How many parents of students in the system today bribed or cheated to get their kid a seat?
We know there are bright motivated African American and Latinx kids out there!
1
7, you're kidding! did you know only a tiny number of whites made the Duke basketball team. Now what do we do?
112
How about this. GIVE ALL THE SCHOOLS THE SAME CURRICULUM THAT THEY ARE GETTING!! It’s not fair that they get to be more college ready than the rest of the NYC high schools and get to take the same regent exams. Everyone deserves a great education.
18
This is sarcasm, right?
The school is for exceedingly motivated, high achieving, TALENTED students. That's the point.
63
Clearly, this is a highly sensitive issue, as it involves questions of race. As a liberal, it pains me to see the inequality, but as a teacher, I absolutely would not want to see the requirements for entrance into these schools become less demanding. I have taught in a school in which there were stringent requirements to be in an honors or an advanced placement class and one in which a student could choose to be in one of those classes, with no requirements. There is a world of difference. The former is a true college-level class with its accompanying workload and high expectations. The latter is a watered-down version that benefits absolutely no one.
The central question here is why are so few black students doing well on the exam? It can not be that the Asian students have some kind of magic solution to acing these exams. If it is a matter of discipline, perseverance and hard work, then they deserve entrance and the students having difficulty getting in would be better served by having programs available to them to help them prepare to get into a specialized high school.
Being prepared for a rigorous program involves so much more than acing an exam. The preparation begins in the home at birth, reading to the child, taking him or her to museums, family discussions of world events. This does not require affluence, but it does require a family system that provides the emotional support for the child to do his or her best in school.
The exam is not the issue.
1386
@Patricia Caiozzo
Perhaps, the fact that some students have to go to schools where the resources are inedequate and the teaching sub par have more to do than the magical parental involvement.
85
@Val yes, but are all these poor Asian families getting their kids into the best elementary/middle schools? They’re not. Mentioned briefly in the article is that many of the students at the specialized high schools grow up poor. It’s not like they’re living in the fanciest neighborhoods with the best schools, or going to expensive private schools. Somehow they manage to succeed despite the same NYc public schools that are available to everyone else.
350
@Val
There truly is no substitution for 'magical' parental involvement. Without that, children lack critical years of developmental preparation. Build a house without a foundation, see how well it does after ten years.
It would be lovely to be able to assign responsibility and blame to local, state, and federal governments for problematic outcomes. However, it is very clear from the data and decades of observation by professionals... parents involvement isn't magical, its mandatory for good outcomes.
168
Reading the comments it is obvious as to why in 2019 their is such a disparaging gap between the races. By in large it seems white people, Asians, white Latinos believe that meritocracy can be achieved from passing a test. That all have come to the competition and all occupy the same spot at the starting line. As another reader pointed out African- American kids are coming from an entrenched legacy of disenfranchisement, cultural dislocation and economic disparity. True many of the Asian - Americans passing these tests also come from similar under privileged economic backgrounds , however; they have a strong connection to their culture and a sense of obligation and pride to a place. They are also, from day one, socialized and expected to perform as the “model minority “ which effects how teachers educate them and how they approach their own educations. Nevertheless, IMO they can have these “elite” schools which have become homogenized and perhaps not at all inspiring or the best place to produce black excellence. The most prominent HBCU’s do not care about these schools and they are the places that are the incubators of Black thought , excellence and exceptionalism. They are the institutions that produce Stacey Abrams, Spike Lee, Kamala Harris , Martin Luther King Jr. and the list goes on. So don’t fret black parents. As a Spelman Alum I say give them their schools as we already have ours. And take a look at the most influential leaders, none are Asian Stuyvesant grads.
7
@The End well said!! I agree, however, I think it’s unfair for them to use tax dollars and exclude some people based on a test, which is really a backdoor way of excluding black people!
@The End As I read I thought that I agree with everything you said and I am thinking along the same lines. Then I got to the "As a Superman Alum"... I transferred from Spelman for financial reasons and graduated from two other institutions. My short time at Spelman was the best time of my life. I think everyone should go to an HBCU, if possible. African Diaspora and the world needs to be taught from preschool. I say let them keep their test. I am not knocking anyone if they want to study for the tests and attend these schools. I know that if, "we" as a community made it a priority to go to these schools then we would be in these schools at much higher numbers. These people are putting in a lot of time effort and resources and teaching their children to pass these tests from an early age. Another interesting article I read pointed out that although Asian Americans are at these schools in such high numbers, the results are not as expected. Love this comment!
1
@The End Thank God for your comments. HBCUs have fostered Black excellence since the 1800s & will continue to do so. My twin niece & nephew will be graduating from two different HBCUs in NC this Spring. I feel, however, the NYC educational system should focus their efforts @ the elementary & middle school level. Also, AA parents need to demand nothing short of excellence from their children. I was able to get my son in a college prep hs in FL, he graduated, then obtained 31 college football scholarship offers (he was a hs All American), he graduated from an elite Div. 1 university & is working in the finance industry. It can be done, but it takes hard work. Also, sports is a great way to get your kid in an elite college, but they have to work hard to graduate. Now, my daughter, whose in middle school attends a college prep school; Nothing is impossible with hard work.
1
I'm a liberal, voted straight donkey all my life, but any time I've attempted to help black folks who are less fortunate, it ends up being for nothing. Which is why I believe the majority of the African American population in most urban areas are lazy because for the past generation, their ancestors have been lazy. They don't work and the children seeing their parents, guardians slacking off are more likely to slack off themselves. The father is out playing dice and gambling the week's grocery money away, an older sibling is already locked up, the weekends are spent playing hours upon hours of video games. There is no responsibility or accountability. They don't know what's out there, but worse yet, they don't want to know. It's that ignorance is bliss mindset. Books are not allowed in the homes. Using proper English is frowned upon, obesity reigns free. The musician J. Cole has a lyric "‘Cause ain’t no hope for the youth, well ain’t that the truth when all your role models either rappin’ or they hoop..." Ask 90% of black males and they'll say they want to be a rapper or a basketball star. No future scientists, engineers, doctors, or accountants. Education is for fools according to those hanging out on street corners. The ones that do break from the masses and attempt to make something of themselves are still marked. Nothing harder than trying to shed that ghetto image without coming off as an Uncle Tom. Just a sad situation to be in. Hope the blacks vote in 2020.
12
Maybe we should also look at the gender breakdown of student at this high school because based on this picture it appears to be mostly a school for white and Asian boys.
2
These pesky Asians keep disrupting the well worn liberal racial/victimology narrative. The Left argues that blacks and Hispanics come from low income families who can't afford test prep and attend under-performing primary schools.
Then the Asians come along who are few in number, low income, and non-white, and they are excelling. Their plan to fight segregation was to study. Maybe other groups can follow their example.
87
This article left out a few important pieces of information. What percentage of Black students who took the test were admitted, and how does that compare to the percentages of other groups?
What were the admission rates at the other specialized schools, like Brooklyn Tech and Brooklyn Latin?
It behooves us to remember that the reason these schools are "special" is because they are full of kids who do well on the test. If we take the test away, or make it easier, more kids will get in, but the school won't be as full of high functioning kids.
The solution is not to desegregate the Specialized High Schools. It is not even to desegregate the elementary and middle schools. Only politicians want that.
The real solution is the one that no one wants to address. We need programs to encourage low income families to foster positive language development in children from birth till age three. Every single study shows that is the key to academic and social success regardless of race.
13
@Neil. And we get back to the catch 22 dilemma. You need good language skills to get out of the hood, but you can't gain those skills while living in the hood.
2
Reading this made me wonder about the demographics of the NBA. Looked it up online and, using the latest statistics(2015) I could find for both the NBA and the US population discovered that things are horridly off-balance there. While blacks are only about 13% of the US population, they constitute 74.4% of the NBA players! That's basically 75% folks while only being 13%of the US population! Whites on the other hand, while 62% of the US population are only 23.3 % of NBA players!
Hispanics fare really badly, with their share of the US population at 18% yet only constituting 1.8% of NBA players! And Asians, while 5% of the US population are only 0.2% of NBA players!
So what's to be done to fix this inequitable situation? Given that winning a spot in the NBA can lead to fame and fortune, we're clearly leaving out whites, Hispanics and Asians from claiming their fair share!
Obviously, we need to do something. Perhaps we should just require the NBA to select the top graduating players from high schools all over the US until their racial/ethnic balance is representative of the US population? Providing remedial basketball lessons would be a good start. Maybe we might even need to lower the baskets?
Yeah, I know the NBA is a private entity and the NYC public schools are public but they need to provide a good example to follow!
747
@Greenie...Equating a professional sport with the education system strikes me as either tongue-in-ckeeky or a sign of shaky logic.
16
@SteveExBrooklyn
Or, logically, both.
Yea, it's definitely both.
12
@Greenie
Perhaps not a "perfect" analogy but point well taken.
53
Looking at the photo accompanying this article, I see only boys. Perhaps another group is being underserved.
7
Actually, as a recent Daily News article pointed out, boys are only a slight majority at these schools (they are 52% of the nyc school population fwiw) whereas the other high-quality screened schools that employ “multiple factors” are 60-70% female. Boys are actually crashing and burning both in NYC and nationally, so some success in getting boys into accelerated programs is actually a good thing.
4
In Harlem, Columbia University recently opened an impressive art gallery on 125th street and Broadway. But what about enhancing science, math and tech education in the schools and community centers? Such education would prepare Black and brown students for future entrance to selective high schools and beyond and it would go a long way in showing a sincere commitment to readdress the economic, educational inequality and the gentrification that the University itself is largely responsible for.
4
EGAD!
What we need right now to address this appalling disgrace is several TV/Cable TV series about ... this appalling disgrace. I wouldn't mind seeing a skit on Saturday Night Live. Flood the public mind and subconscious with vivid images. That will get people thinking – at least. Anyone reading this article can't help but clearly see that those who have the power to bring about change haven't the slightest creative idea to bring about change.
5
Instead of asking why less African American students are admitted, the question should be why less of those students score well on the exams. The answer is obviously poverty - underfunded schools in low income neighborhoods are the root of the problem. Ignoring the income gap and only focusing on race misses the point.
5
@mike. Or could it possibly be that their parents don’t stress education?
12
@mike actually the answer is not poverty. A good number of the Asian students who are accepted could be considered lower income. It comes down to focus -- focus from the parents, the student and the environment. Stop blaming poverty. However, some blame should be placed on the poor quality of middle school education and preparation.
7
@mike
LOL. If anything, public schools in poorer areas of the city get MORE funding.
What is infuriating is that there are cordons around the level of education that everyone should receive in the first instance. How is it not possible to have the same standards of excellence at all of our schools? The Scandinavian countries have managed this.
My children are still in diapers and I have parents trying to get me on board to game the system so my kids will get the best possible education. Forgive my naivete, but I'd much rather have my kids attend a quality school in our neighborhood. I refused to play the tutoring and prep game for college admissions that many of us knew was a scam long before last week, and I did fine. Similarly, I refuse to involve my children in the sordid nonsense of gaming the NYC school system. I will, however, be vociferously advocating for the same level of quality education in all NYC schools. I hope those who are serious about this issue will do the same.
66
@Law Feminist
Good luck to you hopefully you will not change your views as your children get older. It is an enormous task to improve all the schools, you must start somewhere. The elite high schools are the low hanging fruit. It is an easy fix and will set an attainable goal for all students if it changes to a fair admission policy. You have some time since your children are still toddlers but those in middle school now need a fix right away.
2
"tutoring and prep game,,"
So,, getting extra study and tutoring,, learning as much or more than what the school system teaches,, studing your behind off,,, is somehow a scam? Yes, there are monies under the table that I also find execrable. No arguement there.
