WPRO News and the Associated Press
PROVIDENCE, R.I. (AP) – A student group at Brown University is holding a conference this weekend to draw attention to the challenges faced by first-generation students at elite colleges.
The Inter-Ivy, First-Generation College Student Network, says the conference will bring together more than 250 Ivy League students from around the country as well as administrators and educational stakeholders.
The group’s co-founder, Manuel Contreras, says the network was created last year after he and other first-generation students at Brown realized they felt like they were excluded. Contreras says they created a course last spring to examine the challenges faced by first-generation college students at elite universities across the country.
This is the group’s first conference. Eric Waldo, who leads first lady Michelle Obama’s Reach Higher initiative, will be a keynote speaker.
