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Disadvantaged Students Stay In College If They're Told Everyone Struggles (arstechnica.com)
An anonymous reader shares an Ars Technica report: Lower-income and minority college students often have trouble sticking with higher education. But past studies have indicated they would be less likely to drop out of school if they receive appropriate counseling once they start experiencing academic problems. A new study published in PNAS demonstrates that if students receive this kind of intervention prior to college enrollment and during their first year at college, they are more likely to avoid having academic trouble in the first place. And the counseling can be done over the Internet. The counseling involves letting students know that it is common for students to struggle with the transition to college and that this transition will get easier with time. This is known as a "lay theory intervention."
Where no one ever questioned them or enslaved them to "grades," "attendance," and other forms of oppressive white patriarchy.
SJW's don't eliminate discrimination. They just expropriate it for themselves.
I've seen many students having trouble going from "high school" mentality (e.g: I ``have'' to be here, so can goof off) to college mentality (e.g.: I'm *lucky* to be here---I'm paying tuition, etc., and shouldn't cut class and should pay attention).
Those are the folks who drop out of college after their first year.
The counseling involves letting students know that it is common for students to struggle with the transition to college and that this transition will get easier with time
If that's all we need to do, then let's do this all up front... just put those words on the admission application, the website, and on a huge sign in front of the dorms.
I wish the movie "PCU" were still available on streaming or home video. People really need to go back and watch both that and (oddly enough) "Demolition Man," both of which proved to be oddly prescient.
Whodathot?
What a surprise. A genuine and honest surprise. I'd have thought they'd be more likely to quit and leave.
Well, actually, after hearing a few vacuous minded therapist pump me with banal platitudes, I am, but that's because of conditioning. I get frustrated with the experience.
Hmm. Maybe this study is bogus.
I say we just shut down all the colleges instead, be honest, they'd rather just have football games all year round.
And, gosh darn it, people enjoy your presence on campus!
"Don't worry, everyone's failing, so its ok for you to as well".
If these kids can't take a little adversity and power through it, or sack up and decide on a career course change, then they weren't prepared to be there in the first place.
remember when slashdot had practical posts about tech instead of pointless, heavily-politicized click-bait? Me neither.
Took the words right out of my mouth. What was once satire is now full blown reality.
"You got that right. You see, according to Cocteau's plan... I'm the enemy. Because I like to think, I like to read. I'm into freedom of speech, the freedom of choice. I'm the kind of guy who likes to sit in a greasy spoon and wonder - "Gee, should I have the T-bone steak or the jumbo rack of BBQ ribs with the side order of gravy fries?" I want high cholesterol. I wanna eat bacon and butter and BUCKETS of cheese, okay? I wanna smoke a Cuban cigar the size of Cincinnati in the non-smoking section. I wanna run through the streets naked with green Jell-O all over my body reading Playboy magazine. Why? Because I suddenly might feel the need to, okay, pal? I've SEEN the future. Do you know what it is? It's a 47-year-old virgin sitting around in his beige pajamas, drinking a banana-broccoli shake, singing "I'm an Oscar Meyer Wiener." You live up top, you live Cocteau's way: what he wants, when he wants, how he wants. Your other choice: come down here... and maybe starve to death." ... or oddly prescient...
hear me out first.
There are many ways to learn something and get accredited for it, trades have apprenticeships, there is indentured servitude, self study, and more, the problem isn't that some people do bad at college it is that the alternative ways of college are effectively banned, it's monopoly of bettering yourself, sure you can self study, but if you can't legally be employed in what you taught yourself there is little point other than for knowledge's sake. (there are exceptions like computer stuff ofc).
Maybe these lower class and minorities would do better in an apprenticeship role, there is no reason you can't learn anything as an apprentice. Maybe it is not the fastest way to pump out skilled and trained people, but it provides stability to your life and it guarantees you a job because you will be working the entire time, which is more than can be said college.
survival of the fittest. Get that in your mind and you'll do well.
...but you'll notice my rather low user ID, so I was around when it started :/
Quando Omni Flunkus Moritati
-Possum Lodge Motto
Everyone does not struggle. There are reasons you have difficulty--not that you're too stupid for college, or that the next guy has a better brain; it's that you're using the wrong methods, and you're entering an unfamiliar environment.