My words for your opinion of hard work to succeed are perhaps a bit less than polite. I assume your take is that you want it all handed to you on a silver salver, where all are equal and no one has to work for anything. I am not of that opinion.
17
There is no structural bias. Only excuses. Very poor Asian families with little resources spend their meager resources to educate their children. After school programs, chaperoned homework by Asian parents who don’t speak fluent English and the constant reminder that in the Asian community educations trumps all is THE narrative. The process is merit based, for those who take it seriously and their education seriously.
This isn’t institutional racism or biases. Let’s be brutally honest. This is about playing the victim. For once, African Americans and Hispanic Americans need to contend with the Asian narrative: a group of people that did not oppress others, have faced similar 20th century bias (let’s not live in the past) and despite that has succeeded academically and professionally by filling the nations most prestigious schools. And this is also about de Blah Blah Blasio making noise for re-election.
There is no secret that poor Asian families have. Any family can emulate this. Do it or don’t complain.
29
Two points-
1- Changing the criteria for entry into these elite high schools is such a twisted form of logic. So, then, these wouldn't be "elite" high schools anymore, right? What am I missing?
2- I'm curious to know, out of the 70% Asian students enrolled in these schools, how many of them are citizens?
7
New York City consistently ranks among the top three segregated school systems in the United States. Period. It's been that way for a long time.
New York City benefited from slavery and its history is such that the city did not vote for Abraham Lincoln, and later, the apartheid of Jim Crow laws informed how the city treated its Black citizens, including vis-a-vis education.
With the 1954 Supreme Court's Brown v. Education decision ending legal segregation, city leaders, white New Yorkers and the major papers demurred (read: did absolutely zero to desegregate).
Those with power worked to keep inferior education that targeted not Whites, not Asians, but Black residents and those Latinos who lived in their neighborhoods. For 50+ years school segregation based on Black exclusion ruled.
Acrid, interminable, and defiant, a racist problem pervades our school system. Today, too many white and Asian residents seek to ignore our schools are haunted by a legacy whose segregation targeted Black students from even a semblance of adequate education opportunities.
Still we fund schools based on property values and cling to tests that are de facto exclusionary because public education was intentionally designed to exclude Black students from the best NYC has to offer.
Equity, fairness and affirmative access for Black and Latino students denied the best public education is at stake here. There are solutions that are not based on exclusionary testing.
Implement them now.
61
I am a parent of Specialized HS students. I teach in one of the Specialized HS. We have incredibly diverse students from all walks of life and backgrounds. Specialized schools embody the very nature of true diversity - the diversity through merit. We speak 40 different languages. People drawing on the strength of different cultural backgrounds, multitude of ideas, and individual responsibility create a great educational community and are united by the drive to succeed and excel. This is the path to the American Dream. Our school is elite not because it was born out of privilege -quite opposite is true. Our students are successful not because somebody handed them their success. They earned it with the talent, hard work, and dedication. Their family work incredibly hard, and often sacrifice a lot to instill in their children the love of learning and the drive to succeed, and they should never be forced to apologizes or be discriminated against for their drive to make the American Dream reality. We don't just teach subjects - we raise independent and self-sufficient citizenry of our great country - not the wards of the state beholden to the almighty bureaucracy to choose their path for them. And who would be that all powerful bureaucrat who would choose their future? Why would anyone think that he would poses a better sense of what is right and what is just? (I think that a bureaucrat will choose his self-interest every time). Bring other schools up instead of tearing us down.
159
@Tony Glover
"exclusionary testing"
a.k.a.
merit-based outcomes.
99
@Tony Glover
DeBlasio's plan to only allow the "top 7%" of each middle school class to apply to the specialized high schools is exclusion on steroids: it excludes 93% of the student population from even APPLYING for the specialized schools. Currently, 100% of NYC eighth graders can take the test, regardless of their academic record.
Still think DeBlasio's plan is a good idea?
90
There is a reason the schools have high graduation rates and produce excellent students. Removing the testing or lowering the bar will only decrease the excellence.
210
Why is it that the readers here talk about institutional racism against African Americans without also mentioning:
1. The Chinese Exclusions Act that was in force for sixty years from 1882 was the only immigration law in American history that prevented immigration of the Chinese solely on the basis of race;
2. The Japanese Gentlemen’s Agreement in 1907 that restricted Japanese immigration;
3.The SAN Francisco School Board forceabily segregating the Chinese children from white children 100 years ago;
4. The "Hindu invasion” and the "tide of the Turbans" which was outlawed in 1917;
5. The Japanese intern camp of Americans solely based on their Japanese ancestry.
If you dig into it, very few minorities in the country have not been a victim of institutionalised racism at some point.
103
"mostly low-income Asian students who make up the majority of the schools’ student bodies."
Why can poor asian students make it and not poor black students? IF it is not a matter of wealth then what is the difference? Parental commitment? The education culture?
WHAT?
113
"Only a tiny number ... were offered admission"?
That like a saying that only one marathon runner was "offered" a gold medal.
Nobody offers spots in specialized schools. They are earned by beating the scores of others be who took to test at the same time.
115
The best-performing, low-income black and Hispanic students go to Prep for Prep, Teak, Oliver, ABC and Breakthrough and then to private school. These programs (and their private school partners) do not particularly want low-income Asian students. Oliver Scholars explicitly excludes Asian (and white) students.
72
New York's public schools consistently fail to lift poor black and hispanic students to the level where they can do well on the competitive entrance exams to Stuy and Bronx Science. Instead of correcting for this injustice by fixing the neighborhood, fixing the family, and fixing the public k-8 system that have failed these kids, Social Justice Warriors pretend that scrapping the entrance exam of 2 of the BEST HIGH SCHOOLS in the country would somehow help these communities. These are lies. The last thing that can help these communities is to increase token representations at elite high schools while failing to fix the broken public education system at k-8 that are failing these communities. DeBlasio is full of lies.
87
Let's remember, New York was a slave state through and through. Very recent in emotional memory and etched in trauma.
The linguistic heritage of black families needs to be taken more seriously, with more respect, and held on a par as presenting challenges of ESL.
It applies to Ebonics and AAE, perhaps as much as for Hatian Creole and Jamacan Patois.
AND YET standard global English needs to be taught with more respect. Its mechanics and richness and global scale.
Time to blow the door off these taboos--our shame--or it will continue to own us!
As long as held at bay, we will be haunted by the cultural baggage of Jim Crow.
10
If black and Hispanic students don't do so well on the high schools admissions test in math and English, why not ? If Asian students can learn excellent math skills, how are they studying math ?
I used to teach mature students at Britain's Open University. Often, my students had been barred from attending academic secondary schools and going on to university, thanks to the old '11-plus' exam. This exam, which supposedly determined whether a child was capable of reaching university, was taken by children at the age of eleven. Most of my students who'd fallen at the '11-plus' barrier were perfectly capable of university-level studies, as they proved at the OU.
19
I attended Bronx Science in the 80's as did many other black kids. As other commenters have noted, New York City's public schools have been segregated for as long as most people alive can remember.
However, the bright spots for high-achieving black kids (high achieving kids of all races, frankly) used to be Stuy, Sci and Tech as we called the three elite public high schools the 80's. When I attended Sci, it was very diverse with black, white, Asian, and Hispanic kids of many nationalities represented.
Something has truly changed.
35
Thank you for this article, and especially for including the comments that address the need for all NYC High Schools to be of such caliber.
I wondered about why the High School of Performing Arts is not mentioned, and if there are other such schools in New York that have selective admission on a different basis. I wonder about racial distribution in acceptance at Performing Arts. It may broaden the discussion to include that (or those) schools.
9
@interlocutor1 It's gone. Check Wikipedia.
1
@FRONTINE LeFEVRE @interlocutor1 In 1985, Performing Arts HS and Music and Art HS merged and moved to the Lincoln Center Area, becoming the Fiorello H LaGuardia HS for Music and Art and the Performing Arts. Full disclosure, I actually left Sci after 9th grade in favor of PA, where I was a member of the last graduating class. It was very diverse and so is LaGuardia now, I believe.
6
I thought you got into these schools based on your academic excellence? What does color have to do with being admitted or not admitted to these schools? I grew up in NYC and Stuyvesant was always really really hard to get into...(I would not have bothered to apply-I was, unfortunately, a slacker as a youngster). Is there some kind of ethnic origin quota at these schools?
46
I am Chinese and didn’t make the cut back in the 80s. I wasn’t an A student and school didn’t come easy for me. I was only a mediocre student. I earned Bs if I studied. However I think the system is fair. I think leave race out and help students earlier if they have problems. Focus your efforts on that will have better rewards.
59
In full disclosure: I am in my 50's, Black American, a product of an excellent public JHS and a SHS-->The Bx. HS of Science. I am now a practicing physician having trained at the zenith of medical centers in Baltimore. Yes I worked hard, I had involved parents I'm sure that's what you want to hear but there's more. I had access. When my mother approached the guidance counselor about the dates for the test she received a blank stare. Although my JHS was rigorous and selective the guidance counselor lacked the skills to advise parents of dates and resources to ACCESS the test in the first place. My mother started the trend of students taking that test and fifth graders soon entered the school with the intent to sit for the exam and prep began on day 1. Within 5 years my JHS sent 10 to 20% of the class to the SHS's. Fast forward today: that JHS is on life support, forced to share digs with a rapacious charter school that has devoured my JHS' library, chemistry lab and art studio to make room for "creativity zones" that have sent zero students to Bronx Science. Failing to report the systematic destruction of the successful feeder programs of the late 70's and 80's that served Black students especially in central Brooklyn is just sloppy journalism and leaves out an key reason for the plummeting Black and Latino enrollment. But I think you know that...
84
Using the language of "offers" and acceptances" makes it seem, totally erroneously, that this admissions process has a degree of subjectivity to it. No. It is entirely based on the test score, and the cutoff changes each year based on how well the top scorers do. There are a certain number of spots at each of these schools, and the cutoff is calculated after the tests are scored, so that the spots can be filled (not counting the Discovery process spots.) I wish the NYT would stop using language that makes this seem like a racially based "selection" process rather than a simple matter of getting a certain score on an exam.
75
@RE
And now that they see the exam perfectly eliminates black kids from these schools population, will they continue with the same test and the same system?
4
@sginvt
The exam does not eliminate them-- their scores on the exam do. The fact that so many fewer Blacks than Asians put in the necessary academic work it takes to excel and even took the exam is what eliminated them.
52
Where you go to high school doesn’t go on your resume. Where you went to college does. How much of a difference would it make? Leave the system alone! It’s fine as is. It’s objective and fair!
22
As a taxpayer my goal for public education is to ensure that most children finish high school and can preform at a twelfth grade level. The best teachers and most resources should be directed at the weakest students, not the best. These top tier kids should be in larger classes, with less experienced teachers. Heck, they could probably self organize and teach each other, and just have the teacher present to maintain order.
But the sad reality is that strong determined parents use every level available to advance their children. Good for them, but not good for society as a whole. The weak students are tossed in a crowded room with the worst teachers, and turn 18 with a poor education and poor chances in the job market.
15
The idea that the most gifted and talented students somehow deserve less and not more is just appalling. You're not from New York and have probably not seen the crowded, run down apartments in the Pearl Street neighborhood where many of the Asian students who make up 75% of Stuyvesant's student body come from. What separates them from the others who took that test is definitely not wealth or privilege - it's talent, natural ability, and most of all hard work and determination. And usually parents who push them, and support them at great sacrifice, to succeed.
59
They should "teach each other?" Do you really not understand that bright, talented students need the help of bright, talented teachers in order to be the best they can be - to achieve that which we may not even have imagined yet? These kids really will shape the future. It's to all of our benefit to supply them with what they require, and have earned by their hard work and perseverance.
