Precarity and the Predation of Black Women by For-Profit Colleges and Universities

• In Event: Black in the Ivory: Exploring Supports, Pathway, and Transitions

Abstract

Numerous investigations have demonstrated that for-profit colleges and universities (“for-profits”) engage in predatory practices, but extant scholarship has yet to robustly examine why these institutions disproportionately enroll students who are low-income, (single) parents, and Black. Drawing on Black feminist Marxism, I argue that for-profits exceedingly enroll Black women due to their precarity, which I conceptualize as structural vulnerability to violence characterized by excess responsibilities and a denial of means to meet them. Empirically, I reveal how descriptive statistics about Black women’s enrollment and financial need in for-profits corresponds to precarity. Furthermore, by examining the training materials for admissions "counselors" at for-profits, I contend that for-profits succeed at enrollment growth by manipulating the pain, urgency, and relationality of this precarity.

Author

• Caleb E. Dawson, University of California - Berkeley
  Presenting Author