Elitism runs rampant at USC
Contemporary elitism taints the walls of McCarthy Honors Residential College, setting USC students on an unsatisfying journey to an incomplete purpose and dividing them from one another on a scale of intellect and, in some cases, worth. An honors college, at any institution, serves as a tangible reward.
Ultimately, this hinders the success and promise of every student at that institution, as an honors residential college creates a space that sets students apart from their peers on a scale of superiority before their potential at the University level has even touched the brim.
Now, this does not mean that students who earn acceptance to McCarthy are to blame. Unfortunately, the elitism plaguing USC is embedded in the system.
Take, for example, entrance to USC in the first place. Extraordinary privilege — affluent parents, SAT tutoring, private schools and academically advanced endeavors — allows students to meet the threshold of achievement required for admission in many cases. Although these privileges are not limited to USC, many Trojans have embraced their advantages to another level. This was evident at the tailgates for the USC versus UCLA football game, with houses plastered with posters reading “You can’t afford us” and “Your dad works for my dad.”
While school pride is a virtue to have at USC, the line between pride and arrogance is often crossed at the University. Daily Trojan writer Annie Bang who covered the elitist behavior at the tailgates said, “Allowing these statements to exist without backlash establishes a toxic, pervasive culture of shallow values, placing significance on socioeconomic status and discriminating based on financial footings.”
With the nickname “University of Spoiled Children,” is USC truly following their core values of supporting, educating and engaging students to “transform the world?”
At USC, elitism is embedded in casual conversation. I remember sitting with my friends and watching people search for each other’s high school tuitions to compare the amount of money they had to pay over the four years. Although some people were visibly uncomfortable, for others, these comparisons were normal.
USC also offers another program to its undergraduate freshmen: the Freshman Science Honors Program. It asks students for their AP test scores and research experiences. My high school never required its students to take the AP exams, and as a student who went to three different schools within my four years of high school, I had no period of continuity to dedicate to research. Nonetheless, I carefully curated my essays for the application and hoped for the best.
I was soon rejected and put on the waitlist for the program. However, during the break, they emailed me back, asking if I would like to join the program since I earned an A in my biology and chemistry classes during my first semester. I was shocked. How is it that all it took for this honors program to accept me was a tangible letter grade? I didn’t have to write any essays explaining my passion for STEM or life story. No, all it took was proving my academic capabilities.
I didn’t take the offer, not because I wouldn’t love to be in an honors program, but because I knew that entrance to the program was solely dependent on grades, rather than a true passion for science or my ability to eloquently portray that in an essay.
Why is it that all these privileges exist? Complacency.
Privilege is comfortable. When you have the upper hand, why change it? Why admit to a problem when your life is comfortable without it? However, USC must change. If elitism at higher-level institutions is not dealt with, not spoken about or if students, faculty and staff are not supported in their complaints, incentives for working-class entry into the world of academia will inevitably decrease.
Society chases a tangible trophy to accompany its goal. Regardless of how far one may get in their journey to success, there will always be an extra “and” or another thing one can do. For USC students, this can be anything from living in McCarthy to enrolling in FSH to having a high number of LinkedIn connections. And to be clear, nobody’s to blame – not even USC for creating McCarthy or FSH. In fact, these programs are simply a reflection of us all.
Far more important than these programs, however, is elitism – the idea that individuals ranked based on a set of skills, often intelligence or wealth, contribute more to society than others – itself.
USC simply made life easier for their student populations and carved out this elite group from their college applications. When the four years of college are over, perhaps some will continue on this pursuit. However, more often than not, the attempt to divide students on this basis will undoubtedly allow elitism to continue to run rampant in our society.