Catch a showcase of UT fashion talent at the Frank Erwin Center.

In recent years, reports show UT students have primarily come from wealthy families. According to the UT Report to the Governor, more than 50% of reported family incomes of UT students enrolled in 2018 were greater than the national median income of $61,372, cited by the U.S. Census Bureau. The New York Times reported in 2017 the median family income for a UT student was $123,900.  Affluent families have more choices in the schools their children attend, influencing access to Advanced Placement classes and extracurricular activities, Plan II lecturer Jill Kolasinski said. Additionally, their children are more likely to take the SAT or ACT multiple times and have time to volunteer, said Kolasinski, who founded a charter school network called KIPP Austin Public Schools. “Even a seemingly income-neutral criterion like class rank (which determines automatic admissions) is going to be impacted by things such as having access to enrichment activities, like tutoring, greater access to resources like computers and high-speed internet, test prep (and) travel,” said Richard Reddick, educational leadership and policy associate professor.   #mc_embed_signup{background:#fff; clear:left; font:14px Helvetica,Arial,sans-serif; width:100%;} /* Add your own Mailchimp form style overrides in your site stylesheet or in this style block. We recommend moving this block and the preceding CSS link to the HEAD of your HTML file. */ Want more content like this in your inbox every morning? A holistic admissions process is used to determine the specific college auto-admit students are admitted to and whether non auto-admit students are admitted to UT. In addition to coursework and grades, this process considers special circumstances such as socioeconomic status and adversity, said Kendall Slagle, communications coordinator for the Office of the Executive Vice President and Provost. UT receives more applications from students of family income brackets exceeding $80,000, which could partially explain the distribution of household incomes of UT students, Slagle said. “(Students admitted holistically) talk about the challenges they may have faced on their pathway to college,” Reddick said. “But even knowing how to talk about your experience without sounding like you’re apologizing for your circumstances is a skill, and many college counselors in underresourced (schools) don’t have the bandwidth to give all students the support … to shape their application.” Laura Nguyen, a management information systems sophomore, said until her senior year of high school, she didn’t know what colleges sought in applicants. “When I was starting out as a (high school) freshman, I had no idea what GPA was,” Nguyen said. “A lot of the kids in the top 10% (of the class) took SAT classes outside of school. They were able to afford it. They also had parents who actually went to college, so they had somebody to guide them, or they had a network community that would help them with the process. I felt like I had to work twice as hard.” Even when students from low-income backgrounds are admitted to UT, they face other barriers to accepting their offers, such as the high cost of living in Austin, Reddick said. For those who overcome these barriers, however, institutions like UT can push students’ learning and extend their connections to later receive a job, start a business or pursue other post-college endeavors, Reddick said. “These effects are most powerful for students from underrepresented backgrounds,” Reddick said. “College is giving them access to these networks that they can’t get another way, like being from a wealthy neighborhood or having parents with extensive networks. Attending UT can be a ‘generation changer’ for a low-income student or a student of color.”

Students are unlikely to see any benefits and could even be hurt by the state’s proposal to counterbalance the property tax rate cap with an increase in the state sales tax, experts say. However, in its current form, the tax swap also faces a potentially steeper battle than other tax proposals. The proposal would raise the state’s base rate sales tax by 1% while capping the property tax rate increase for local jurisdictions at 2.5% per year, unless it gets voter approval for a higher increase. Because people under 35 have the lowest rate of homeownership of any age group, according to the Census Bureau, Martin Luby, assistant professor of public affairs, said students will probably not receive any perks from the property tax increase cap.  In theory, Luby said, a cap on the property tax rate increases could trickle down and result in better rent prices. But in a place like Austin, where demand drives rent up much more than property taxes, the chances of lower or slower rent increases are slim, Luby said. “You would definitively see an increase in what you would have to pay on the sales tax,” Luby said. “Practically speaking, I would expect … to see an increased burden of taxes on students in the form of higher sales taxes and probably not a reduction of rents.” Student renters would likely pay hundreds of dollars more per year through the proposed 1% sales tax increase. “Not everyone owns property, and now they’re putting a tax on consumption to fix something else,” said Federico Chávez-Torres government sophomore and UT chapter president of Young Americans for Liberty. “It seems that you’re just putting the same Band-Aid on a different hole in the same sinking boat.” The swap, filed as House Joint Resolution 3 by state Rep. Dan Huberty, R-Humble, would result in a $5 billion sales tax revenue increase for the biennial budget. The state’s base sales tax rate is currently set at 6.25%, and the increase to 7.25% would put the state on par with California, which has the nation’s highest rate. Local jurisdictions would also maintain their ability to raise it by another 2%, meaning the increase would put the sales tax rate at 9.25% in most cities. Luby also said the sales tax is widely understood to be a regressive tax, meaning it puts a greater burden on lower-income people than the wealthy. Because of this, raising it has brought a lot of criticism from Democrats who called it “dead wrong.” The sales tax increase/property tax rate cap swap is currently planned to be a constitutional amendment, a feat possibly more challenging than passing a standard bill by simple majority. A constitutional amendment requires two-thirds support from both chambers, no governor’s signature and final approval by voters in a statewide election. Additionally, Gov. Greg Abbott has said he would only support the legislation if other property tax reform bills were also passed.  Joshua Blank, manager of polling and research at the Texas Politics Project, said using a constitutional amendment for the tax swap makes it both harder and easier to pass than a standard bill.  Constitutional amendments have been used in the past to give cover to lawmakers because of the requirement of final approval from voters, Blank said, resulting in a higher proportion of them voting in favor, which makes the two-third majority threshold easier to reach. Blank said constitutional amendments are typically used for issues associated with major spending or taxing components that may attract controversy in the electorate. “They’re not themselves passing an increase to the sales tax — they are giving voters the opportunity to vote on an increase in the sales tax,” Blank said. “And while that might be a fine distinction, it’s one that legislators and the Legislature has used around issues of this sort.” After passing through the Capitol, this type of legislation would be up for voter approval in a Constitutional Election in November.  #mc_embed_signup{background:#fff; clear:left; font:14px Helvetica,Arial,sans-serif; } /* Add your own Mailchimp form style overrides in your site stylesheet or in this style block. We recommend moving this block and the preceding CSS link to the HEAD of your HTML file. */ Subscribe to our mailing list * indicates required Email Address * First Name Last Name Politics categories Governor State politics Washington, D.C. Education Taxes Healthcare (function($) {window.fnames = new Array(); window.ftypes = new Array();fnames[0]='EMAIL';ftypes[0]='email';fnames[1]='FNAME';ftypes[1]='text';fnames[2]='LNAME';ftypes[2]='text';}(jQuery));var $mcj = jQuery.noConflict(true);

Apple Inc. CEO Tim Cook on April 23 sharply criticized large companies that form political action committees, saying it should be up to individual employees to donate money transparently to candidates they support. “Apple’s probably the only large company, or one of the very few, that doesn’t have a PAC,” Cook said during a wide-ranging interview at Time magazine’s Time 100 Summit. “I refuse to have one because it shouldn’t exist! I think the people that should be able to donate are…