When Is a Student ‘First Generation’? Words Fail Us

It seemed like a simple question: Which students do colleges consider to be “first generation”? But when Liz Stack raised it on a popular admissions email list a couple of weeks ago, she got a bunch of different answers.

“I felt like I opened Pandora’s box,” says Ms. Stack, who was seeking clarity on behalf of families at Coral Gables Senior High School, in Florida, where she is the College Assistance Program adviser.

First-generation status is one of higher education’s main markers of student disadvantage, along with Pell Grant eligibility and membership in an underrepresented minority group. And there’s good reason for that: Researchers have known for years that parents’ level of education is a big predictor of whether students enroll in and complete college.

Because of that connection, colleges and other groups pay particular attention to this group of students. Some colleges consider first-generation status as one factor that can help put an applicant’s achievements in context during the admissions process. There are special scholarships for first-generation students. Various programs offer them additional support during the application process and while they are enrolled. That means being identified as first generation could help shape a student’s college selection and experience.

Despite the importance of the designation, however, there is no universal definition of what it means.

The main split: whether “first generation” refers to students whose parents did not attend college or to those whose parents did not earn degrees.

From one perspective, students are disadvantaged if their parents never make it through the admissions process and onto a campus. From the other, even parents who did enroll don’t provide a big edge if they didn’t graduate.

Focus on Completion

There was a time when “first generation” was typically understood to mean that neither parent had ever been to college, says Faith Sandler, executive director of the Scholarship Foundation of St. Louis, which makes a point of helping first-generation students, though that status isn’t required for any of its scholarships or programming. The definition began to change, at least in some quarters, Ms. Sandler says, when college completion became more of a focus.

“Especially among the low-income group,” she says, “it’s a common situation that someone in the household tried and didn’t complete.” In other words, looking at whether parents have degrees may be gaining some traction as a better measure.

That’s certainly Yolanda Norman’s hope. “When people say, ‘first in the family,’ I cringe,” says Ms. Norman, a higher-education consultant and advocate for first-generation students.

The reaction is based, in part, on her own background. When Ms. Norman was in high school, her mother began taking classes at a community college but never earned a degree. Her mother’s experience, Ms. Norman believes, doesn’t mean she wasn’t first generation.

Some colleges and others follow language in the Higher Education Act, which defines “first generation” in the context of the federal TRIO programs. Its definition refers to students whose parents have not earned bachelor’s degrees. That’s an approach Ms. Norman would like to see adopted more broadly.

But not even the federal government uses that definition in every instance. A number of reports from the National Center for Education Statistics define “first generation” as students who were the first in their families to attend college.

While there is no consensus, “there are some places where we have go-to definitions that we can choose to follow,” says Kim Cook, executive director of the National College Access Network. Figuring out which one is best, she says, is “a conversation worth having.”

No Clear Answer

Whether first-generation status is about parents attending college or graduating from it isn’t the only definitional question, either. What if a student’s parents didn’t go to college, but an older sibling did? Or a grandparent? What if a student’s parent has an associate degree, not a bachelor’s? A degree from another country?

That last question is of particular interest to Ms. Stack, the counselor who raised the question on the email list. Some 80 percent of students at her high school are Hispanic, she says, and many come from immigrant families. In most cases, Ms. Stack says, neither parent has a bachelor’s degree. But sometimes, a parent has a degree—even a Ph.D.—from another country. And sometimes, that advanced degree doesn’t translate to the United States, and the parent is working in a blue-collar job. Does that make the student “first generation”?

In the end, Ms. Stack got about two dozen replies to her question, she says. While there was plenty of disagreement, a majority of respondents told her that they thought a student should count as “first generation” as long as neither parent had earned a bachelor’s in the United States.

Ms. Stack still wrestles with what she thinks the term should mean, though. Before becoming a college counselor, she worked as a lawyer, so she sees the appeal of a universal standard. But she also works on the ground with students. “I think I’ve made up my mind,” she says, “and then a kid comes in and they have a special circumstance.”

With no clear answer to her question, Ms. Stack is left to keep doing what she was doing before. When students ask if they are first generation, she’ll research what each of the colleges they are interested in has to say about it.