of-touch, private
school alumni.
Plenty of research around both here and
overseas,” he tweeted.
Campus Review contacted a journalism
academic who said that while there is
no research on the class backgrounds of
Australian journalists, research from the
UK and the US corroborates Morton’s
claim. In the UK, for example, two-thirds
of journalists are from families with
professional or managerial backgrounds.
The day after Alberici’s tweet, a US-based
story broke about how the rich and famous
bribed a fraudster so that their children
could be admitted to prestigious colleges.
Actresses including Lori Loughlin (Full
House) and Felicity Huffman (Desperate
Housewives), among many others, arranged
for their kids’ SAT scores to be doctored
and their athletic abilities overstated so they
could attend the likes of Yale and Stanford.
One commenter hoped the scandal
would cheapen top colleges’ credentials,
and therefore help level the playing field.
A journo wondering aloud “what’s it
like to be poor, do you have to dip into
savings occasionally?” is a postcard
perfect snapshot of why newsrooms
shouldn’t just be middle class folks
who went to private schools.
— Joshua Badge (@joshuabadge)
11 March 2019 Maybe this will help put to rest the idea
that students from certain schools are
more worthy of internships, entry level
jobs, etc – in journalism or any other
field. (But I worry it won’t.)
— Amy Chozick (@amychozick)
12 March 2019
The social affairs writer at The Australian
and proud ex-public school student Rick
Morton supported Badge’s sentiment.
“Journalism is increasingly the domain
of the skilled and university educated and
increasingly of the comfortable classes. I was literally told early in my career –
by a top magazine editor – “Your clips
are great, but we really want someone
who went to Harvard.”
— Amy Chozick (@amychozick)
March 12, 2019
Whether or not the ABC specifically suffers
a privilege problem, both the Alberici
tweet and the US scandal illustrate the
wealth-education-opportunity link. While
this is not new, the fact that it is ongoing
is alarming, considering the various
attempts to address it. In Australia, for
example, the demand-driven system has
achieved its goal of admitting more low-
SES students to university, while in the US,
affirmative action policies have guaranteed
that minority groups are represented
on campus.
Yet a degree doesn’t always translate
to career success. Many studies show
that people hire people who are like
them. In professions like law, and perhaps
journalism, this means private school-
educated, golf aficionados tend to employ
their miniatures.
Some say the inequality of opportunity
begins to manifest at school, where
curricula and assessments are weighted
in favour of a certain kind of achievement.
Adding to this concern, the performance
gap between low and high SES students
is widening.
In the US, meanwhile, the picture is
yet more unequal. Divergent school
conditions, like private and public, are
compounded by the often exorbitant
amounts of immediately repayable
university debt. Poorer students, therefore,
are at a disadvantage.
People have accused the government
of being a plutocracy – never mind
that Trump is patently nepotistic. His
son-in-law, Jared Kushner, embodies
the aforementioned wealth-education-
opportunities link. Not only is he senior
adviser to the president by virtue of his
familial tie, his admission to Harvard is
continually questioned, given he didn’t
achieve the requisite grades and his
father donated $2.5 million to the college
before it accepted him.
These facts indicate an uncomfortable
truth: despite well-intentioned education
policies aimed at curbing inequality, it
persists, right up to the Oval Office. ■
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