The Ethics of Higher Education for Economic Mobility

• In Event: AERA Roundtable Session 15
  In Roundtable Session: Enabling Access: Ethics and Higher Education (Table 5)

Abstract

Education is widely considered to be one of, if not the primary, means through which individuals can become economically mobile. A great deal of recent work has focused on the challenges which poor students face to be successful, but what this work leaves unexamined is the assumption that college should provide such mobility. This paper examines the costs that the narrative of economic mobility itself imposes on poor students. It argues that the narrative of economic mobility, with its assumptions about consequentialism, rational choice, and personal responsibility, imposes additional ethical costs on poor students. The solution involves reframing the conceptualization of rational choice in college while simultaneously providing social supports which would allow poor students to embrace this alternative.

Author

• Dustin Webster, University of Pennsylvania