The Glass Slipper's Retail Price
Socioeconomic equality is an idealistic myth which is facilitated but hardly solved through institutions of higher education. The reality is that America can install programs such as financial aid and affirmative action to make education opportunity more accessible, but it remains infeasible for many students to realize their absolute potentials at their absolute dream schools regardless of inherent talent. Furthermore, even those who battle the odds and reach their dream schools face a whole new world of variation in opportunity. Many students run to work-study jobs between and after class instead of being able to immediately do schoolwork or join organizations which could further their prospective career. Only some can afford a school parking permit which allows access to off-campus jobs. Some can fly home on extended weekends while others may only rarely get to spend time with their families during the academic year. Hassles as simple as renting a library textbook because of an inability to afford a personal copy perpetuate the inequalities with which students enter the higher education landscape.
Guardians cannot be blamed for wanting to make their child’s life better by providing them with the best possible education and accommodations while away from home. Students cannot be criticized for utilizing their resources to maximize the potential of their degree. It is not the “rich kids’” fault, although it may be easy and nearly automatic to resent someone’s access to fancy coffee and work-free Saturdays and modest loan debt. Rather, institutional greed demonstrated by universities and other corporations in regards to college-age students, all of whom have substantial career vulnerability, not only widens the achievement gap; it assures that, more and more, every single graduating class will glorify and equip not the most brilliant students, but the luckiest ones.
My research examined a more recently crucial educational privilege: the summer internship. Once the great equalizer through its installation and development of financial aid and scholarship programs, this role of a college education diminishes as more and more hiring companies favor, or even require, vocational experience in their applicants. Undergraduate students are expected to bolster their standing and credentials with internships, networking, face recognition. In reaction to students' need for internship opportunities, companies are reducing or removing their internship stipends-- some are even requiring that their hired interns pay them for the experience.
Using a professional theatre inventory site, I sampled 100 undergraduate internships for their provision of stipends and housing for their interns. When stipends were available, these ranged from $50-$200 per week. However, the majority of internships offering stipends did not specify the amount of this stipend. That is, many companies indicated their pay rate per month or quarter, leaving the amount earned per hour ambiguous. However, the majority of companies chose not to specify their stipend amounts, opting for terms such as "modest" or "small" to describe the rate of pay. This was done presumably so that this amount could be adjusted to match the qualifications of the applicant. Twenty of the sampled internships in this sample offered college credit in exchange for students' work. Some companies offered this as an alternative to payment-- and explicitly included that providing credit was their preference. Very few internship opportunities offered housing, especially in acting "hotspots" such as Hollywood and New York City. In general, large cities such LA, NYC, and Chicago offer fewer internships than their suburban counterparts. Of these, housing is almost never provided and stipends are small if anything (less than minimum wage). Some companies even specified that they would not cover the cost of parking, which can be expensive in the heart of these cities. These places are more likely to offer classes in performance for youth than internship positions. Many companies also specified that they would not validate or provide parking. Some companies required that interns purchase meal plans. Perhaps most strikingly, many (about one-fifth of my sample) had tuition costs. These ranged from $150 to thousands of dollars for one summer "semester."
Moreover, these sites also characteristically employed a rhetoric which assimilated internships with volunteer positions; where I expected to find internship information located under Employment tabs on company websites, I more often found them grouped with the word "volunteer." Internships are not expressed as an employment opportunity, but rather as a volunteer position; and that even euphemizes what internships actually are: work that students do which costs us money. With “modest” to no stipends and steep living expenses, summer interns are lucky to come out even.
Paying to work is counterintuitive and therefore only a privilege for the privileged. Cinderella could not have gone to the ball if she had to pay carriage fare, and so she is the exception. For those of us outside of fairy tales, the evil stepsisters with money are the ones with access to their dreams coming true. As long as jobs favor candidates with internship experience, companies will continue to depreciate the conditions of their offered internships, and inherently qualified students will pause their career pursuits to be summer nannies. Those without cars will work wherever public transit can regularly take them. Those who cannot afford bus passes will walk every day to work at the closest gas station or grocery store. And so on. Some cannot have career pursuits at all.
Guardians cannot be blamed for wanting to make their child’s life better by providing them with the best possible education and accommodations while away from home. Students cannot be criticized for utilizing their resources to maximize the potential of their degree. It is not the “rich kids’” fault, although it may be easy and nearly automatic to resent someone’s access to fancy coffee and work-free Saturdays and modest loan debt. Rather, institutional greed demonstrated by universities and other corporations in regards to college-age students, all of whom have substantial career vulnerability, not only widens the achievement gap; it assures that, more and more, every single graduating class will glorify and equip not the most brilliant students, but the luckiest ones.
My research examined a more recently crucial educational privilege: the summer internship. Once the great equalizer through its installation and development of financial aid and scholarship programs, this role of a college education diminishes as more and more hiring companies favor, or even require, vocational experience in their applicants. Undergraduate students are expected to bolster their standing and credentials with internships, networking, face recognition. In reaction to students' need for internship opportunities, companies are reducing or removing their internship stipends-- some are even requiring that their hired interns pay them for the experience.
Using a professional theatre inventory site, I sampled 100 undergraduate internships for their provision of stipends and housing for their interns. When stipends were available, these ranged from $50-$200 per week. However, the majority of internships offering stipends did not specify the amount of this stipend. That is, many companies indicated their pay rate per month or quarter, leaving the amount earned per hour ambiguous. However, the majority of companies chose not to specify their stipend amounts, opting for terms such as "modest" or "small" to describe the rate of pay. This was done presumably so that this amount could be adjusted to match the qualifications of the applicant. Twenty of the sampled internships in this sample offered college credit in exchange for students' work. Some companies offered this as an alternative to payment-- and explicitly included that providing credit was their preference. Very few internship opportunities offered housing, especially in acting "hotspots" such as Hollywood and New York City. In general, large cities such LA, NYC, and Chicago offer fewer internships than their suburban counterparts. Of these, housing is almost never provided and stipends are small if anything (less than minimum wage). Some companies even specified that they would not cover the cost of parking, which can be expensive in the heart of these cities. These places are more likely to offer classes in performance for youth than internship positions. Many companies also specified that they would not validate or provide parking. Some companies required that interns purchase meal plans. Perhaps most strikingly, many (about one-fifth of my sample) had tuition costs. These ranged from $150 to thousands of dollars for one summer "semester."
Moreover, these sites also characteristically employed a rhetoric which assimilated internships with volunteer positions; where I expected to find internship information located under Employment tabs on company websites, I more often found them grouped with the word "volunteer." Internships are not expressed as an employment opportunity, but rather as a volunteer position; and that even euphemizes what internships actually are: work that students do which costs us money. With “modest” to no stipends and steep living expenses, summer interns are lucky to come out even.
Paying to work is counterintuitive and therefore only a privilege for the privileged. Cinderella could not have gone to the ball if she had to pay carriage fare, and so she is the exception. For those of us outside of fairy tales, the evil stepsisters with money are the ones with access to their dreams coming true. As long as jobs favor candidates with internship experience, companies will continue to depreciate the conditions of their offered internships, and inherently qualified students will pause their career pursuits to be summer nannies. Those without cars will work wherever public transit can regularly take them. Those who cannot afford bus passes will walk every day to work at the closest gas station or grocery store. And so on. Some cannot have career pursuits at all.