Low-income students have enough financial worries
There is no doubt that college is expensive. According to the Education Data Initiative, about 43.4 million Americans owe $1.6 trillion dollars in student debt. USC, in particular, ranks as the most expensive school in California for the 2021-22 school year, according to CollegeCalc. As a low-income student attending such an immensely wealthy school, I sometimes find the apparent privilege and wealth across campus as distressing.
The seemingly frivolous spending of our University, such as the recent $110 million contract with new Head football coach Lincoln Riley, can feel as if USC does not support low-income students. It feels a bit immoral that USC has provided Riley with a private jet and a $6 million Los Angeles home while students with financial disadvantages struggle to afford their books and school supplies. It is clear that USC has the funds to better support low-income students, and in the severe financial struggle following the pandemic, it is beyond time that the University starts doing so.
In addition to Cal Grants and federal resources such as FAFSA, USC helps students finance their tuition through scholarships, work-study jobs and need-based aid based on your family’s financial situation. However, for other costs such as school supplies and living expenses, like food, students have few resources. The most accessible resource for this kind of aid is the Office of Student Basic Needs, but the process to obtain funds is unnecessarily complicated, with applications evaluated on a case by case basis.
This is simply not enough. The confining requirements restricting the grant to “students who are experiencing sudden financial distress due to unforeseen circumstances” — as stated on the Office’s website — make it inaccessible for many students who struggle with constant financial distress, and therefore have an ongoing need for financial aid, in which a “one-time funding opportunity” will not suffice. Receiving the aid one needs to support their college education should not be difficult, especially not from a school such as USC, which boasts an immense image of wealth.
As discussed by Washington Post writer Karen Weese, the number one reason low-income students drop out is due to financial distress, which tends to stem from a minor detail or an abundance of minor details that middle class students wouldn’t have to think about twice, like being unable to afford transportation, food or school supplies. Scholarships and financial aid for college tuition serve a great purpose and make the idea of higher education accessible to disadvantaged students. However, there are many more hidden expenses that come with attending college that scholarships and financial aid do not cover. It is often these small expenses that add up to make college unaffordable.
Colleges can alleviate all of these “minor” spendings if they would just provide school supplies, such as laptops and textbooks, which can be very expensive but are a necessity in college. Although these expenses might be minor to wealthy universities such as USC, to low-income students, these expenses could make or break their college careers.
According to a 2020 Daily Trojan article, students spend $20,000 on average on school supplies, housing and transportation on top of their tuition. While some students at USC can afford to spend $20,000 in addition to tuition, most students cannot.
USC prides itself on its Affordability Initiative, an initiative that funds the full cost of tuition for students whose families make $80,000 or less, regardless of home equity. While this seems like an extremely generous gesture, it still leaves students with a large sum of money to cover the cost of housing, meal plans and several other binding expenses. If USC wants to foster a diverse community of students, it must choose to invest in the needs of its most vulnerable students over the superficial desires of keeping up its lavish appearances. USC claims that their first priority is the education of its students, but they have yet to truly prove it.