The brain, first and foremost, is an energy-hungry organ. To minimize energy usage, it restructures to readily follow the most common set of actions. Overriding this--self-activation or response-inhibition--requires first formulating a plan in the prefrontal cortex, then activating the dorsolateral prefrontal cortex to directly control the midbrain. In short: your brain out of high school is a high school brain, and making it take actions different in *any* way from high school requires using one part of your brain to force the rest of it into compliance. Those parts of your brain all consume energy and, just as doing an endless stream of push-ups will eventually leave your muscles physically-incapable of lifting any more, your brain will run down the ATP supply in involved cells and become fatigued and, eventually, physically-incapable of taking these actions.
Many people work around this by setting schedules and reframing.
Setting schedules creates a low-energy activation system: your brain, over an average six weeks of effort, restructures such that keeping to that scheduled set of actions is a lower-energy behavior. Over years and with the experience of repeatedly changing schedules as necessary, your brain even develops the facility to set new schedules and adhere strongly to them in a few weeks as *the* lowest-energy behavior. Lowering the energy expenditure makes it easier to cope with something like a move from high school to college.
Reframing reduces energy expenditure by connecting one impulse to another. If you can evaluate an activity in terms of how it supports something you are actively interested in, that activity becomes a low-energy pursuit. Think of it like changing your work into a distraction: studying engineering is hard and boring, but you *like* tinkering with engines and building go karts and such; studying engineering will let you build *better* go karts, and that connection draws your brain to react on impulse by studying engineering. When that study converts quickly and recognizably into a greater depth of enjoyment of your hobby, you get positive reinforcement, causing your brain to structure itself around seeking those results by executing those actions.
Besides all of this, the geniuses among us are only using competent mental techniques. These range from scheduling and reframing as above to structured study techniques (SQW4R, OK4R), casual or systemic mnemonics (simple visualization up through mind palaces and other systems), and even structured note-taking systems (Cornell notes are the best generic; there are better systems for certain specific materials). Developing and exercising the correct skills *vastly* reduces the difficulties faced in college because time spent studying is optimized: less effort and less time produces more complete understanding and better grades.
Telling people to grin and bear it because college is hard is idiotic. If the effort and cost of college are high enough, it's *not* worth the investment--I dropped out and it was the best decision of my life; this may have been wholly untrue if I had employed more-advanced study techniques (and, in fact, I've gone back and structured my own computer science program to self-teach on the weekends because it's a six-month task if I can find 1 hour per day). Identify *why* they're struggling and fix it.
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Why bother going to college/university ? You'll come out thousands in debt and then end up in a shitty job anyway as degrees are no longer trustworthy.
Better off getting an apprenticeship in plumbing or such like. After a few years on the job getting paid training (and work and business experience) you can set up on your own. You'll make more money, you won't be in debt, and you'll be your own boss. And you'll have enough money to pursue the things you're interested in as hobbies.
The whole higher education system is now a scam to get suckers into huge debt.
Talk about a race to the bottom.
When I transferred from community college to university in 1994, I applied to the Equal Opportunity Program. Being a poor white boy who was the first person in his family to go to college, I got accepted into the program. The Latino guidance counselor told me not to bother with the tutoring resources, because, you know, I was white, and didn't need that much help, and to come back next year to renew the EO&P contract.
My first year in the university ended with my girlfriend and I breaking up, leaving me depress and on academic probation. I got called into the EO&P office to explain my situation to a different guidance counselor. She demanded to know why I listened to that "idiot" from the year before and not follow the program as laid out in the contract. I pointed out the contract language that specifically stated that I must do everything that the guidance counselors told me to do. That took the wind out of her sails. Either way, I got kicked out of the program and the university. Ironically, the academic probation policy changed the following year because 10% of the student body was at risk of being kicked out (typically, it's 3%), which was too much money for the university to let walk away, and many of those students stayed.
I never went back to the university. A decade later, I went back to community college to learn computer programming and made the president's list for maintaining a 4.0GPA in my major. That was the beginning of my technical career.
Just major in EE, where you get your ass kicked, and 2/3 of the students really do flunk out after 2 years. Then they won't feel so bad.
The issue is that in public High schools they got taught that "everybody wins" by default. Kids these days are raised to believe that they are owed something just because they exist. So we don't keep score, everybody gets a trophy, regardless of how hard they try. So why try all that hard?
It's no surprise to this right wing nut job that what most people need coming out of High School is a huge dose of reality, that if you want something in life you have to work for it. That equal opportunity does NOT mean equal outcome or equal pay. That it's up to you to decide what you will accept as good enough in life and how hard you want to work to achieve that. That failure is assured by not trying, while success eventually comes if you keep at it long enough.