26
Asians come in as varied in color as Hispanics with similar economic statuses and have similar immigration parities. Why punish the group with earned it and succeeded and give the reward away for free to the other group?
46
We need to stop playing around and seriously examine our entire education system.
Paying teachers a salary they can live on is a good place to start. Raising standards in all areas would include students and teachers alike.
19
how many did apply...
i am a product of on of those schools (B T '52).. and unfortunately I had no preparation... but i see children taking special courses, and pursuing studies beyond the school day...granted, it may be overdone by some, BUT children who do not have qualifications will soon flunk out, probably leading them to do even worse in their neighborhood schools..
going to a special school does generate social troubles... in my case, i lost all my neighborhood 'friends'
9
These schools are exceptional and competitive. While not everyone is a good test taker, like myself, some people are. There are also critical factors like family, support, educational setting and rigor leading up to HS, test prep and more. Just because I am not a good test taker doesn't make me any less exceptional or bright than someone who is, but these schools rely on a test. My brother would have tested in with ease.
We forget that there are a lot of other exceptional high schools out there, just not enough of them. When AOC states all schools should be of the caliber of Brooklyn Tech she is misguided, because not all students are of the caliber of Brooklyn Tech. I make this comment having been a middle school Assistant Principal in the Bronx for 12 years and I can guarantee you that my statement is true. What we need are schools that are rigorous and meet the needs of all students. What we need to get rid of are failing schools.
I have a godson who is currently a junior at Beacon High School in Manhattan. He is excelling. This is only one school, of many, that are rigorous, but not so-called specialized. His brother, on the other hand, attended Hunter K-12 which is another high end high school.
Keep the test. Address the issues leading up to the test. Look at reality - not everyone is ready for the rigor of a specialized high school.
41
The question should be is why isn't a representative percentage of minority students ready for the test and schools?
8
Not much to add. Really like many of the comments. My father went to Stuyvesant. it's not a right but a privilege afforded by hard work to be admitted. We are reaching a point in our society where we have to have brutally honest conversations about why minority groups are not achieving on an objective basis. Our government leaders of course want to get rid of "the test," and pander for votes. But, that doesn't fix the problem or really help minorities who are not achieving. There are commonalities to the latest pay to get in college scandal and this pandering to get kids into examination schools. It's not about the kids and making the world a better place for them to achieve. It's about making people feel better. We need standards. We need people to strive and achieve on their own. Keeping the tests and high standards for examination high schools does not mean that those who don't get in will not receive an education. They may still attend public school. But, getting rid of the test because it fits a political narrative of making people feel better and let's them ignore the underlying and real problem of the inner city poor DOES ZERO TO REALLY MAKE LIVES BETTER.
51
Shame on De Blasio to manipulate this issue into a political circus.
As a nation we need to take care of people whom we wronged for centuries and caused the current problem.
Economically, the Asian students at Stuy were roughly at the same quartiles as the Black students when my daughter was a student there a decade ago (the Asian students made up 55% of the school’a population then). Plenty of parents who were, at best, lower middle class, if not outright poor, were working multiple jobs as can drivers, short order cooks, waiting on tables, working in non-union construction jobs.
The students were bright, motivated, determined to do well and change their lot for good. They worked hard under real hardship to get to get admitted to the school.
The Asian families believed their children had the opportunity to succeed in America. I think that was not the case with the black students whose parents had seen time and again that it was a white man’s world too recently in history. By the time the kids took the SHSAT, it was always too late to increase the numbers of admitted black students. Now the number is 7 out of 895 we are told in the article!
We have to spend what we need to spend in financial as well as moral capital to undo all the wrong we did. That is the real elephant hidden beneath all this. Di Blasio does not have the chutzpah to call a spade a spade. Does not look like he gets much good advise from his spouse either.
33
what are the percentages of students who took the test? Not everyone wants to go to a majority white school in the first place.
5
What majority white school are you talking about? The school the rest of us are discussing is overwhelmingly Asian. Whites are a small minority, a fact the NY Times is not highlighting.
31
It is not so clear to me that what these schools should be about, first and foremost, is to provide opportunities to all our kids, in some equitable proportion, to become the best thinkers, innovators and leaders for our city, state and country.
That said, I am also not so convinced that the best test takers, test drillers and test trained and supported kids are what we should be rewarding and encouraging.
I don't think colleges still rely on a sole test source for their admissions process and perhaps these schools...supposedly the gateway to those colleges for the non-wealthy...should do the same. It's certainly a better "pre-test" for applying to college.
The numbers say it all...and it's all wrong to me.
3
@signmeup Harvard assigns the lowest scores to Asian students supposedly because their "personalities."
Cultural differences are seen as deficiencies. And that is why some Asians argue for "non-holistic" admissions criteria such grades and test scores only. They are objective.
19
If I had read this article 2 weeks ago. I would have shrugged my shoulders and thought this situation is based entirely on merit. Those who passed got in and those who didn't pass did not get in. But that was before the college admissions scandal and all those revelations of very wealthy parents actually paying people to take the SAT/ACT test for their mediocre child or paying people to change and correct the answers on those tests among other things. I suppose I am naive but I had zero idea that people could or would do such things. But now we all know they can and they have. Given that admission to one of these elite public high schools can drastically change the trajectory of a young person's life for the better. Given that your child going there means you do not as a wealthy or upper middle class parent have to spring for private school. The motive to game the system is definitely there. My point is only 7 Black students out of almost 900 is at best "statistically suspicious". Maybe this whole process can and should be looked into much more closely.
6
@Marian Majority of Asian students in specialized high schools are low-income. The way you can tell is % of students on free lunch as it is determined by home income level. They aren't the movie stars and billionaire fund managers paying Singer a total of $25MM to bribe and cheat their way in. What Asian students have done is to study and after school prep courses. All to take the tests themselves.
32
One way to keep the test and boost minority enrollment would be to use state G&T tests and whatever other tests NYC students take in elementary school to identify promising black and Hispanic students in poor districts (in second or third grade). Teachers or administrators would then discuss the importance of test prep and extra curricular educational activities with these students' parents and suggest a curriculum and activities that can be done with students several years in advanced of the SHSAT. These promising students should also be encouraged to start prepping several years in advance of the actual test, by doing grade appropriate math and reading exercises. The key to such a program's success is that it would begin early and ideally involve the parents of these children.
8
Article should be celebrating/recognizing Asian academic achievement breadth (Chinese, Korean, Indian, Japanese, etc.).
71
Shame on De Blasio to manipulate this issue into a political circus.
As a nation we need to take care of people whom we wronged for centuries and caused the current problem.
Economically, the Asian students at Stuy were roughly at the same quartiles as the Black students when my daughter was a student there a decade ago (the Asian students made up 55% of the school population then). Parents who were at best lower middle class of not outright poor; working multiple jobs as can drivers, short order cooks, waiting tables, working in non-union construction jobs were abundant.
The students were bright, motivated, determined to do well and change their lot for good. They worked hard under real hardship to get to the school. The Asian families believed their children had the opportunity in America. I think that was not the case with the black students whose parents had seen time and again that it was a white man’s world too recently in history. By the time the kids took the Stuy (and other SHSs test), it was always to late in increase the numbers. Now it is 7 out of 895 we are told in the article!
We need to spend what we need to in financial as well as moral capital to undo the wrong we did. That is the elephant hidden beneath all this. Di Blasio does not have the chutzpah to call a spade a spade. Does not look like he gets much good advise from his spouse either.
14
Deeply racist attitudes lurk under many calls for "diversity". To many, diversity is only skin deep. So, as long as they see an appropriately proportioned rainbow, all is assumed to be as it should. The assumption is that all who share a skin color are the same and, in fact, that *all* people regardless of background are actually the same. That not only can they achieve the same things, but they actually want the same things. In this extremely simplistic view of the world, racism is the reason that every facet of life does not precisely reflect the racial/ethnic mix of the local area. Since all people are the same, obviously discrimination is what causes any color to be over or under represented. This completely disregards the cultural and possibly other differences that these folks, often in the same breath, extoll as the benefits of "diversity". People are told what they should prioritize. Others are told that they prioritize some things too much. So much for a celebration of diversity. Next there will be an outcry over why 25% of NYC's Mandarin teachers are not black.
I agree that we need to remove obstacles where they exist so that anyone who wants to pursue or achieve something is not handicapped by color, creed, etc. But a true appreciation of diversity would stop there and let the chips fall where they will.
15
As a returning college student, as with other older students, what one sees to day is really nothing but a game. 95% of the professors have no master of English, but yet teach in an English speaking country. They use YouTube more than they should, so the Internet is the classroom. No test we took did not have the answers on the internet. Classes are interactive, so what does one think happens? This really means nothing either, considering what was reported over the weekend. These kids mastered the test to gain entrance, money and other factors played a part. Also black parents are home-teaching which is sending black students over the top into academia. I am not mad, but I have no children.
If I understand this correctly,,, Now, today, including these numbers, this test and admission are colour blind. There is no box to check per race. There is no consideration for black, white, yellow, male, or female,,other. It is based just upon an acrdemic test.
This is not racism. The colour, the discrimination, is taking place only within the newspaper. This article repeatedly uses buzz words, and 'lead to conclusion' sentences. The article is what is racist.
And one of the numbers?? 60% are of Asian descent? Rather than do something racist and give preferrential treatment to a group,, study what the successful group is doing correctly.
49
The existing criteria for admission to these high schools is fair and is based upon merit.
Pass the test and you get in.
Any change in the criteria for admission will destroy the exceptional quality of these schools.
Students who are unable to meet the rigorous demands of these schools will be unhappy and will not last.
I found the intellectual competition at the Bronx High School of Science to be more intense than in my medical school.
48
I was so burned out by Tech that I went to Art School. Then when I got out of art school I went back into STEM because it paid well. 100% Tech was harder on the mind than Uni.
12
I appreciate the article as it highlights issues of diversity, equity, and inclusion in our ed system. We need more of these articles not less.Yes, African-American students are grossly underrepresented in the 2019 admission statistics. But then so are Latinx students who comprise almost 41% of the entire NYC DOE system. (see
https://www.schools.nyc.gov/about-us/reports/doe-data-at-a-glance). As I look at the bar charts, Latinx (Hispanic) students represent a very, very thin, orange slice in most of these high-performing schools.
Latinx students represent the largest student demographic in NYC, LA, Chicago, Houston and yet the conversation is most often a binary one between black and white student outcomes. We need to have these conversations but not to the exclusion of one group or the other.
7
I agree and if taken into consideration that Latinx people often have African ancestry that situation is even more complicated and dire
2
One of my children attended Hunter College High School in the late 80s and in order to be considered the student's current school had to recommend them just so they could apply. Another went to their local school eventhough they were accepted at Bronx Sci because they didn't want to travel. . I never sent them to any of the SAT prep schools when they applied to college because I felt that they didn't need it and they should score on their own. Both schools were very competitive student wise and any applicant today should be able to function at the level of the student body. They both turned out just fine.
1
The exams must stand. Bright students usually spend their lives in classes waiting for the other students to catch up. Let them have their gifts.
However, FIX the other schools bringing up the standards so those students who apply have the same chances as those in better neighborhoods. Don't penalize the students.
Wake up DeBlasio. It is not about color; it is about allocation of resources from an early age. Discrimination starts early.
26
To be able to interpret these numbers, we also need to understand both the input and not just the output. What was the percentage of black students who took the exam and is that number stable, increasing or falling? I agree that the absolute number of black students admitted is striking. However, if the percentage of black students who are taking the test is also falling, then the problem is also input and thus highlighting a need to get students to the test.
