THERE'S A MILLION DOLLARS IN THE QUAD, IF YOU'D JUST PICK IT UP.

The latest quest for inequities in higher education takes us to ... Ivy League institutions that are Manhattan in microcosm?  "A new report finds the middle class is heavily underrepresented at elite private colleges -- and boosting low- and middle-income student representation at such colleges could increase U.S. income mobility."

The study in question is by a number of solid quantitative economists, including Raj Chetty and Emmanuel Saez, and among the salient findings we read,

Building on their previous report, researchers found that students whose parents were from the lowest income bracket made up 7.3 percent of students with a test score of 1400 who attended Ivy-plus colleges. That was slightly below the average for all income groups. Students whose parents had the highest incomes made up a larger share, at about 10.8 percent, which was above the average for all groups.

But the students whose parents' incomes are in the middle attended Ivy-plus colleges at rates much lower than the average, between 4.4 percent and 4.7 percent. This means that middle-class students are underrepresented at elite colleges, and the report refers to them as the "missing middle."

We used to have the state flagship universities, land-grants, and mid-majors to provide income mobility.  Apparently, something has gone wrong.  "Whether it's possible for middle-income families to afford elite colleges or not, rising tuition costs are pushing them toward flagship public institutions."  That would not be a bad thing, if the students eligible for admission at the Ivies were getting the same sort of intellectual challenges and networking opportunities at the state flagships, but that statement appears to be conceding they are not.  I had hoped to be proven wrong when I wrote, "Is the competition to get into those elite universities so intense in part because the state flagships and the land-grants and the mid-majors have abdicated their responsibility? Is it really the case that the next generation of Masters of the Universe really requires high-status, stressed-out parents who are outsourcing the child care to nannies?"  Evidently not.  I had hoped that the people in charge of higher education would rethink their priorities.  "And yet, business as usual in higher education seems to be doing anything other than raising expectations, and all the time fretting about how higher expectations are hostile to Access or Diversity. What do they have to lose trying something else?"

Raise expectations, turf out the special education bureaucracies.  What do you have to lose?