Is it no wonder that pulling these kids who believe they are entitled aside and trying to explain to them that the "everybody wins" mentality they've grown used to doesn't wash in college? (or life) That they need to be ready to struggle for things and make an effort to be successful? somehow helps them prepare mentally for what's to come? Sounds like conservative right wing truth is making an appearance.
Yea, call me shocked (not) that this little dose of conservative truth has a positive effect on those who hear it and take it to heart.
So I guess it doesn't help when I say "That test was easy, I didn't even have to study!" to all the disadvantaged students.
I'm visually impaired, when I went into the Computer Systems Technology program at NAIT they hadn't really dealt with a visually impaired person before. The committee running the program at the time recommended I take semesters in halves so I wouldn't get overloaded. I took this advice and started during the summer intake. That first half semester was a bitch, they didn't have materials to help me along and the 13" monitors they had were brutal for my vision. Anyway, I got OK grades in most classes, but nothing great, in the introduction to programming I passed with a 65% (bare minimum pass) but I felt like it just wasn't for me. The instructor there at the time took me aside during one of the last days before the semester closed and told me that I had a lot of potential and that I should give it another try.
The next half-semester I re-took the introduction to programming, by now the program had purchased 17" monitors and my grade shot up 30%. Maybe it was finally having the equipment I needed, maybe it was taking the course for the second time but I know it was the words of encouragement that made me do labs as soon as I got them, try to work harder in other courses too, connecting the dots between them.
After that second half-semester I decided to go to normal semesters like everyone else and excelled. Turned out I was naturally gifted for problem solving and all sorts of other things that I didn't really think I was capable of.
Anyway I graduated in 1999 with a love of programming and a lot of confidence. Sometimes I wonder where I would have been now if I hadn't been given that little boost of encouragement from a person I respected, it's not easy to want to achieve things when you are a "minority" particularly when you have a disability because the deck is stacked against you, but then somebody tells you it doesn't matter and maybe the first time in my life I really believed it.
crazy dynamite monkey
Ordered the last copy off Amazon for about 3.32 GBP. Sounds like a good watch. People sell it for crazy money on eBay.
My experience with college and life in general is that so many people are terribly disorganized. They forget things, put things off to the last minute, run poor sleep schedules, don't eat at regular times (or at all), etc. Disadvantaged students are disadvantaged because they are not well-prepared for college; often times it's a poor high school that doesn't challenge them. When the work is easy, they can achieve an acceptable level of success (in a relative sense) despite this disorganization. But when there's a million things being thrown at them...demanding professors, a million people around them who want to hang out constantly, handing of daily life activities (laundry, finding their own food, etc.), involved homework that's collected weeks after it's assigned with no milestones or check-ins between...they cannot succeed with that level of disorganization. A really smart kid can get by in high school without studying and playing games all the time. He may need to study a bit more as undergraduate. But if he waltzes into graduate school and doesn't up his game, he'll find himself at the bottom of the class quickly. That's what's happening here: the environment has gotten a lot more demanding and harsh and the old level of "winging it" isn't going to get it done anymore.
This doesn't just "fix itself" with time. To tell kids "stick with it and you'll get it" is having them do the same thing over and over again and expecting different results--as one genius put, that is insanity. It's not a matter of feelings. The world doesn't care that you are overwhelmed (because most of it is as well) and saying "I feel overwhelmed" and talking about that isn't going to solve the problem. The answer is to succeed and learn to navigate through an overwhelming number of tasks to _not_ feel that way in the first place.
Is this is new idea? If we talk about our feelings the source of those feelings will go away? It doesn't work like that. These kids need help putting their lives together. They'll feel better once they're accomplishing something.
In my recent college experience, it seemed like no matter what, everyone got an A. Including the ones that would have clearly been a D student in my high school. The same kids with the "Genius by birth, slacker by choice" T-shirts who claimed that they graduated their high school with a 5.0 GPA after taking a bunch of AP classes.
Nearly all my professors pulled me aside after the semester to say that I was an exceptional student, the best they'd seen in YEARS, etc etc. I'm not any smarter than average, but I did put in a great deal more effort than probably 90% of my classmates.
Isn't that a hate crime? Or I guess maybe just a microaggression (depending upon the size of the journal)?
Eloi are stupid, throw morlocks at them!
