The Review of Higher Education

The educational outcomes of low-income students in higher education, particularly compared with wealthy students, has been well documented (Bowen & Bok, 1998; Kahlenberg, 2004; Melguizo, 2008; Long & Kurlaender, 2009; Posselt, Bielby, Jaquette & Bastedo, 2010; Bastedo & Jaquette 2011). Prior research has demonstrated that beyond low-income students’ limited financial resources, such students struggle with college readiness and have inadequate knowledge about college, and their academic trajectory is further affected by whether they attend a community college or four-year institution (Ellwood & Kane, 2000; Perna, 2006; Luna de la Rosa, 2006; Deil-Amen & Turley, 2007; Bozick & Lauff 2007; Long & Kurlaener, 2009; Enberg & Allen 2011;). Consequently, these factors decrease the likelihood that these students will earn a college degree, which then affects their pathway to social mobility (Grodsky, 2007; Melguizo, 2008; Bowen, Chingos, & McPherson, 2009).

To advance our understanding of the effect of being low income, or poor (both terms are used), Anthony Abraham Jack specifically situates such students’ experiences within an elite institutional context in The Privileged Poor: How Elite Colleges Are Failing Disadvantaged Students. Notably, Jack does more than ask “can poor students be privileged?” (p. 1). He shifts the associated paradigms related to both poverty and privilege by further asking “What does it mean to be a poor student on a rich campus?” (p. 19). His perspective invites readers to change how they understand and challenge how they approach timeless higher education focus areas related but not limited to class, access, retention, as well as inclusion, all within the context of an elite institution, from various localities.

In our current roles and through our research agendas, we seek to address systemic bias across educational contexts, including access to higher education and inclusion. This work led us to question policy implementation and institutional practices. We find this book to be useful across our multiple positionalities. Having both worked in private collegiate settings, we recognize that as administrators and instructors, institutional communities can be blinded by elitism and privilege in ways that further marginalize those we desire to support. Jack’s explanation of the student-to-faculty and the student-to–campus programs relationships has helped us to reconceptualize how we engage with students and how we impact how our students engage and navigate campus. This book informs praxis as if it were a “how-to” manual for improving learning environments.

The author’s style and approach of this work are a mixture of interesting, thought-provoking, and, at times, humorous narratives placed together with various socioeconomic, sociological, and educational theories that are aimed for a wide readership. Jack used three different recruitment approaches to gain access to and interview 103 Black, Latinx, and White undergraduate students, who fell into three distinct income categories: upper income, Privileged Poor, and Doubly Disadvantaged. Jack also conducted “two years of ethnographic observations of undergraduate life at Renowned” (p. 205). The use of personal narratives and observations, supported by quantitative data throughout the book, further provide context, carrying [End Page 159] the interest of the reader through each point and chapter. As a result, the narratives become a series of meaningful and often-untold stories in an attempt to illustrate how poor students can be “privileged.” To do so, Jack introduces us to the Privileged Poor and the Doubly Disadvantaged. The former group members are poor but “have the privilege of an early introduction to the world they will enter in college,” whereas the latter group members are “both poor and unfamiliar with this new world” (p. 11). Having knowledge of these distinct groups broadens our understanding of how low-income students transition and navigate college, while also introducing various issues that question inclusion at these elite institutions. As an expose, for the book seeks to narrate and provide exclusive access to exclusive places (Stevens, 2007; Martin, 2011), this text takes readers behind the veil of “Renowned University” to describe and present the practices...