Race and Class Matters at an Elite College

3 First Encounters with Race and Class

3 First Encounters with Race and Class S tudents came to campus with differing experiences, attitudes, hopes, and fears based on their race and class backgrounds. Students who were black, lower-income, or both were joining a predominantly white affluent community and had different concerns from affluent white students, who were joining a community where the majority of students would be similar to themselves. To what extent were differences in social class and race on the minds of students in the first weeks? What role did students think class and race would play in the journey ahead? Social Class Students’ Possessions Students first gained awareness of the class differences among them not through knowledge of the educational attainment, occupation, or income of their classmates’ parents, which were not known or visible to them, but through differences in the material possessions students brought with them to campus. Amherst College has made great strides in being attentive to students with high financial need as they move to campus . Students with the greatest financial need received a $400 start-up grant the first week of classes to help with purchases like winter clothing and room furnishings.1 At first glance this is an extremely generous 26 / Chapter 3 amount of money, but for students who did not have much to begin with, it buys only the essentials. These efforts have gone a long way toward helping students according to their need, but considerable variance is still apparent in what students bought for or brought to campus. Matthew, an affluent white student, had this to say about what he purchased for college: I bought a whole room worth of stuff. Bedding. I already had a computer . I bought a TV, clothes. . . . I already bought a lot of that because [I went to prep school]. A laptop. I think a lot of kids don’t have laptops because when you’re home, what do you need it for? What else? An iPod. I don’t know, not freshmen here, but some kids buy a car. I already had one. That’s all I can think of. Here’s what Robert, a lower-income white student, had to say: I only had two bags in the airplane. All I brought was a bag with as much clothes as I could bring and a bag of my [athletic] gear with my shoes and random stuff like that. When I got down here, I dropped about $400 at Wal-Mart. I had to buy bedding and lamps and rugs and things that I didn’t even really think about until I got down here. My first night I was sleeping on the mattress with one little sheet, and it was so hot and I was really uncomfortable, and that first night was actually pretty tough. I was just like, this sucks. I felt like I was almost in a jail cell, just plain white walls, empty shelves. And it was money that I hadn’t really budgeted for going out and spending. But you know, I’m going to be here four years, so I went out and made it more homey. I bought a TV. I shouldn’t have bought a TV, but I did. The families of students in this study varied greatly in economic capital, which was reflected in students’ possessions, in what they already had and what they needed to purchase for college, and in the strain the new purchases placed on families. The physical possessions that the 58 students in this study reported bringing to campus ranged widely in quantity and quality, from sofas and flat-screen TVs to dental floss and pens, from Ralph Lauren polo shirts to Wal-Mart tees. Possessions are indicators, sometimes inaccurate, of socioeconomic class; as such, for some students they came with layers of feelings attached, and for others, especially those for whom a budget was never an issue, with little thought at all. Personal computers today are considered by students to be a necessity, and on the high end of outlays. All the participants in this study, with the exception of one lower-income white female, brought a computer with them. First Encounters with Race and Class / 27 For 70% of students the computer was newly purchased.2 All but one of the affluent students brought laptops, the more expensive and preferred option, while a quarter of the lower...