Both of my parents were the first in their family to go to college.  My mother was born in Detroit and grew up in poverty.  Neither of her parents had gone to college, but her mother, determined that her daughter would go to college, delayed her retirement for years so that my mother could have the chance to go to college.  My dad was the son of Italian immigrants, neither of whom went to college, and was the first and, until me, the only person in my family ever to go to college.

What sounds like a feel-good success story, however, hides some disheartening facts.  My mother, after moving 12 or 13 (I don’t know the exact number) times before she began high school, worked very hard during high school and went to the only school she could afford, Pratt Institute.  After getting her bachelor’s there, she was accepted into Columbia.  Being that no one in her family had ever been to college before her, she could not pass up the chance to go to an Ivy League school.  Unfortunately, she didn’t have enough money to go there and still do the work she wanted, which didn’t pay well enough to justify taking out so much debt.

My father was accepted into Cornell after High School, and desperately wanted to there.  He wanted to study physics and math, and Cornell’s programs in both were very well respected (Carl Sagan taught in their science department.)  Unfortunately, he didn’t have the money to go there and instead had to go to Stonehill College, a small college in Massachusetts that offered him a full scholarship.  Later, while working on his PhD in Physics at the University of Iowa, he was forced to forgoe his dream of being a college professor altogether because he began to realize how little money he would make.  None of his siblings had gone to college, his father was dying of cancer, and he had to start making money.  So he used his math degree to get a degree at an accounting firm so that he could begin making some money.

My parents were unable to go to the colleges of their choice not because of high tuitions costs, like those seen today, but because they were poor.  So, when they were older, and not poor, they made sure to save up money for me to go to college.  Unfortunately, because of the high price of tuition, I still would have had to take out debt had I gone to a private school.  I was accepted into many very good schools, but went to Baruch primarily because I got a scholarship.

It’s astounding to think that, because of how expensive college has become, as a middle class kid today, I faced the same obstacles my poor parents did decades ago.  It is as if the only kid who can really go to the best college they get into are the one’s who rely on a great education least, wealthy children.