Thriving at an Elite Institution while being First-Gen and Low-Income

Ian Carlo Macato
Jul 20, 2017 · 7 min read

December 2014

“Congratulations! It is with great pleasure that I offer you admission to the Stanford University Class of 2019.”

Reading this line was possibly the most affirming and validating moment of my 17 year old life thus far. I remember sobbing tears of joy and disbelief the second that I finished reading my acceptance letter. That’s when my Pa came down from his nap, worried that something terrible had happened. When I told him I got into Stanford, he told me, “you don’t have to cry about it.” His response was a result of the fact that he had forgotten what Stanford was and what it meant to us, as a first-generation and low-income family, as well as the sociocultural context of gender norms in Filipino households.

Pa, a Filipino immigrant who moved to the U.S. to seek out better economic opportunities than were available in his native Philippines, was unable to finish high school as he was the third eldest and needed to take care of his eight siblings.

Ma was thrilled. She started crying and wooing because of my acceptance, and during this, I took a moment to hug both of my parents to thank them of what they had done, as there would be no access to higher education had my parents not worked full-time jobs to support my family and provide me with so much emotional and cultural guidance. They were carrying on my ancestors hope for a brighter future for their family. It’s an adage you hear often in immigrant families, “I want a better life for my kids than I had.”

So with my journey to Stanford starting in the fall of 2015, many would think that’s it, I have successfully reached social mobility or the mythical American Dream that so much imperialistic violence has been justified upon. People assume that just getting into Stanford will ensure that the rest of my life is set, and sure, a Stanford degree provides me with a stability unknown to my parents and extended family, but that means I need to get through Stanford. But no one ever asks how Stanford supports first-gen and/or low-income (FLI) students like me when they get here.

August 2015

“Jerry House, yeah this is it.”

Driving onto the Stanford campus for the second time in my life was different, this time instead of Admit Weekend, I was going to spend the next three weeks at the Leland Scholars Program (LSP), a transition program for FLI students into the Stanford culture. I was anxious about the friends I would make, the memories I would create and the classes I would take. As a rising junior and halfway through my Stanford experience, I can confidently say that doing LSP was one of the best decisions I’ve made since coming to Stanford.

LSP in solidarity with #BlackTransLives

LSP is not just a transition program, it is a community building program, it is an affirmative and radical program. It is a program rooted in the idea that creating collective and interdependent spaces makes us stronger and more resilient. In the face of a Stanford that often wants to prioritize our accomplishments over our health or that doesn’t understand that we don’t actually have that money to pay for books because our parents were just laid off from their job, LSP is here to support us and be our champion. Through LSP, I was not only given the resources to survive and thrive at a place like Stanford, but I was also able to cultivate a mindset of how to survive a place that perpetuates elitist exclusion, that devalues the work that my parents have done to support me, that contracts the black/brown custodial crew that allow this institution to run. This mindset is founded on three main truths:

  1. Asking for help is not only ok, but it is necessary to build interdependence with each other.

Stanford and other elite institutions are stereotyped to be ultracompetitive environments, and while that may be true, for minority and FLI students, building a strong support system whereby we can each rely on each other to talk about our 3am existential crises on what we’re even doing here is essential. You can’t do Stanford alone.

2. Take advantage of these opportunities while also making sure to use this new privilege for the communities you care about.

Stanford can push an excess of resources and programs at which point, I felt a sense of urgency and anxiety trying to take advantage of all of these newfound privileges within my four years. It’s as if you haven’t eaten for an entire week, and then when you arrive at the buffet, you eat, but are terrified that you won’t get this opportunity again.

You have a responsibility to survive and thrive at this institution. Get your degree yes, but leave it better than you entered for the future FLI and minority students, leave it better for the workers, and leave it better because your ancestors demand it.

3. Steal fire.

Junot Diaz, the eminent Dominican American writer and professor, came to Stanford to talk about this topic and his single argument is that as minority students within an oppressive neoliberal institution like Stanford is to “steal fire.” We are here to survive this place so we can distribute its resources to our oppressed communities in the hopes of a more just and equitable world. Often times, it feels futile and you can get stuck in the bubble of privilege that is Stanford, but getting off campus, partnering sustainably with community organizations and stealing fire for your family is necessary.

September 2016

Start of sophomore year, I’m no longer pre-med and intent on only taking classes and doing activities that I love but also challenge me. My mental health is worth more than the potential security majoring in a program that I don’t love. I need to take advantage of Stanford, and to take advantage of this place, I need to find what I love. I love the communities I’ve been a part of — the Pilipino American Student Union, Okada, the Stanford Asian American Activist Committee, the Asian American Activities Center, the Diversity and First-Gen Office, LSP and FLIP. To be in community with the people of these spaces is one of the best privileges of a place like Stanford.

To thrive as a community is to bring others from the community with you, so for every opportunity you don’t see fit for yourself, forward and encourage others to apply. It is only through rooting yourself in interdependence, that thriving at a neoliberal and competitive institution is possible. Individual people may let you down and you should protect yourself from toxic relationships, but communities are shaped by no singular individual. To fully be comfortable in an immersive experience such as college, community is key.

January 2017

I’m almost-halfway through my Stanford journey and while I know these are not going to be the best of my life as I’m optimistic about the liberated future. My friends are thriving and surviving, they are interning in fields that have traditionally been exclusively wealthy white men, they are back home taking care of their family, they are on campus retaking classes. Excellence does not take the form of accomplishments or outdoing your peers for that next coveted internship, excellence takes the form of every day actions that allow you to exist and survive spaces that were never meant for you. It means treating others with the respect and humanity that is often times lost in our world. Being FLI, we are forced to be resilient to survive, forced to get over the thousands of microaggressions we face for simply being ourselves. I’m hopeful of the future when the racial and income gap in our higher ed system not only becomes nonexistent, but when we won’t potentially even have a Stanford or an ivy league institution as all people are able to have access to an excellent education.

That is the struggle, figuring out what I had done to deserve the opportunity to go to college than my parents. My parents who work just as hard as me to provide a life where my brother and I are safe lived in an era where their labor was more profitable in the United States than in their native Philippines. My brother, just as smart as me, moved from the Philippines at a critical developmental age where the American public school system reinforced notions that a low-income immigrant student like him has to face an unbearable amount of obstacles to reach higher education. But oddly, I am the one at this prestigious university. We need to ensure that the additional support I received, the investment that my teachers and counselors made in me are extended to all students, regardless of their identities.

July 2017

The FLI community is here. We are prideful. We are resilient. We are strong. We are soft. We are humble. We are confident. We are good. We are bad. We belong. We feel impostor syndrome. We define ourselves from where we come from. We are sometimes ashamed of where we come from. We are more than just ourselves. We are our ancestors. We are our parents who were never able to attend college. We are our grandparents who immigrated for a better childhood. We are more than the systems that oppress us. We are in solidarity with other folks who live on the margins. We don’t pull ourselves from the bootstraps. We believed in the American Dream to realize it’s all bullshit. We are our community. We are here.


Ian Macato (he/him/his) is a 3rd year majoring in Symbolic Systems and Comparative Studies in Race and Ethnicity. I’m passionate about community organizing, social good technology and self care. As a community organizer with the Pilipino American Student Union and the Stanford Asian American Activism Committee, he is committed to making this campus and this world more equitable and just.

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Ian Carlo Macato

Written by

Stanford ’19 | he/him | tech + ethnic studies | Organizer + Engineer

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