Tailgate Scholars

Nine thousand beds, a hundred thousand seats, and a bed that costs half what the same bed costs in Massachusetts.

Reference marketFirst identified in Tuscaloosa, Alabama (ZIP area 35487).

Also found inState College, Pennsylvania; Columbus, Ohio; East Lansing, Michigan; College Station, Texas; Gainesville, Florida.

Thesis

The institution is the town, the stadium is the institution, and the bed is $10,866 because the legislature has to be able to defend the number.

The largest residential populations in America, priced like a state that intends people to attend.

Portrait

In their own words

Age20
Income$0
Net worth$0
EducationIn progress
HomeA double in a tower named after a donor
Ownership0%
HouseholdNine thousand two hundred and ninety-four beds, one of them his
VehicleA 2011 sedan parked eleven minutes away, by permit
Debt$27,000 and climbing, in his own name

Vice: Six home games
Most likely to: Explain that it is not really about the football, then check the depth chart
Signals: Student section wristband, a permit sticker, a dining plan with a swipe limit

Who they are

One resident, twenty, no income, $27,000 in loans already in his own name, and $10,866 a year for a bed and a meal plan in a tower named after somebody who gave the institution money. In-state, which is the whole financial architecture of his life and a sentence he has said many times. He works nine hours a week. The town has 1,339 residents in this ZIP code and the university has 39,000 students, so the arithmetic of who this place is for has already been settled. Six Saturdays a year the population of the county doubles and he can walk to all of it.

Our neighborhood

Ninety-three per cent of the people here sleep in a building the university owns, and the university owns most of what is not a building. Median age nineteen point six. Nobody is married. The stadium seats more people than live in the surrounding county, and on the days it is full the local economy performs a year's work in nine hours. Room and board sits in the bottom half of the country, which is the point of a state university and the reason nobody here regards $10,866 as expensive until they meet somebody paying twice that for the identical bed.

Shopping

The bookstore, which is a clothing store. A great deal of licensed apparel, most of it received as gifts, all of it worn. Groceries are a supplement to the meal plan rather than a replacement for it. The single largest discretionary purchase of the year is a ticket package, and it is not discussed as discretionary.

Spending

Room and board $10,866, tuition in-state, and $27,000 in federal loans he can describe to the dollar and has not yet converted into a monthly payment in his head. Works nine hours a week at the recreation centre. Spends about $140 a month, most of it on Thursdays.

Media

The depth chart. A message board he claims not to read. Three group chats, one of which is the floor and one of which is a fantasy league. He follows more people who cover the team than cover the state.

Interests

Six home games and the four days preceding each of them. Intramural flag football. A major chosen because the building was close. The road trip to the away game everyone agrees is the good one.