The nation’s name-brand colleges have made virtually no progress in admitting more low-income students over the last decade, according to the Jack Kent Cooke Foundation, which is calling for a “poverty preference” in college admissions. In 2013 Pell Grant recipients accounted for 17 percent of first-time, full-time students at the 193 institutions with the most competitive admissions, according to the foundation, which crunched federal data for a newly released report. That was up one percentage point from 16 percent in 2000. In contrast, colleges described as having competitive admissions increased their Pell Grant recipient percentage to 42 percent from 35 percent over that same period. “College admissions for kids in poverty is profoundly unfair,” said Harold O. Levy, the foundation’s executive director, in an interview Monday with journalists.

January 12, 2016 ・ From Inside Higher Ed