Is that it's hard to put your life on hold for 4 more years. You need a lot of money to do that. The kids work hard and that's the trouble. They get part time jobs that turn into full time and before long they're falling behind in their studies. Then they get blamed for being lazy... It doesn't help that a good percentage of the population is activity trying to keep birth control away from then either.
Hi! I make Firefox Plug-ins. Check 'em out @ https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/youtube-mp3-podcaster/
The only advantage I remember from college was the economic advantages some kids had.
It doesn't make more economically advantaged kids smarter, and many of them squander this advantage partying, but they also don't face the soul-sucking grind of a job or the soul-sucking money problems that come with it. And the job of course takes hours away, sometimes leaving you amotivated to study or flat-out with less hours to study.
None of this means it can be done, but it does make it harder. Harder still for those occasional emotional crises that arise in college -- a couple of bad grades, social problems, etc.
Which is tell us that nobody's going to be there for us every step of the way at college like at high school, that we have to prepare and take initiative as much as possible, that we have to think ahead of what we want to accomplish and pick the right courses, and that This Is Real Life so we'd better take it seriously and not slack off or fuck it up because nobody will be there to pick up the pieces. Well, to someone with anxiety issues and a mother who was saying at 18 I better be ready to move out, I did not know what the fuck I was doing, who I could talk to for some understanding and sympathy (which I needed re anxiety) as well as support (I was aimless and did not know how to achieve a career I would be happy with or realize that I could try for other jobs even if I didn't have a degree specifically for that job and I could always go back to school).
Twinstiq, game news
Is there a new field of science called DUH that nobody told me about?
If you tell college freshmen you're going to apply a "lay theory intervention" to them, you might find them a little disappointed with the result when you just talk.
-Styopa
I had to struggle, too.
White, upper 5% of my HS graduating class, well read, into sports...
And get a few bad grades until I figured out what I was missing...
And had to... OH, THE HORROR!... sit my ass down and study.
And work while attending college.
So what about the newbies dropping out?
Too undiciplined?
Too far behind to catch up to college-level work?
So working at McDs or TBell is easier? Or road crew? Or manhole inspector?
Or electrician? Or paper-delivery?
I did all of those and more to get through college.... paying as I went.
... is the very same need in telling oneself "I am weak, I can't stand on my own"
Imagine one having this kind of self-image ... how the hell can that individual ever becomes successful?
I think I got my copy from the Walmart bargain bin back in the day. Had no idea it would end up on the other side of the supply-demand curve. Although that happens more often than you might think.
A Pirate and a Puritan look the same on a balance sheet.
NOT coddling them.
Not doing this stupid "Everyone gets a trophy!"
Not trying to boost self-esteem with no effort required on the part of the kid ("Aw, you failed to say the alphabet, you're still smart, here's a prize for failing!")
... is the very same need in telling oneself "I am weak, I can't stand on my own"
Maybe not. Maybe it means, "I need a little help getting started."
When I was an MIT undergrad way back in the late 60s, MIT was just beginning to try to identify high-potential students from "disadvantaged" backgrounds. They would be offered a preparatory summer session to prepare them for the rigors of freshman year. While there were some flaws in the initial execution, the program had some real successes.
There were a number of black kids brought in under this program, and they soon formed their own affinity group, the Black Students Union (BSU). (There were other similar groups for Chinese students, etc.) A year or so later, the BSU did something that has me respecting them to this very day.
MIT was offering four years of full scholarship for the disadvantaged students--- very generous indeed. The BSU went to the administration and said that one year is fine, to help students get started, but more than that is sending a message to the student that you're incapable of making it on your own. So here we have a minority group offered something for nothing, turning it down because they were wise enough to realize that it could be harmful in the long run. Hats off to them.
Some people just feel better when they learn that someone else is also doing badly. Studies have been made and it has been proven again and again.This new study, again, supports it.
Most famous empirical, yet cruel real life exercise took place in Soviet Russia in 1920-1930. They were building socialism, and anybody who was successful (irrespective of whether individual was loyal or not - that did not matter) was under the risk to be reported as a bourgeois government hater. Millions and millions people were pushed to the soviet class warfare mincer by their neighbors.
The rich and powerful started doing everything to look like they are normal people. No efforts are spared to be "accepted". That is why rich and powerful are polite in public, hate scandals, despise scandals of other rich people and try behaving like most of us mortals: Hillary riding subway, Warren Buffet living in his $600K house, IKEA owner driving a beater car, governor attending baseball game and so on and on. However, that does not change reality and to quote cynic George Carlin: There is a club and you ain't in it.
