A college adviser in every school.

• Author: Edelman, Gilad

POOR KIDS NEED COLLEGE ADMISSIONS HELP THE MOST BUT GET IT THE LEAST. THIS INJUSTICE CAN BE SOLVED WITHOUT BREAKING THE BANK.

Tucked amid high-rise public housing projects between the bottom of Chinatown and the elbow of the East River is a tidy five-story brick building that houses University Neighborhood High School, a New York City public school. Nancy Corona spent the last two years working there as a member of the College Advising Corps, a nonprofit organization that places recent college graduates into high schools to help kids with the college application process. (For now, think Teach For America, but college advising.) When I visited, in early April, she had a meeting scheduled after school with a senior I'll call David. Though bright, David had been missing classes--Corona suspected he was depressed--and was at risk of not graduating. Corona braced herself for a tough conversation.

But David had good news. He had been making it to school more regularly in the morning, despite a long commute from the Bronx. If he kept it up, he had a good shot at graduating. He had even signed up to attend community college in the fall. The problem was this: his dad was refusing to submit his tax information so David could apply for financial aid. Without that aid, there was no way he could afford to go.

David lived with his adult sister. Their dad lived with his girlfriend. He stopped by often to check in, David said, but their relationship was tense. "He was distrustful about me actually applying to college and getting accepted," he told Corona. "He said, 'Why should I do this for you if you're not going to do what it takes to graduate?' I didn't know what to say to that."

If you have kids in high school, I'm guessing your role in the college process looks a little different. If you're a regular reader of this magazine, there's a good chance you're a member of the upper middle class; you almost certainly have a college degree. You're probably pretty invested in getting your children into the best possible school. Maybe you're helping with their essays, driving them to campus visits, or paying for SAT prep.

Most kids like David don't have that advantage. Seventy-three percent of students at University Neighborhood High School qualify for free or reduced-price lunch. Nearly half are Hispanic; most of the rest are black or Asian, including many recent Chinese immigrants. The odds are that they are the first in their families to go to college (called "first generation" in education circles). This means that their parents, while wanting the best for their kids, may not have the expertise to help them navigate admissions and financial aid.

So that job falls to the school guidance counselor. But most schools don't have a Nancy Corona. In fact, the United States does a terrible job supplying guidance counselors for public school students. The American School Counselor Association recommends a maximum student-counselor ratio of 250 to 1, but only three small states--New Hampshire, Vermont, and Wyoming--meet that number. According to the most recent public data, the national average is 482. Some states are particularly bad: California has 760 students for every counselor, Arizona 924. With such huge caseloads, even the most motivated counselor is lucky to get a few hours of one-on-one time all year with the average student.

The statewide ratio numbers alone understate the severity of the problem. First, they conceal disparities between rich districts and poor districts within states. Second, even where ratios are the same, counselors in poorer schools have more to deal with--violence, hunger, homelessness--than those in richer ones, who have time to go over application essays and letters of recommendation. According to a 2015 survey by the National Association for College Admission Counseling, counselors at public schools spent 22 percent of their time on college counseling, compared to 55 percent at private schools. Put simply, the kids who get college admissions help don't need it, and the ones who need it don't get it.

The good news is that the problem is far from insurmountable. Studies of the College Advising Corps suggest that providing dedicated college counselors to disadvantaged kids can move the needle on what should be the most urgent priority in American higher education: getting more low-income, first-generation, and minority students into college. And a few local and state governments are beginning to recognize the importance of well-funded, well-managed school counseling.

The question is whether more political leaders will wake up to the long-term value of investing in positions that are among the easiest to cut when budgets are tight. As James S. Murphy noted in the Atlantic last year, counselors don't rate highly in public perception of where to invest in education. A 2016 national survey asked people what the top spending priority should be if taxes were raised to fund public schools. Spending on counselors came in last, chosen by only 6 percent of respondents--behind school supplies. Only thirty states require that high school students have access to counseling; the seven most populous states aren't among them. Fewer than half of the...