16
Rewriting admission rules to adjust the racial balance undermines the support for the public school system from parents of students who can benefit from the education but are shut out of the elite schools due to lack of space.
Consider another important question: "Why aren't there enough spaces in elite schools to support most or all of the students that can benefit from elite educational opportunities?"
I submit that supporting racial balance adjustment by denying appropriate education to capable students will simply drive parents from the public school system in New York, just as it has in other school districts around the country.
11
What if you heard about a reporter and some editors who hung around outside an academic testing center and noted the skin color of every person who failed a test? And then published the observation that people with a particular skin color were very likely to fail?
If that isn't racist, what would be?
4
Maybe NYC should just build a non elite high school in Chinatown strictly for local residents. I guarantee that within five years there would be cries of racism because kids from Brooklyn and Upper Manhattan were not able to attend.
17
Look at the outcomes for Medgar Evers College Preparatory High School.
https://insideschools.org/school/17K590
88% of the students are Black and 2% are Asian
67% receive reduced/free lunch which speaks to a high level of children from low income families
97% graduate in 4 years
84% take college credits while in HS.
Many are actively recruited to the top colleges in the country
Many students decline to apply to the specialized high schools feeling that they receive a better education at Medgar.
Intelligence is evenly distributed across all populations. So if a group has poor outcomes then it must be systemic issues. The countless students of color who have the potential to excel will not do so without the right mix of resources.
The exceptionally talented 8 year old Nigerian born boy who won his age group at he New York state chess championship had a coach, and a supportive school and home environment.
https://www.nytimes.com/2019/03/16/opinion/sunday/chess-champion-8-year-old-homeless-refugee-.html
We have a very high poverty rate in NYC and many parents work long hours. We can argue that the combination of inadequate family resources and poorly resourced schools are the main contributing factor to these poor outcomes.
Revisit the scores at Medgar Evers College Preparatory School.
4
@C. Jama Adams Tani from the linked article a) studies and practices hard, b) has a very supportive family. So do the Asian kids who get into specialized high schools, except that some say it's unfair because studying is "test prep" and a supportive family a "privilege". Did Tani and his family complain about discrimination? No - his father actually called NYC the best city in the world. I agree that the issues in NYC are systemic (high poverty and social disintegration in some communities) but it is hardly the test's fault. Also, accepting few more black kids into those schools won't fix those systemic issues.
10
Our elite high schools do not have elite teachers or elite buildings; the only elite thing about them is elite students. So if you substitute good, but not elite, students, they’re not going to an elite school after all. All you’ve done is destroy the education of the genuinely elite students.
And, it’s worth noting that top private schools recruit minority students for their own diversity goals, so those students have no need to even take the NYC test. But, to include them in the percentages would spoil the narrative.
28
If you want to change these numbers, add basketball and football programs to these schools and let them recruit.
(Of course, that won’t change the underlying problem...)
11
"mostly low-income Asian students who make up the majority of the schools’ student bodies."
Why low income Asians is the question? What is the difference between low income Asians, low income Blacks, and low income Hispanics? Where are the economic sociologists that can explain the issues and detail the causes? I am surprised that no graduate students are using this for research and thesis projects at City University, Queens College, NYU, Columbia, nor Cornell.
14
Taboo?
10
@nagus
The answer is Asians aspire to academic success. Blacks, Native Americans, and particular pockets of long-established Puerto Rican communities do not aspire in the same way. These are cultures settled with the idea of failure. They have strong identities they give to their kids that are separate from the dominant culture. As a Reading teacher in the South Bronx, kids would tell me, "I'm Black--I don't read." And the parents wouldn't blink an eye. Latinos are usually lumped in with Blacks to confuse the taboo issue, but they are not comparable to Black as if you take into account their often newly arrived status they succeed remarkably well, usually advancing considerably by the very next generation.
11
@nagus, “ I am surprised that no graduate students are using this for research and thesis projects at City University, Queens College, NYU, Columbia, nor Cornell.”
I’m not. Their research would lead to politically unpalatable answers and get them in massive trouble. See Nobel prize winning scientist, Dr. Watson who was unpersonned for one factually correct comment. See also the fate of the Bell Curve author, Charles Murray.
10
The admission should have nothing to do with race or religion. Give it to the most qualified. That's also the way we should choose politicians . Enough already with this PC nonsense
23
I hear and understand that the exams may not be perfect standard. But open the door to portfolio or other supplemental ways to measure academic aptitude are also problematic. Portfolio will definitely give wealthy/ privileged students more advantage. I know because I used to work at a so called art studio, helping students create portfolio. These additional classes cost more $$$ and time. It will open up for inequality when you can get a lotof “help” with portfolio. Not different from paying for test prep classes, yes but at least the student has to take the test.
5
I say this as a black lady and with love - but unless there is some actual evidence of decisions being made based on something other than the test and this article does not suggest that - perhaps the focus should be on getting black, Latino and white students to study harder and longer - seems to be the main difference between their performance and the Asian students
53
What is the point of the existence of these selective HS?
Academic excellence, I guess.
de Blasio's plan is totally radical and unfair to all the students from poor and hard working families, no matter their ethnicities.
It is even more authoritarian than the communist in China. It is a short-sighted, terrible, and shameful plan. It will cause harm to the foundation of education system.
Impreach de Blasio!
18
Here you go, it’s the parents:
https://www.wsj.com/articles/the-war-on-poverty-remains-a-stalemate-11552847932
9
How biased is the NYT? Were any black students bypassed?
If not, the headline should read, only 7 black students were deemed qualified for admission, and put the onus on the students and their parents - where it belongs, not on a ‘racist’ test.
Sad.
29
I am a parent of Specialized HS students. I teach in one of the Specialized HS. We have incredibly diverse students from all walks of life and backgrounds. Specialized schools embody the very nature of true diversity - the diversity through merit. We speak 40 different languages. People drawing on the strength of different cultural backgrounds, multitude of ideas, and individual responsibility create a great educational community and are united by the drive to succeed and excel. This is the path to the American Dream. Our school is elite not because it was born out of privilege -quite opposite is true. Our students are successful not because somebody handed them their success. They earned it with the talent, hard work, and dedication. Their family work incredibly hard, and often sacrifice a lot to instill in their children the love of learning and the drive to succeed, and they should never be forced to apologizes or be discriminated against for their drive to make the American Dream reality. We don't just teach subjects - we raise independent and self-sufficient citizenry of our great country - not the wards of the state beholden to the almighty bureaucracy to choose their path for them. And who would be that all powerful bureaucrat who would choose their future? Why would anyone thinks that he would poses a better sense of what is right and what is just? (I think that a bureaucrat will choose his self-interest every time). Bring other schools up instead of tearing us down.
21
It is important to note that this number is before the low income children have the opportunity to participate in the Discovery Program which does increase the number of minority students a bit.
As to why the numbers are so skewed— When I went to Stuyvesant as an Asian, I did basically no prep work. In contrast, the only student in my niece’s middle school in a low income neighborhood that got into Stuyvesant did prep work for 3 years. So maybe the one summer of prep work provided by city programs pales in comparison to the number of other students who are doing 3 yrs of it, getting private tutoring, etc.
5
Those who benefit or have benefited from a system like this almost always strongly believe it is both merit-based and fair. It is clearly neither.
There is nothing fair about a contest that can be gamed, such as with tutors and test prep classes, and that advantages the privileged students attending the better NYC middle schools afforded the comfortable and wealthy over the unlucky students attending the dilapidated ones begrudged the struggling.
There is nothing merit-based about a system whose outcome is so highly correlated with the accident of a student’s birth.
NYC’s entire elite school system reeks of corruption designed to keep the privileged happy and justify not only ignoring the rest, but redirecting public spending away from them and towards schools they are almost never allowed to enter.
3
@Scott Macfarlane
There are 8 test-based schools.
At many of the schools - Stuyvesant included - at least 1/3 of the students are from low-income families that qualify for free lunch.
At Stuyvesant and the other schools, there are students whose parents are waiters, taxi drivers, etc. There are students whose families are doubled up or tripled up in dilapidated housing.
Many people commenting on this article are not aware of this - and mistakenly assume the students are wealthy, from "elite" families.
42
Studying is not gaming if others have the opportunity to do the same,
24
Right, right. Keep it a meritocracy. Not everyone is born equally gifted, not everyone improves their own lives through hard work.
10
It's about the education, not the school.
I guarantee certain kids will do well in their professional lives because they study and are curious about things.
People of my generation may well remember being forced to stand up at the dining table to tell guests "what I learned in school today". Maybe in two languages. And maybe with a poem for good measure.
5
It would be probably be intrusive and would be asking too much of a young person, but it would be interesting to find out from some of the black students who were admitted to Stuyvesant what the key was to their success, which they clearly earned. Perhaps they would cite what many readers have zeroed in on: A supportive family, self-discipline, hard work and study.
16
How many kids took the specialized HS exam and, of this number, what was the demographic and geographic breakdown? I think this information should be disclosed as a matter of full disclosure of the facts in order to facilitate a more informed discussion.
The concern over the low number of black and latinx students in the specialized high schools is well placed, but there's a subject I think isn't asked as much: Why aren't more black and latinx students making the grade on the exam?
If I recall from reading past articles about the controversy, the number of black and latinx students in Stuy/BronxSci/BklynTech has been going down since the 1980's.
Instead of calling for a wholesale change to what I believe is an objective method of determining the entrance to these academically demanding institutions, shouldn't we ask why segments of our youth are not performing as well as others - and address the root cause?
15
Just 1 in 4 Black/Hispanic 8th grader take the test; 7 in 10 Asians take the test. I rarely see this cited in media.
21
@Yiatin Chu
Only 29 percent black, 31 percent Hispanic students passing NYS math test.
5
Let's say, for argument's sake, that a certain group is unable to reliably pass the Driver's License test. This could be due to poverty, homelessness or institutionalized racism. Through no fault of this group of citizens.
Is the answer to lower the standards so that everyone can drive in equal numbers, regardless of their actual capacity to be behind the wheel?
Or is the answer to ensure that everyone gets the same quality and amount of Driver's ed courses, free of charge and with equal access to all?
At some point, the achievement gap has to be closed and it won't be done by lowering expectations instead of equalizing the quality of public education.
25
This article is about diversity. And Asians make up over half of the world's population. However, I expect that the statistics on Asian accepted by New York's elite schools are themselves somewhat messy; Asians are a very diverse group, Chinese, Indians, Japanese, Southeast Asians, etc., and it might help if one looked at the composition of these various Asia groups vis-a-vis diversity. Additionally, what about gender; are the girls getting a fair chance?
12
I think it needs to be said that fewer offers were made overall to all students in order to accommodate the 450 seats for the Discovery program. About 200 fewer Asian students and 100 white students were "offered" seats. I'm much more interested in how these students will be placed throughout the specialized schools.
15
While having just one form of evaluation - The Test- to decide who gets into the elite schools or not is not the perfect choice, until De Blasio and his cohorts can find a better way, we have to stay with the test. Now There are a number of schools such as Midwood High School in Brooklyn that use multiple evaluation tools such as state test marks from JHS and interviews stilliresulting in a preponderance white and Asian students in these elite programs. But we don't hear DeBlasio yelling about that. 85% of the students in the elite medical program at Midwood just happen to be white and Asian. Why is that?
8
So, NBA and NFL are discriminating against Asian? Or, are they just giving the chance to whoever the most prepared (and hence must have worked exceedingly hard to achieve the excellence with singular discipline)? It doesn't make sense to say that black kids are discriminated by these academically focused elite schools while implying that Asian kids are somehow favored. I don't understand why this is so complicated or even a 'sensitive issue.' Kids get in if they have demonstrated their work ethic and preparedness.
