Giving Compass' Take:

• Brown University economist, John Friedman, is calculating which colleges promote the most social mobility, which he defines as " the percentage of students who come from the lowest income families (the bottom 20 percent of the income distribution) and make it to the top (the highest 20 percent)". 

• Who is to blame for low mobility rates in colleges? The schools? The kids? What might other factors besides the institution come into play when colleges are determined to have low mobility rates? 

• Read Brookings' findings on social mobility in America and they will illuminate the challenges that many people go through in terms of barriers they hit when trying to move forward. 

Back in the 1980s, Derek Peterson was admitted to Stony Brook University in New York as part of a special program for low-income students who show potential but aren’t fully prepared for college.

 But he did do it. Peterson graduated in 1988 with a degree in computer science and applied mathematics. Now he’s a wealthy tech entrepreneur and he’s setting up a scholarship at Stony Brook to honor his father, who never finished college.

Stories of upward mobility were once a key feature of American life. Children born in the 1940s were almost guaranteed to grow up and earn more than their parents did.

But upward mobility has stalled, according to Brown University economist John Friedman.

Friedman – along with economists Raj Chetty at Stanford and Nathaniel Hendren at Harvard – started the Equality of Opportunity Project to try to figure out what has led to the erosion of the American Dream, and how it can be revived. One of the things they’re investigating is the role of higher education. In particular, they want to know which colleges in America are doing the most to promote upward mobility.

They examined millions of anonymous tax forms and financial aid records covering everyone who went to college in the United States between 1999 and 2013.  With this data, Friedman and his colleagues have created a mobility report card for every college.

Read the full article about which colleges are promoting social mobility from APM Reports at The Hechinger Report