The study is merely a repetition of the experiment about monkeys, cucumbers and grapes: https://www.youtube.com/watch?...
Except that it was done on humans, who were made to believe that everyone else is getting cucumbers. This is a well known phenomena, because positive attitude, (or, as experiment demonstrates, ignorance of the true state of affairs) combined with a good word, encouragement can do wonders for the inherently capable people.
Look at this from a macroeconomic point of view. Especially in mid-tier large state universities (like the one I went to a million years ago,) it is super-common to have students fail out after their first year for a number of reasons. Some weren't meant to be there but get pushed in by the "everyone must go to college" rhetoric. Some fall prey to the Greek life or other constant party atmosphere and just neglect doing any work. Some aren't emotionally ready to handle the huge shot of independence they get. Whatever the reason, many (most?) of these students are paying for their education at least partially with loans that must be paid back regardless of the outcome. Going to college and not getting the degree is way worse than not going -- you get no benefits career-wise and are stuck with lifelong debt. Wouldn't it make sense to provide some help and encouragement, especially to a population that really is at a disadvantage?
The state university system I graduated from has something like this - extra help, remedial classes, etc. for truly disadvantaged students to try to give them a leg up, and keep them there once they've made it in. And they need it; going where I went, as a freshman you really are an anonymous number. It's a whole lot like dealing with a state agency in terms of personal attention and "customer service." It wasn't until I got into the end of sophomore year in a relatively small department that I started to lose that sense of anonymity. Going from a 4,000 student random freshman class to about 300 focused chemistry students with good faculty support was a big change. If I had been in the engineering school (~8,000 students) or business (10,000+) that would've been way different. Point being, Joe Random Freshman in a 300-person lecture class might be having a hard time, but have very little in the way of avenues to get help. I do feel that part of the value I got out of my degree was learning to do things for myself, deal with crappy bureaucracies without throwing up my hands, etc. It's allowed me to work for big companies with stupid rules and advance pretty far in my career compared to people who just whine and complain when things won't bend to their will.
Elite universities may have a different problem, in that you have people in the top 5% of their high school classes merging into a population where _everyone_ graduated at the top of their class. That said, elite universities have plenty of support in place...they just don't let you fall out of the club once you've made it in. Having that Harvard, Princeton, Oxford, whatever degree qualifies you for the rarified worlds of investment banking, management consulting and other professions that only hire Ivy League/elite university grads as part of their culture. After that, Easy Street for life, If you're smart, and work really hard in high school, the tuition you pay at any of those places is a worthwhile investment. If you're driven but not rich or super brilliant, going through the state system is still a very valid way to go.
...just keep digging. Lie to yourself that eventually you'll get yourself out and everything will be ok.
How do you explain wage stagnation when a larger percent of the population is graduating with a 4 year degree?
Maybe the assumption that the elevated salaries commanded by degree holders will stay elevated if more people have degrees doesn't hold true? If that's the case: does the assumption that giving everyone a degree will increase tax revenues also hold false?
Excellent answer but unfortunately it doesn't answer GP
The keyword in GP is "need to self-identify"
What you have described is MIT's identifying a group of students who comes from worse-than-others' background
What GP was saying is that, if one self-identifies oneself as 'disadvantaged' then one essentially downsized oneself's self worth
Precisely!
The black students were able to de-couple themselves from the 'disadvantaged' moniker because they never self-identified themselves as 'disadvantaged.'
It all boils down to self-fulfilling prophecy -
If you see yourself worth less than others, you will not work as hard;
But if you never see yourself worth less than others, you will ask yourself why should you work less hard than others.
I have had thoughts along those lines when I hear about STEM education outreach at work: "but if more people go into STEM I am worth less than I was before!"
To educate, culture, and generally grow up.
I went though it, but so do most people. As smart as you might think you are, it is a big world out there. I was always near the top of my class in high school, however one thing that probably helped me, was that I had a sister that consistently did even better, so I always had that sort of competition.
I also saw some crash and burn, particularly in year one.
As much as people think University is for smart people, it really isn't. Sure you can't be a dummy, and need some solid educational foundations, but more than that you need to be willing to put in the work and have some determination and perseverance. As much as a degree is anything to an employer (and I'm not saying that is what it is ultimately for), it is more of an indication of certain basic foundations, and a recognition of work ethic and persistence. The harder or more elite the school really doesn't mean you actually know more or are smarter than someone else, it really just shows character more than anything else.
