Complicating Understandings of Low-Income Students’ Financial Stress and Well-Being in Order to Inform Institutional Support

• In Event: Saturday Roundtable 7:45 am
  In Roundtable Session: Creating Equitable Systems and Spaces in Higher Education to Support Low-Income Students (Table 28)

Abstract

Postsecondary institutions have designed a wide range of approaches to support students from low-income backgrounds, yet financial stressors still have a significant impact on students’ experiences. This paper seeks to enhance understanding of how low-income students navigate financial stress by integrating the asset-based concept of financial well-being and including a focus on institutional context. Data collected from 160 interviews with students from low-income backgrounds illustrate complex ways that students experience financial stress and financial well-being. By centering students’ perspectives in analysis while also accounting for programmatic and institutional contexts, authors aim to push theory and practice toward a more nuanced understanding of how to best support students from low-income backgrounds as they navigate affording college and fostering financial well-being.

Authors

• Ralitsa Todorova, University of Southern California

• Khalilah Lauderdale, University of Southern California

• Genia M. Bettencourt, University of Memphis

• Zoë Corwin, University of Southern California