My work on this book began in much the same way. I had heard about a series of novel interventions that were designed to improve the fortunes of disadvantaged teenagers by subtly shifting their behavior—encouraging them to apply to more prestigious universities, to study harder for the SAT, to resist the temptation to drop out of college when the going got tough. These interventions all proceeded from the same premise: that uninformed students were making foolish errors that were undermining their college prospects. According to this way of thinking, the higher education system was eager to
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