Duke is looking at the socioeconomic diversity of its students. Here’s a progress report from the Duke Chronicle.

“The issues are deep and I would rather have Donna [Lisker] and Alison Rabil take their time and do it right rather than rush and get some answer,” Nowicki said. “They’ve learned that some of the dimensions we were thinking about looking at aren’t as interesting, and there are new dimensions that we weren’t thinking of looking at that are interesting. As they’ve been thinking about focus groups, they’re sort of growing beyond our original thinking.”

Since the initiative was approved, four focus groups, each with five or six student participants, have been conducted and videotaped. They will be viewed at a later date for further analysis. Administrators had planned to do 10 focus groups over the course of this year with 10 to 12 participants in each, The Chronicle reported last September.

Nowicki, Lisker and Rabil said the complexity and sensitivity surrounding the topic of socioeconomic diversity has necessitated a slower-simmering approach than they initially anticipated.

My gut tells me they haven’t found The Big Bad Problem they believe is inherent in kids coming from families with varying income levels. Rest assured — they’re going to keep meeting and looking until they find The Problem.