Bridging the Education Gap

Jiahui Wang

Privileged enough to be a college student, the student enjoys his or her campus life for a promising future. Unfortunately, however, not all people are granted this privilege. Many lack the money to afford expensive tuition, and even more so is that their lack of financial resources at young ages prevent them from having the necessary preparation for college education. And without higher education, many are forced to work as laborers, and in the end, they may not be able to afford the same resources for their own children, resulting in the vicious cycle of income inequality as well as education inequality.

Income equality is closely related to education equality in that a lack of income often means a lack of educational opportunities, resulting in education inequality. On the other than, education can mean a path to higher income, resulting in greater income equality. In this way, these two are intimately related.

This makes the situation in many developing countries desperate. Many of the poor are forced to fight for their everyday survival such that they rarely have the luxury of looking beyond the day to a brighter future based on higher education. To them higher education is something designed for people they see in television and rich neighborhoods.

One way to look at this situation is to focus on providing the poor with education so that they can increase their income. Another way is to focus on their income so that they can have education in the future. Both have their advantages and disadvantages, but in some ways, the latter may be a more realistic option in that the poor have to focus on their daily needs first. Therefore, if there are opportunities to meet their daily income needs in addition to a small surplus income for the future, then perhaps their future generation can have the necessary education. That is, this issue is a serious one that may take generations to solve, so perhaps a longer-term approach may be a more practical option.