The Socioeconomic Diversity Initiative will start holding focus groups this month to analyze the experiences of Duke students who receive financial aid.
The initiative hopes to identify elements of the student experience that need improvement due to challenges that stem from socioeconomic differences between students.
“I think it is important to know what students are struggling with, whether that is academic, financial or beyond,” said Alison Rabil, assistant vice provost and director of Financial Aid. “We want students to make the experience here the best it can be and make sure everyone is included despite income, language or culture.”
Students differed on the way they percieved the effects of money and class on campus.
“I don’t feel like there is any effect at all,” said junior Misha Lavrov. “People usually don’t talk about that sort of thing. I feel like the initiative could be beneficial or it could be a waste of time.”
Nearly half of students get some sort of financial aid—43 percent receive need-based assistance and 3 percent get merit or athletic scholarships, Rabil said.
Some students feel that there is a social difference between those who are on financial aid and those who are not.
“Take the relationship between me and my roommate last year,” said sophomore Gabriel Arce, who said he receives financial aid. “His dad is the [chief executive officer] of the Royal Bank of Canada, which is the top bank in Canada. He is a good guy, probably one of the most humble guys I’ve met at Duke, [but] we couldn’t fully connect or relate to each other. He would hang with all the other well-off frat guys and I would hang out with other people who were more like me. We got along very well but we just tended to interact with different groups of people.”
Money is also an issue for students in similar economic situations.
Sometimes there are uncomfortable moments when the subjects of financial aid packages and loans are brought up, several students said.
“I feel like it comes up in conversation—who’s on financial aid or taking out loans and who’s not,” said junior Tina Del Carpio. “I work as a [resident assistant], so I don’t have any student loans, and when that comes up, sometimes there’s tension with friends who do have to take out loans. Sometimes there are awkward moments, but I don’t feel like it hinders my experience. All things here at Duke are open to students despite any socioeconomic gap.”
Some students said financial aid helps minimize the socioeconomic gap and make opportunities—such as clubs, study abroad and internships—available to all students.
“I feel that there are socioeconomic gaps and distinctions at Duke, some more obvious than others. In a purely monetary sense, however, a large portion of the gap is reduced by the aid many students receive or at least in my case, my financial aid places me at less of a disadvantage,” said sophomore Jonathan Lee. “I believe that in my case, the socioeconomic differences are a bit less distinct than they were in high school. I went to very diverse schools and everyone blended pretty well together, so I expected much of the same when I came here. But it’s quite obvious that people self-segregate very easily here since they have much more control over who they live and associate with.”
The average financial aid grant last academic year was $30,000, bringing the amount of money used on financial aid that year to approximately $97 million, including money distributed by Duke and the federal government, Rabil said.
Incomes at Duke vary, but some students said a willingness to interact with people they normally would not associate with can help bridge divides.
“I think the reason why we had such a good roommate relationship was because we were forced to live together and we were just naturally outgoing people,” Arce said. “People from different socioeconomic levels don’t tend to interact with each other. But just because they don’t doesn’t mean they’re incompatible, and Duke provides an environment for us to find where we are compatible.”
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