39
@Chris - You're absolutely right. It's not complicated at all. What is complicated is the root cause of the problem, but this admissions process is not the right place to try to figure that out. DiBlasio and Carranza (sp?) want to skirt the actual issues and just give kids a pass into these schools, like waving a magic wand, and then say, "we solved the problem! We've created perfectly racially balanced elite high schools!"
21
@Chris
I would agree that the process isn't intentionally discriminatory, but it certainly isn't accommodating or equitable.
@RE
Bill Cosby once got into trouble for saying that"...[black families] are not parenting. They are buying things for kids. $500 sneakers for what?? And they won't spend $200 for Hooked on Phonics." Of course, his real trouble was elsewhere. Anyway, my point is that family values, culture...among other things (i.e. deeper societal issues surrounding race) are the roots of this 'problem,' not the specific admissions practice of these schools.
10
One reason that whites seem to be under-represented in the top schools is that many whites have chosen private schools, and many white families have chosen to move to other states to avoid the lottery aspects of the quality of NYCity public education.
Abandoning the current race-blind merit system of admissions is a horrible mistake, motivated by "reverse racism."
As bad as this idea is, Democrats won't be able to stand down now. They put this albatross around their necks voluntarily.
16
Imagine during Sputnik Cold War crisis Government advocating watered down STEM curriculum.
20
If the admissions is race-blind, then so be it. It's the kids, not the system.
It's not the end of the world. There are plenty of other schools for mediocre kids to get mediocre education. Face it...most of us are mediocre.
14
To be totally honest, you are all asking the wrong questions. It is not a matter of equality — by all measures, the test is fair and moderately precise. It is an issue with equity. Despite having similar socioeconomic statuses, as other commenters have pointed out, black families lack the cultural emphasis on education that comes with East Asian heritage.
As an individual who is half-black, half-Chinese, I feel that it is my duty to explain my stance well. I think that many black folks may be lost — they do not have a blueprint for success; many seemingly do not see education as the 'way out.' This is quite different from most Asian families who instinctively turn to the meritocracy and test preparation, as has been done in China for centuries. This cultural difference places black children at a disadvantage.
Moreover, the New York public school system is doing a horrendous job of educating these children. Academic success comes not only from knowledge and test preparation but the installment of academic-oriented values. The public school system has failed to do so, instead of leaving this to the parents and communities of these children. They are being failed by this educational system.
So yes, perhaps the bar should be a little bit lower for black students. We need to get some in there and establish a route out of poverty for the black community. Equity is the solution to this problem.
8
@c. - NO!! Don't set the bar lower. That is insulting to everyone. "We" cannot establish routes out of poverty. Families need to do that. Schools and programs can provide materials, teachers, curriculum, preparation, etc., but nobody can emphasize how important all of it is other than your family and immediate community.
18
@c.
The State cannot replace the parents. There is no substitute for parental involvement. Children learn because they desperately seek the parents approval. The higher the standards the parents set and the more importance the parents place on school performance, the more the children will excel. There may be a child here and there that are self motivated and do well regardless, but those are the exceptions. The teachers come from the same pool, good schools, bad schools, rich schools, poor schools all have the same quality of teachers. If the parents don't care that the child is learning, the child will ignore all the teachers efforts and just while away the school hours. Eventually the teachers will give up because nobody keeps making effort if they see all their effort wasted.
12
@RE
Part of the problem — and I should've explicated this — is that students are admitted solely through a testing process. Including a supplemental essay for individuals who pass a cutoff would refine candidates without reducing them to a number. It would also allow for this sort of curve that I proposed in my comment.
I think that because it is high school, not college, they can afford to let in students who aren't "academic weapons." They're eighth graders.
1
Perhaps the SHSAT should be changed so that it's more reflective of IQ than of knowledge, reducing the advantage of prep work.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Specialized_High_Schools_Admissions_Test#Examination_format
When I attended Bronx Science one of the best qualities of the school was it's diversity. Unrecognizable today.
Questions worth investigating: Are there academically successful and gifted young non-Asian New York kids who because of an inability to prepare for the exam being shut out of the magnet schools? If so, can there be additional factors added to the application process like overall GPA or extra curricular achievements? Other states magnet schools are required to take a certain number of students from every district as opposed to letting any one dominate. Perhaps that should become a model for NYC? Finally, how bad is the education everywhere else for young, gifted students and as a result how diminished are their chances for getting into a good college?
4
@Thankful68
You raise good points. The good news is that there are a huge number of good high schools in NYC--some as academically rigorous as the Specialized schools, others slightly less ambitious. And there are hundreds that offer interesting niche programs and vocational programs--some of these even offer a 13th or 14th year so that kids graduate with a useful vocational certification or associates degree. Admissions criteria range from a separate entrance exam (Bard) to portfolio review and interview (Beacon), to holistic evaluation of grades and test scores, to lottery-based admission, to strict geographic zoning.
It's a huge shame that people seem to think Stuy is literally the only decent school in the DOE. It's completely untrue.
5
New York City schools don't need to be the equivalent of low-income housing. These should be places where kids feel good about getting there: because they worked for it. My Puerto Rican neighbor's daughter got into the school of her choosing because of her hard work. Let her be proud of it. I know her mom sure is.
25
Instead of throwing out the system to achieve some arbitrary racial balance, they need to find out why blacks have trouble with the test, then work on that. They need to work on the problem, not try to cover it up.
31
The question is why and the answer is we have made it to be this way with centuries of treating people as second class citizens even after we “granted” slaves their freedom.
Spend huge amounts of money (we owe it to them as repatriations in any case) in improving their lives in the inner cities. Provide them with excellent education from pre-K thought high school but mostly make their parents make their children feel their equality and potential. Read Michele Obama’s autobiography not for its success story but for what it leaves unsaid.
Don’t change the excellent exam that truly measures scholastic aptitude. Change society so that everyone taking the test is fairly prepared for it.
De Blasio is s cheap politician unfortunately. I voted for him on promises. Turned out to be an opportunist like Cuomo.
My wonderful daughter took the test after 8th grade at the Dalton School. Got in and enjoyed a superlative education while attending the pre-college program at Juilliard. She went on to study Philosophy and Music at Harvard. She is now a violinist and a doctoral student in the Emerson Institute at Stony Brook. I am proud of her and I am equally proud of Stuy as a NYC institution.
16
Tests are susceptible to test prep. Especially tests that have not changed substantially for many years, like the SHSAT.
That's not to say that tests are meaningless, but it is to say that tests are much more an indication of how well one has prepared for the test, rather than any innate measure of intelligence.
This is the reason that colleges look at the SAT or ACT along with other factors when considering admission. And it is also the same reason why the SHSAT should be just one of the factors considered for admission at the city's top schools.
I see nothing wrong with also including a portfolio of work, or class grades as part of the consideration. The idea is to build a class that is capable as well as diverse.
6
It all boils down to IQ. Both of my children are grown and are both intelligent, highly educated people. My daughter has her Masters degree and is a teacher. My son is a physician. They were both raised in the same environment but my son, as a child, was unusually smart. His sixth grade teacher sent us a note stating that he could be anything he wanted to be. He went through his first 4 years of college without taking notes. It is a myth that all people are created equal and can accomplish equally, if given the same opportunities.
25
We are being given the same message over and over but our politicians refuse to learn. School performance depends on family involvement. Teachers, school, funding, neighborhood, mentors etc. can only work if parents are first doing their job. If the parents don't care what grades the child is getting, whether the child turned in their homework, if they did their lessons, reading, project, preparation etc. nothing else is going to work. If the schools can find a way to make the parents accountable, every child will be a superstar!
20
@Rahul
This is a societal belief.
I was raised in a culture where people believed the opposite--the family taught morality and discipline and values (religious or otherwise) and the teachers taught academics. There was no "parents helping with homework" or "homeschooling", Schools were trusted to be societal institutions that provided the education needed to function in society.
It's not surprising that we've abandoned that belief--we are a country who is in the process of systematically dismantling all out societal institutions.
Our schools are the canaries in the coal mine.
3
@Amv
There is a difference between parents doing the homework and parents making sure homework is getting done. There was a time when fathers worked outside the homes and mothers stayed home to look after the kids and give them love. The fathers main role in raising kids was to discipline them and a mother's favorite phrase was "wait till daddy gets home and hears about this". The teachers also had canes which they could use on the most recalcitrant. Times have changed, both Mom and Dad work outside. Kids have few role models like siblings and myriad distractions. Raising kids takes teamwork as in mom and dad working together and requires a lot of negotiating, cajoling, pushing, rewarding and appreciating. Hats off to the single parents, I wonder how they even manage. Basically, nowadays a kid can glide through school without learning anything and if the parents don't care, nobody else is going to care, they will get their diploma even if they cannot read and cannot count.
7
@Rahul
Again, societal beliefs. My parents were both working STEM professionals, because the society into which they were born thought it was a waste to leave 50% of the brainpower of the population out of the workplace. There was social child care as well, and the role model was the society itself.
I'm not here to argue which is better or worse--both the American way and the Communist-era Eastern European way have its good and bad points. It should be noted that my compatriots are well-represented in the specialized high schools, but not so much in entrepreneurship or the ranks of creative thinkers. Although that, too, is changing.
it's worth it to try to recognize one's own cultural biases, as they are not always constructive.
5
Opportunities in life do not divide equally among the races so at what point should government stop forcing equality. Should we force equal distribution in college, NBA, jobs out of college, high paying jobs? Not sure when do we stop.
I graduated Stuyvesant class of 1996 but I got in through the Discovery program. My parents were poor, lacked a network and didn't even know what to do to prepare for the test. I was self-motivated after failing the Hunter test and I studied like a madman to catch up to my classmates.
I was successful because I failed first on the Hunter test so my message is let the students fail to get in. For the ones who will succeed in later in life, they will pick themselves back up. Stop being a helicopter society.
21
@AStudent Yes indeed! I also failed the Hunter exam and I redoubled my efforts to get into Bronx Science ('98). Failure is one of the best motivators. I still have my rejection letter from MIT. It motivated me all through college and graduate school. I have done ok for myself since. Lin-Manuel Miranda recently tweeted his own rejection letters from this and that art program.
https://twitter.com/Lin_Manuel/status/1106643280836612097?s=20
As i said rejection is a great motivator.
6
De Blasio is blaming everyone except the parents. If parents are not hands on with their kids education, then no matter how much money you throw at the problem, it won't work.
I have 2 sons that attend NYC public schools. The school they attend is approx. 40% minority.
When there's a parent teacher conference,PTA meetings, test prepping,etc. 99% of parents who show up are White and Asian.
De Blasio blew $750 million in his school renewal program in a effort to turn around failing schools. Only a quarter of schools in the program show improvement.
The only thing our mayor know what to do is to waste money.
Without parent involvement, nothing will work.
46
@Richard...agree ....so agree.....De Blasio.....develop programs to get all parents involved....
2
Modern "Progressives'" obsession with skin color to the exclusion of virtually all other immutable human characteristics is actually REGRESSIVE in its redolence of past racial classification schema codified in the antebellum South and extending through the Jim Crow era. Admission to Stuyvesant is meritocracy in its purest form: Ethnic background, gender, religion, and material wealth are entirely irrelevant. If you exceed the entrance exam benchmark, you're in; if you don't, you're out. A first generation American from a non-English speaking family on public assistance is able to matriculate possessing nothing more than a No. 2 pencil and scholastic aptitude. What a country!
29
The northeastern elitists rarely miss an opportunity of criticize the south for what it believes to he discriminatory actions. Based on what we are now seeing, almighty New York seems to be far far worse.