I know my personal challenges were more due to foundational curriculum as where I went to high school calculus wasn't even offered, and where I went to university (it was a requirement for CS) the introduction course expected high school calculus. So you can probably imagine how well that went for me without any prior experience. In the end (after dropping it once) I managed to postpone it until my final year of university. I was the oldest guy in class, struggled my way though it with the help of an enthusiastic young professor, who in the end probably knew it was my last requirement to graduate, appreciated my hard work, generally felt sorry for me, and let me squeak past... :)
Then again I also dropped a CS class twice (changing majors once), before passing it... but then on the other side I was one of six who managed to pass another CS class where 90% dropped out. There are other examples, but anyone who has gone though it probably has a list of their own experiences. Ability is great, but without drive it isn't a guarantee of success.
colleges are loaded with fluff and filler classes that we can do without and some of them are in a way a joke for some.
big lecture classes where it can all be about cramming for the test.
classes that are not part of the Major but are forced where people cheat.
I heard about this art class where some turned in papers saying art is cool art is grate but for the finale they turned in a plagiarized paper.
I'd have to say that just about everybody living in a first world country is "advantaged" just by being in a first world country.
I think that's just the side effects of offshoring, outsourcing and the drive for companies to squeeze every penny out of every person they can. The problem that people are experiencing is that the number of jobs being affected by these trends is increasing quickly. There was a time, and I was around when this was true, that graduating from any college with any degree in any field was a guarantee that you would be able to start some sort of career with an entry level position. Now, the supply of college-educated people is up, the supply of jobs that reasonably-qualified-or-trainable people can fill is down, and companies are no longer willing to pay someone a salary reflective of their experience throughout their career.
This is why you're seeing little private liberal arts colleges, even ones with lots of history and endowment money, closing up shop. Companies refuse to take educated people and train them, when they can call Tata or Infosys and get a drop-in replacement flown in next week. Therefore, there's less demand for a liberal arts degree, because students don't see them as having an immediate return on investment. Way in the past, the rich sent their kids to small private liberal arts colleges to give them growing-up time until the family business was handed over to them. In the recent past, the fact that any degree from anywhere equaled employment meant students could study what they wanted. Now, it's a vocational program that's valued most.
MIT was offering four years of full scholarship for the disadvantaged students-.... The BSU went to the administration and said that one year is fine, to help students get started, but more than that is sending a message to the student that you're incapable of making it on your own.
There is another strategic angle to this approach: spreading the risk, and hopefully multiplying the reward. (4x) students get that opportunity to "get started" for the same money instead of just (x) students getting all four years. There will be more winners, all around.
The elimination of skin color preferences in admission would be a much more effective way of helping underrepresented minorities excel in college (a college where they are on equal footing with everyone else).
I didn't struggle. Not one bit.
Well in the end it does not really matter. The number of people who drop out, must drop out. It is not like these universities are running at 50% capacity. Sure, there are ways to improve your chances individually, but if that method ever kicked off and was used by everyone, the same number of people would still need to be kicked out or drop out. Academia worked off of bell curves, and requires the bottom x% of the current stock to be culled ever semester.
Troll is not a replacement for I disagree.
If your not, then the school isn't doing their duty. Its probably pretty easy to determine if this is the case, simply take the grades of all the students and see if they resemble any kind of standard distribution.
Opps, did I say something wrong?
I remember being in school, and I graduated probably because of sheer stubbornness (although my GPA actually was pretty decent when compared with my peers, now days its probably considered bad). There were 5-6 classes that were absolute killers, mostly because the professors teaching them had high standards. A couple were the get a "B" with a 25% type of classes, a couple were personal issues, and there were a couple that I actually retook with another professor and did fine in (aka mismatch between the professors teaching methodology and my ability to learn it like that/by myself from the book).
They said "PNAS"...
When you come from a lower income you are quite possibly the first and only person from your family to go to University, or maybe even finish high school. Even after doing well in High School you have no clue what to expect, and no reference points. The idea that even as a graduate you may be paid more than your parents combined is hard to get your head around for doing something you enjoy studying.
Having to do part time work to cover the costs your parent cannot doesn't help, but more than anything else there is the nagging doubt that you shouldn't be there and should go do manual labour and retail like your family was raised to do. You wonder when you will get caught and told to go back where you came from, so you tend to keep your head down and not make best use of the support systems the Uni already has in place for everybody.
You just got to be a stubborn bastard and keep at it, but any encouragement does go a long way since you just don't know how the system works.