cities (Gamson and Modigliani 139).
Today, without a college degree will definitely decrease the chance
of upward mobility. Public universities give preferences to minorities
based on race and gender. Many private universities, including Harvard,
Chicago and Stanford, have given preferences to the children of alumni,
faculty, and athletes. This is not to say that public universities
give the same preferential treatment, but it goes to show that public
institutions use affirmative action to uplift the non-privileged
minority (Leslie 1991, 59). And universities gives special
scholarships and fellowships to a limited amount of applicants from a
particular, regional, gender, ethnic, or religious backgrounds (Lipset
39).Conservatives believe that people could achieve social mobility by
"hard work (and ambition) rather than lucky breaks or help from other
people" (Lipset 30). From 1983 through 1990, surveys taken by NORC
found that around two-thirds of respondents consistently agreed that
"people get ahead by hard work (and) a much larger percentage said
ambition" (Lipset 30). In October 1989, poll taken by ABC News-
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