7
It is appalling NYC, you seriously have not worked this out yet? No statistics, analytics, formulas.....to academically elevate and equalize an entire "racial" group of citizens? Not even in the last 50 years! I thought the cities were the epicenter of societal progress and equitable public services. How about redefining achievement,and social worth and finding the place for our collective humanity to flourish. Make some calm space for our children to think, find some positivity and self worth in the chaos if that's what school is.
Maybe its time to shut the exclusive schools down until you get this worked out, free up some "brain" power.
1
@sginvt
These schools exclude no one with top class grades.
10
I went to NYC public schools. I am also the product of a single mother who never had formal education. I was never pressured to go to college and professional school. I succeeded! The commenters, as usual with articles like this, all show their bias and specifically stereotypical racial bias jumping to conclusions about family structure, family focus on education etc. as reasons why more Black students weren't selected at prestigious institutions. Do you really think that out of the thousands of Black students in NYC ONLY 7 were "smart enough" to get into those selective high schools? Are you really supposing that genetics i.e the amount of melanin pigment in one's skin play a role on who's "smart". Are you suggesting that socioeconomic factors play a role? If so what are those socioeconomic factors? I implore the intelligent NYT readers to think beyond your knee jerk stereotypical racial biases and selfish progeny/self preservation human tendencies to face the truth about out system of education. It's a rigged system, it's always been a rigged system and for all of you mentioning Asian students as though they're a monolith of "just off the boat" people somehow excelling, please examine your prejudices.
2
@Joyce
Happy anecdotes always refreshing but overall evidence still mattering. Such as struggling white/ Asian working class still out performing middle class blacks.
And constantly brandishing wolf crying bigotry brush generating more yawns, collective sighs.
26
Is the goal to create an admissions process based on merit that is color/race-blind, or to create an admissions process that will produce a predetermined, arbitrary result (more Hispanic and black students admitted)?
16
@BloUrHausDwn - Unfortunately, more and more, liberals are attempting the latter. It sounds almost too ridiculous and unethical to contemplate - trying to predetermine outcomes. To anyone who has ever done research of any kind, the outcomes are sort of sacred. They are what they are. It's the inputs you can change.
4
I once visited a branch of the New York Public Library on East Broadway in Chinatown to kill some time at three o’clock In the afternoon. Every available seat but one was taken up by an Asian teenager studying. There was complete silence in the library. No teenage chatter. It was a “wow” moment for me. I get it, I said to myself, these kids want to succeed.
43
Visited Flushing Queens library on a weekend
It’s very popular too
7
@Patrick
Same typical scenario regarding my local Starbucks.
4
@Sean
Don’t know what you mean, but the NYPL is not Starbucks by s long shot.
1. There are no barristers.
2. You can’t order a soy latte machinato
3. There is no tip jar at the checkout counter.
Perhaps some of the problem lies in the goals of the city administration. “Equity” and “Excellence for all” are contradictory terms. You can have one or the other but not both. Basic English and Math.
7
Admissions to the specialized high schools should reflect the brightest students not the ethnic mix of the population. De Blasio's approach is the wrong headed solution to the real scandal which is the poor quality of education leading up to the exam particularly in the poorest, blackest parts of the city. The statistics that are missing are the % of each group that actually attempt the exam and the success rate of those who take the exam by group. Sadly, this is likely to paint an even grimmer picture. We have failed generations of students and their parents, not just the small percentage who might go to the elite high schools. Like many others, we left Park Slope rather than risk the narrow path through the New York City Public School system. My kids were lucky, we moved them to Switzerland where a very high quality public high school and university education is still viewed as a public good. I'm with AOC on this, raise the quality of all the schools first!
10
How many students took the test, broken down by race? I would like to see those figures.
15
This Puerto Rican baby boomer opines that the entrance exam to this elite school should continue . Perhaps Mr. Blasio can fund School year Saturday workshops for extra academic work to prepare African American Latinos for the test. it should be means tested. He could approach
corporations headquartered in NYC to pay for the cost. Also, the parents of these children should be required to attend workshops on how to create and maintain a literacy rich home (lots of library visits, limit the addictive video game time ( this is what I had to do with one of my kids),and find out which special days the museums are free.My semi-educated immigrant mother worshipped education with constant chants that I had to do well in school, and carried out the aforementioned suggestions.My 1O,000 hours in childhood was spent reading books (okay a lot was spent dancing too). This constant maternal messaging made all the difference in the life I have led.
15
I think this whole controversy calls into question the reason why specialized high schools should exist in the first place. I would like the politicians to explain why these schools should exist. If they can't they should support scrapping the entire system.
If the purpose of the schools should only be to reflect the diversity of the city, then they should propose a concerted policy to desegregate the entire New York City public school system, which is already very segregated.
Let's not lose sight of why these schools exists in the first place.
9
@Arthur Lee
Finally, the million-dollar question!
@Arthur Lee
These schools exist as a place where the best students in city can get a top education, for free. The only alternative for poor students is charity or debt at private schools, which means fewer kids from poor homes get a high quality education.
I love that Stuyvesant exists. I wish it were in Pittsburgh. We have a school called "Sci Tech", but admissions are based on a lottery, not a competition, which means that a kid who is excellent in math and placed well in multiple science fairs may not get in, while a kid who has little interest and only applied because their mother submitted an application form, has the same chance to get in. Unsurprisingly, it's a fairly mediocre school, and most graduates are not likely to get in to top colleges nor likely to ever get top jobs. Public school teachers here often recommend private school, which is sad, and totally unnecessary.
The best test of the quality of a public school system is if parents who can easily afford a private school prefer the public option, not to save money, but because of its quality. The fact that the rich have been leaving the public system indicates the need for reform. Keeping competition (for both students and schools) will improve it over the long haul.
11
I have spent nearly 30 years in education. I think good schools can do many things but let's keep it in perspective. If you take the incoming class for Stuyvesant High and send them to the lowest performing public school in New York and take the same incoming students from that worst school and put them in Stuyvesant. The outcome of that experiment on students across the two groups would be only a marginal impact on the academic level of achievement each student will achieve in life.
I am not saying there are no solutions. They just have to be larger than one high school or group of teachers. We need to find ways to promote education in families at a much younger age.
13
@DoctorRPP Ah, no. You are assuming that each group of teachers is equal in ability, but even worse, you assume the philosophy and the coursework offered is the same, which it isn't. There is no way a brilliant kid at a low expectations school, which only offers enough coursework to just pass the Regent's Exam, is going to learn as much as a student at a school with high expectations that offers the complete course. What we need here are opportunities for all students to be in high expectations classrooms. In other words, get rid of the bigotry of low expectations. Stop doing just the minimum and forcing students to pay tutors or buy books to get the rest of the course.
2
These sorry statistics should not be construed as a statement about Asians (a majority of whom are probably immigrants as well). These statistics should be an indictment of the deplorable educational environment available to black and hispanic children beginning from kindergarten, through elementary and middle school -- where the foundation for learning must take place.
8
@Catlin
Why are low income Asian and white students getting a bigger piece of the pie, according to the justice warriors, than low income black and Hispanic students? They are coming up through the same deplorable educational environment.
17
But if you ask questions like that of the Social Justice set, you don't get answers, they just scream "Racist!" at you.
13
Along the lines of AOC's challenge: Why not add a public service teaching requirement to those who graduate from these elite schools. The grads receive a precious gift from the City and State. Should they not give back, perhaps a year, in some teaching capacity? Perhaps in-class, perhaps in 1 on 1 tutorial contexts? (Surely some arrangement could be found to satisfy union concerns.) The grad also gains from learning how to effectively communicate their knowledge (valuable in their later careers). And some may actually find that teaching suits them, and stay for the long term.
1
@gnowxela While I appreciate the sentiment expressed here, the graduates did not receive a precious gift through anyones good graces, they earned it through effort and out competing all others. They should not be *required* to do anything. Maybe encouraged is a better word? Graduates of these programs give back in myriad ways to this city. One need only look at the alumni pages to see that. Indeed, the CTO of my company, based in NYC, is a Stuyvesant grad, so am I, a software developer that works for him. There are countless examples like this.
14
@gnowxela
It's so easy to give away others' time and money. These elite colleges are private, so what you're suggesting is a pretty massive state take over. I suppose you could conditionalize state funding on a student's acceptance of such a requirement. I'd prefer eliminating state funding altogether, as it has been a major cause of the college price inflation (put the same money toward a basic income for all if you must, which will limit inflation).
2
@gnowxela
The specialized schools already have a public service requirement as a component of the curriculum.
2
If we can strip politics and race away for a moment, and just look at the numbers- something is missing.
We know how many blacks applied 5,000, out of the total applicants 27,000 - which is a good start.
But we are missing something important, how many blacks achieved the required test score out of the total number who scored high enough.
In other words, if the percentage of blacks accepted is close to the percent of blacks who qualified (based on test scores) than you don’t have an admission problem. the problem is blacks under preforming of the test.
As it stands, the stats used in this story are incomplete at best and misleading (agenda driven) at worst.
21
Of course the problem is black kids not performing well-enough in the entrance exam - that's the exclusion criteria for a "selective school". Instead of hand-wringing about the need for "quotas", focus instead on better preparatory schooling to lift the whole black student population out of their predicament.
8
I'm glad this issue is not getting traction in Albany. The goal is not to provide the smartest, most motivated kids equal access to these elite schools, but rather to change the nature of the schools so as to make the mix of their attendees' skin pigments more appealing to certain elements on the left.
Given the same income level, surely there is variation between ethnic groups with respect to the priority of education in the family. de Blasio and his ilk want this difference to be eliminated not by pulling the laggards up, but by holding the leaders down. Simply awful policy. Why must poor Asians suffer to assuage de Blasio's white guilt?
34
The problem with these tests is that parents pay for prep and prep their kids heavily. My daughter was in the top 10% of kids who qualified for the Hunter test this year. She does very well on standardized tests and currently has a 97 average in her subjects. Her friend also qualified for Hunter and prepped constantly at an expensive service. I was not comfortable doing that with an 11-year-old and ultimately decided NOT to have her take the test.
We did apply to another highly rated school that considers many factors, including grades and a group interview. They take a test as well (and people prep, sadly) but it's not the only factor. Unfortunately, there are only about 70 seats at that school and, like all schools, siblings still get preference. Luckily, my daughter is in a school where she's getting a good education, but the schools overall need to improve and the brightest children should not be spending thousands to get into top schools at the exclusion of poorer children.
5
That is a good reason to keep students in the buildings, but rotate teachers to lower performing schools.
3
@Marty Rowland, Ph.D., P.E.
Just as the best performing students should be rewarded by going to the best schools, so should the best performing teachers. Your proposal will discourage people from becoming teachers, and from teachers pushing themselves to improve, because no matter what they do, every few years they could be rotated to a school with students who are unpromising, unprepared, unengaged, rude, vulgar, and even threatening and violent. Even the most altruistic teachers rarely stay long at rough schools: they get burnt out. Students and teachers need to have hope that if they try hard, they noticeably increase their chances of definitively improving their situations.
8
Maybe half should be admitted by test and the other half by test and a measurement of potential. In several years they will have a database to compare the two methods. Using only test creates a learning to the test environment. Using only a test does not capture intelligent people who do not grow up in environments where tests are important. Too radical an idea?
Even better these schools be closed and the teachers sent to teach advance placement courses in all the city's schools. America's education seems hellbent of serving the smartest and those with mark for special needs, the rest are benignly ignored. Not a way to run the nations or city's school system.
2
@GUANNA How do you measure potential outside of the test? The fairest way to measure potential is by taking the test.
17
@Kentucky Female Doc
Hello, teachers know potential.
2
An increasing number of great students are fighting over the same number of spots. Rather than pit various groups against each other, there should be a push for more great schools that people want to go to.
16
@Adam
Yes, all schools should have competitive entrance exams like Stuyvesant.
3
I commented earlier criticizing this article's use of the verb "offer," as in "selective schools" "made offers to" and "offered admission to" non-black students.
From many of the comments, I see I am not alone in this concern. Eliza Shapiro and NYT Editors: In the name of unbiased reporting, it is time for a correction.
The wording of this piece, and all NYT pieces on this topic, is misleading and suggestive. It prompts many readers to think these schools "select" non-black applicants to whom they "make offers." These readers are understandably offended by what sounds like racial discrimination by the schools.
The wording should make clear that students EARN seats and schools ADMIT — not make make offers to! — the highest scorers on a race-blind exam, with placement determined by a computer that processes the scores.
48
The numbers provide clear evidence that blacks and Hispanics are not well enough prepared for the academically challenging schools. DeBlasio is incapable to provide them with good NYC public schools and wants to compensate his utter failure with affirmative action. The socialist way! The destruction of high quality schools would be the result.
23
If black students are 70% of the school district's population, and only 20% or so of applicants to these magnet schools, that is a gap that should be explored. And of 5,500 black applicants, if only 1% are being accepted to these magnet schools, THAT should be explored. The educational system is failing these children. What schools are the whites and Asian kids going to? Why are they doing so much better and getting accepted at such disproportionate rates to their overall representation in the student population? There's no single answer to solving this problem, there are probably countless solutions that need to be researched and tested - including the abject failure of the public school system in NYC to educate black students, much less enable them to excel.
10
Family and culture are important elements.
9
It can only be because the system is intrinsically racist.
The tests should be eliminated. Time and again, entrance exams like the SAT, GRE, and ACT have been shown to very loosely to not at all correlated with academic success. I'd bet you'd see something very similar with this HS entrance exam. It's time to ditch this unscientific and frankly discriminatory metric.
3
@JR-PhD
See article "ACT and general cognitive ability" by Koenig et al for discussion of strong correlation of IQ and standardized tests. My guess is that one's top potential standardized test score is limited by IQ, but study/work/learning is required to reach this limit. So it all matters, work and biology/circumstance. Work absolutely helps. These tests help talented poor people go where their lack of wealth formerly prevented their ancestors.
11
Maybe they should study?
22
I listen to Mayor De Blasio every Friday on the Brian Lehrer show over the internet. I am astonished that an apparently intelligent man thinks he can ruin these schools by removing open competition. Surely he realises the quality of education of the under-represented groups is at issue here. What does it matter what colour you are? or, wether your parents are pushing you? What if black kids are less inclined to study than other kids? Why is this wrong? Why do we all have to be the same? Has de Blasio got a thing about race?
If I lived near Oxford university - would this entitle me to being offered a place there? NO !
21
Maybe I missed it but did you leave out the numbers and percentages of applicants by race?
10
AOC have just tweeted that this situation is bad.
I believe they should keep spots open for African-Americans that have shown the desire and ability to work hard and compete academically.
However, you cannot systematically punish Asians for working hard and succeeding.
9
@Wilson
Yet you cannot have one without the other. Let the competition remain.
5
I am disappointed but not surprised that an overwhelming number of responses think there is no problem with the most selective PUBLIC schools virtually shutting out blacks and Hispanics based on a single test. So as not to appear too racist they just blame the parents and maybe poverty. Could it be that a single test is not the best measure of a student? I got into a highly selective college with mediocre SAT scores because that school took into account many other factors and I thrived there. It's far easier and cheaper to cram a students life into a single test than to consider the whole student.
2
@Jessica
The most selective public schools did NOT virtually shut out blacks and Hispanics. They shut out those students who didn't perform well enough on the test, which is race blind. It seems ludicrous to me to blame a test for being an inappropriate measure simply because certain races performed badly on it. The test is not the problem.
14
@Jessica it is much easier to get inflated recommendations, write false stuff on resume or prepare sob stories about your life. A standarized test cannot be faked. Particularly at that young age, a simple test is best way to select students. As most people have said - when poor Asian students can do it - other race white/black/Hispanic ought to be able to do it as well.
12
Out of how many that have taken it? Could it be that more whites and Asians are at Stuyvesant because of the location? It's located in TriBeCa NYC and VERY CLOSE TO Chinatown, NYC , walking distance, in fact. It's not very accessible to public transportation. You get off the train and have to take a bus or walk 15 minutes; it's past the highway. Demographics show this area is predominantly Asian and Whites. The schools that have higher number of Blacks and Hispanics are in areas where more Blacks and Hispanics live. There may be other reasons. Perhaps parents do not want their 14-17 year old kids to commute on NYC subway by themselves! Who has a job that allows them to take their children to school and pick them up after school?
And a key number is left out - how many people of each race took the test. If more Whites and Asians took it, it wouldn't be surprising that more of them got in. Are Blacks and Hispanics in an equally high performing neighborhood school - such as charter schools. A big piece of the puzzle is left out of this article! Until more information is gathered or disclosed, please do not make changes!
7
@D The school has not always been in the tribecca area. It use to be located around the Washington square park area, so that is no excuse. If the school was located in Queens, it will still be the same in numbers.
1
Isn't it just as bad to eliminate a student from a school because of their ethnicity as it is because their parents bought their way into the institution? What is the caucasian kid with high test scores supposed to think when the seat they should have gotten is given to a non-caucasian with lower scores? No one thinks that the seeds of racism and bigotry are planted as a result? It'd be better if schools had racial mandates with a select number of seats for each ethnicity. Carry it even further to encompass region and various income levels. Why not allocate seats just for Christians, Jews, Muslims, Hindus and atheists? Think inclusive, act inclusive or be a bigot.
8
With a title like that you think there is some sort of agenda to keep black kids out of these selective high schools. The majority of the students accepted were asians, who are minorities. And the vast majority of them come from low-income families. Unfortunately, to the NY Times and Blasio, these aren't the right type of minorities. Asians only represent 12% of the population in NYC and don't really vote, so it's easy for them to not even care. Instead of complaining about the results, how about taking a hard look at why it's this way? This test is race-blind and to get rid of it would just lower the standards of school across the board.
48
Once the Times was part of the solution - an earnest effort to educate, inform, and enlighten.
Sadly, the paper is now predictable - everything is about gender and/or race. Solutions always involve more money, more intervention, and more "right thinking" about how "to fix" things for other people.
This is the new media landscape - where emotional, click-bait headlines rule.
But if you read the comments on this article and others, the readership is growing weary of headlines that pit "white vs black", "male vs. female", "cis gender vs. trans" and so on.
How about real "reporting" that digs into the issues and solutions?
The Mayor spent $773 million on a failed "Renewal" school program - so what's next? Declare everyone above average and give strict proportional admission to an elite school so we now have "high achievers" of all races? Count people by the colors of their skin and pick winners and losers? Raise taxes and dump twice as much into failing schools?
Please try again, with a longform piece that digs into these issues, identifies best practices, calls out the parties that need to help, excoriate those that have failed, and help create a helpful public discourse. Maybe there is a Pulitzer out there!
Or, keep writing articles that declare everything a racial/gender/class outrage, until your readership trickles away and the Times becomes a liberal version of Fox news.
NY Public Schools are in crisis. Help fix them.
44
@William murray Nailed it. Thank you for this! I have often pondered canceling my subscription but they make that link so hard to find and I am lazy. One day if this horrible tilt continues I will not be.
11
NYC public schools have been “in crisis” since the 1970’s.
3
A Last bastion of meritocracy. Pass the test.
12
I am black and I say keep the test. The proposed changes will not benefit blacks or Hispanics. The same handful of blacks and Hispanics will be admitted to and succeed in the selective high schools; these numbers will not increase until significant changes are made in the elementary schools.
The true beneficiaries here are whites. Whites as a group cannot outscore Asians on the exam so eliminating the exam works perfectly for them. Nice of whites to throw a rock and hide their hand. Keep up the fight Asians but you have the wrong villain. Don't fall for the trick bag.
16
@Lynn in DC
Nicely argued. The results show 3:1 asian:white admission results, and I'm sure the population ratio is the probably less than the reciprocal.
2
How many students from each racial demographic actually took the test? Knowing that only seven black students passed the admissions test means nothing without knowing how many black students took the test.
13
It all comes down to this: is a single bubble sheet test the best predictor of success at a highly selective academically challenging, rigorous and accelerated school?
I have read reports that the students selected to these schools via the test do, in fact, mostly succeed. So the good news is it seems that the test produces a crop of successful students who can handle the high level of work. But the unanswered question is - would students who did very well but didn’t make the cut on the bubble-sheet test nevertheless have likewise been able to succeed? To think that a student one or two questions below the cut score is significantly less qualified than a student who squeaked in is absurd.
We should take a look at a range of kids, say the bottom ten percent who got in and the top ten percent who didn’t. As a retired school administrator and teacher in a gifted and talented program I can attest to the fact that there were a not insignificant number of kids in the mainstream who outperformed some of the kids in the gifted track on standardized tests.
How about making offers to the top ranked scorers to fill 90 percent of the seats and then filling the remaining 10% by lottery from a slightly wider range of scorers right above and right below the cut score. Would that increase the number of black and Hispanic students? Again, there is no meaningful difference in overall predictive value between kids with a very small difference in # correct.
2
You'd be better off spending money on providing African American students resources to excel at the exams than changing the criteria to get into the schools.
A school entrance that is merit based is exactly how all schools should be run. If you want more diversity spend money on resources that improve test results for minorities.
7
Here's a radical thought - instead of our mayor focusing on the specialized schools, which have a tiny fraction of NYC kids - what about focusing on improving ALL THE OTHER SCHOOLS???
15
Another article shamming the readers about racism. The article ignores the fact that the test required is 'color blind' and calls it 'unfair' as elite academics should be diverse. Who ever said that schools of higher learning should be diverse?!! Prep for these tests are free - so it's not about discriminating against the poor. Anyone can take the test, so it's not about sexism or racism. For NYC to scrape the test and use some other 'race sensitive' form of admissions would be to destroy the academics at the school.
How about improving the education for all students prior to HS or college? We spend more on education that other countries; it's not about the money. So what is the driver? Why do some kids do well and some do not? Perhaps that's where the efforts should focus. I think we already know - some families, even though poor, value education for their children and either put in the time or figure out how to help when they cannot be home.
I've watched public education decline tremendously over the last 2 decades. Am shocked at the lack of focus on the basics, and equally shocked that 25% of college freshman require remedial classes before starting! How did these kids even graduate from HS much less get accepted to college? The dumbing down of America, happening before our eyes. And now to further dumb it down, let's get rid of tests that minorities don't do well on (in the case of NYC elite HSs, that appears to be whites too).
24
@Ma Are you sure it is not about money ??! most PUBLIC school in the Bronx -for instance- are underfunded compared to those in areas of Manhattan, guess who lives in the Bronx ? Black and Brown people, so of course it is about resources or the lack thereof. A friend of mine works at a public school in the Bronx and he couldn't be any more frustrated with the lack of resources and opportunities available there and wishes he would be moved to a "nicer school..preferably in Manhattan" his words!
4
At age 13, I entered Brooklyn Tech in 1956. I was the only member of my family to not go to a parochial school. My Dad was very proud; my sister said that I would lose my immortal soul, and my 8th grade Nun said I would not be able to make it there. I did - and I still have, last time I looked, my soul.
Until September of 1956, I had never met a Jew, or an Asia or a black person. I had never heard of the Holocaust and I asked my family about it. They knew. While I did know that Columbus discovered America to spread Christianity to the New World I did not know that his crew brought syphilis back to the old world or the reason why Native Americans were called Indians. Until 13, I lived in a sheltered bubble that prepared me for becoming, as my Mom wanted, a priest or something less. In grammar school on the edge of Park Slope, I was one of the smarter kids. When I got to Tech, I discovered how ignorant I truly was. I should have been much better educated. Luck got me to Tech. I really had to struggle to stay there. Our entry class was 1500. Only 1060 graduated. Tech changed my life.
Please preserve these marvelous schools with their competitive admission system intact. It works. What doesn't work is the educational system presented by our elementary schools, the absence of family guidance involvement, and the familial awareness that the schools alone can't do alone. It takes family support to prepare a child for the Big Time and Tech is the Big Time. It's in my Will.
9
Can tell by reading many of the comments that most white people, including teachers and other well-educated professionals, have no idea of the devastating toll the legacy of Jim Crow, racial disparities in criminal justice, redlining/housing discrimination/school segregation, and daily microgressions and implicit bias have taken on the African American adults and children in general.
While Asian and Latinx immigrants have been discriminated against as well, they have not faced the abject brutality of American slavery, Jim Crow, and other forms of institutional racism and bias like descendants of American slaves have.
Many here say it's Black parents' fault that Black children aren't high achieving. Yet they fail to mention how many Black families were destroyed via legislation from Reconstruction through to the present racist local policing and criminal justice systems.
Of course *watering down* the entrance exam will not fix this problem. Only complete, systemic overhaul of housing patterns and school systems will fix this situation. And that's just one part of the problem that needs fixing.
3
@Felicity Twenty Our misguided welfare system did far more to damage black families than anything that happened during reconstruction. We have incentivised single motherhood, to our sorry.
8
How quickly all the naysayers forget about the persistent inequalities in public education, state exams, school expectations, etc. I know many don't care, read, or understand the challenges of being Black in America. Issues go beyond policy. Comparing Black people to other ethnic minorities is irrelevant since their experiences and relation to the US are different. Exams, they've been proven to be questionable and/or racists decades ago, but feel free to ignore those studies. Black children emotionally damaged by our public schools, e.g. like the child forced to play slave in Bronxville, NY, may not score has high on a standardized exam. But if you deny the racism and oppression that is the fabric of our society, then you will believe that Black children and their families merely need to "do better" in order to compete and succeed.
PS: Trotting out successful Black people is also a waste as they are the exception and not necessarily the rule.
2
I do not understand...the test is open to all students with good grades. Isn´t it? no matter their race so everybody has the same chance of passing it and enter.
15
Sorry but math problems don’t see race or even color or even “see” at all so when black students don’t get into a high school that relies solely on standardized test scores, the issue isn’t integration. It’s low test scores. So yes, we should be concerned that so few black students are scoring highly enough to get into Stuyvesant, but the issue is education. We need to be examining the quality of education at schools with large/majority black student bodies, and we also need to be putting the onus on parents and community leaders in the black community to prioritize education.
That’s the elephant in the room. Asian families stress education and despite being the poorest ethnic group in NYC, Asian children continually outperform every other group. Hard work will take you places.
17
1) If the goal of these particular schools is excellence in education, then you cannot expect to lower the entrance standards and reach the goal.
2) If poor Asian American families can, as noted in the article, find the way to promote math and science excellence in their children, why cannot Black and Hispanic families find it on the same scale?
3) the current culture of victimhood includes a complaint that Asians are stereotyped as being "good in math"; stories like this shine a spotlight on why that stereotype exists; Tiger Moms demanding excellence out of their children in educational matters.
10
@mike there is a reason that black and hispanic families cannot do as well as poor asian families. Like Voldemort, it is the name that cannot be spoken, that is not found in any of these comments nor in the article.
It's called The Bell Curve.
4
@Edmund Dantes
Another book on "Progressive" blacklist: A Troublesome Inheritance: Genes, Race, and Human History by former New York Times longtime Science writer, Nicholas Wade.
2
Funny how this article doesn't even bother talking about the number of economically and socially disadvantaged White and Asian students getting into these fancy schools. Asians in particular on represent 5.6% of the US population but represents 60% of these fancy schools. I suppose the assumption is that all these Asian kids are coming from high-income, stable families.
12
"A recent report found that offers to Asian-American students, who now make up about 60 percent of the specialized schools, would drop by about half under the mayor’s plan, while offers to black students would increase fivefold if that plan is approved."
Can we call it out like it is? Liberal anti-Asian policies in the name of diversity.
22
I hope that the author, Eliza Shapiro, takes a look at the private Catholic high schools in the city, including Xavier High School and Regis in Manhattan as well as Brooklyn Prep and others. When I attended Xavier and graduated almost 50 years ago, there was an application not an examination for admission. The late Justice Scalia and Al Roker both graduated from Xavier and went on to great success. Ms. Shapiro should examine these schools as comparators for diversity and achievement without the barrier to entry that a standardized test sometimes poses.
I’ll ask my friend’s son how he did on the ISEE admission and HSPT scholarship tests that Xavier HS required him to take the next time I see him. http://www.xavierhs.org/s/81/rd16/index.aspx?sid=81&gid=1&pgid=2530&sitebuilder=1&contentbuilder=1
I'm black, entered Bronx Science in 1997. I took the test cold, with no prep at all, just like most of the students did from my largely black/hispanic middle school. At the time, BxSci school was largely Asian, but not to the extent that it is now. I don't understand why numbers are shrinking, year after year. What is happening with each passing year? I don't get it.
I later ended up teaching the SHSAT through a test prep company, and yes, 6th graders were there. It is definitely a big help for those students. What I don't understand that, with free help in the "Specialized Institutes" why the numbers aren't going up.
I don't get it. What's happening???
147
@Sarah
Probably, your motivation came from your Parents who took a interest in you. without motivated Parents there cannot be motivated Children.There are far too many black single parents, that cannot carry the responsibility of Parent hood alone, this is the root of the problem.
43
@Independent1776
I'm black and was accepted to Stuyvesant in the 1970s. I came from what was effectively a single parent home in the projects. Lower school education has to improve, more test prep programs should be offered for free, but most of the motivation has to come from the student.
62
@Sarah On possibility is that the most promising students are bypassing the public school system completely? i.e. Success Academy, Prep for Prep? These programs did not exist in the 90s as far as I know.
8
These "elite schools" are public, so why are we treating them like private/exclusive schools? If these schools are being funded via taxpayer dollars (a widely diverse group of people pay taxes), then more students of all races, socioeconomic backgrounds, ethnicities, etc., should be represented in a more balanced way. Is there a gender imbalance in the school (fewer females passing the test than males)? If this were the case, I'm sure there would be an uproar and a litany of reasons why gender balance in the classroom is so important. These schools should fully reflect the communities and those who are paying taxes to support these schools. I also agree with AOC's quote, "My question is, why isn't every public school in New York a Brooklyn Tech-caliber school?" This is the million-dollar question that is being avoided (and was buried at the bottom of the story). Instead of holding lawmakers and those running the educational system fully accountable, the system is pitting us (African Americans, Asian Americans, Hispanics, Whites, etc.) against each other for a coveted "spot." This is ludicrous. We should be focused on forcing the powers-that-be to find a solution (Make All Schools Great) to this problem rather than attacking one another. When we attack each other, we all lose.
4
I'm an immigrant kid from Queens. I often say that with increasingly competitive college admissions, the upper middle classes are learning what it has always been like for the rest of us. When I was applying to high schools in the early 1990s, I was urged by my parents and everyone they knew to take the SHS test, and I declined. Something about having to compete in a cutthroat fashion with all the other people like me for a good education--it was obvious even then that more privileged New Yorkers didn't have to work half as hard--really rubbed me the wrong way.
I did it my way--went to a local high school, selected coursework that interested me and excelled at it, and got in to a small private college that was more selective than Harvard on a 100% merit scholarship. I followed that up with a professional degree from an Ivy, also on full fellowships, and my entire 9-year post-secondary education cost me less than $5k.
I wonder who really thinks it's a great thing for 16-year-olds to wear themselves out in a pressure-cooker atmosphere when they will have 60 or more years afterward to do--more of the same. I guess corporate employers love it.
I wish more people would question the basic premise that these schools are worth it--I certainly won't be pushing my kids to take this test.
And frankly, it doesn't take a genius to figure out that if seven--seven!--black kids from NYC get into a NYC high school, something is very wrong.
5
I went to Bronx Science in the 1960's as did my older brother.
We went to regular NYC Public Schools, took the exams and were accepted based on our scores.
Never was anything asked or mentioned about race, religion, etc.
Speaking for myself, it took years to realize how good of an opportunity it was and how much of a lasting impact on my life it made.
10
“Diversity” and “race-based policies” set kids up for failure while allowing Liberals/Democrats/Progressives top claim the moral high ground. You don’t dumb down the good schools, you raise the quality of education in the bad ones. Democrats penalize success and reward failure.
8
Think about this issue in the context of Palo Alto and South Korea. How much do we want our kids studying for an admissions test when they could be developing other talents - or even playing outdoors being kids? Maybe we need a multi-pronged university system as exists in Europe. Some kids will accept the need to devote their lives to tests (see South Korea) and eventually become society's lawyers and programmers. I hope not all will aspire to this kind of life for themselves and their children.
2
There are a number of reasons for the low percentage of Black students admitted to the upper tier high schools that do not rely on, nor even imply, conscious racism.
First, there is a wide variety in the quality of the educational experiences in the elementary schools which prepare the students for the exams. If the governor, the mayor, or the city wants a more equitable admissions rate, they could start by making a more equitable elementary school experience for the prospects.
Also, although less likely to be talked about, there is a difference in the family expectations in various parts of the city. When academic achievement is more highly praised than athletics or street cred, it will be more strongly pursued. When a strong family keeps the students motivated rather than discouraging school time as racist, the results will be more positive as well. When a good book is more likely to be a gift than a good pair of sneakers, academic prowess will be encouraged as well.
19
I am an Asian American immigrant who grew up in Flushing, Queens and graduated from Bronx Science in the 1980s. I feel compelled to speak. Changing the admission standards by scrapping the test will not solve racial inequality but only dilute the value of a Bronx Science (or Stuyvesant) diploma. We can argue the merits of whether one test should be the sole arbiter of anyone’s intelligence (I for one do not subscribe to this), but it was and is one of the least subjective measures to do so. The test didn’t have a pre-conceived notion of me as an Asian American (i.e., that I would test well in math, which I didn’t. I tested better in the English portion of the test). I was an anonymous number that just happened to make the cut off score. To fix the inequality in New York City specialized schools, there needs to be a thoughtful, comprehensive, and long-term plan
13
Why doesn't IS 217 in Jamaica have honor classes so kids can become prepared. What a waste of a JHS.
.
10
Blacks were historically discriminated in this country! Not Hispanics. Please separate them!
4
@DA you're statement is wildly incorrect, but this article is about access for Black and Latino students to specialized HS not about who has been discriminated against in this country. Black and Latino are also sometimes overlapping categories.
1
@DA
Actually, there was and is terrible discrimination against Latinos in the US, especially the border states.
https://www.nytimes.com/2019/03/02/us/porvenir-massacre-texas-mexicans.html
1
@DA Beg to differ - based on history of Mexicans in SW U.S. states.
1
To fully appreciate the propensity of the admissions test to favor only those who are well equipped to ace it (which, implicitly, excludes black students), it is necessary to know what proportion of students who took the test are black, Asian-American, white, etc. While it’s obvious that the acceptance breakdown is skewed towards and away from specific NYC populations overall, we need to know which populations are actually seeking admission in order to fully judge the admission mechanism. I don’t think the article has these numbers.
8
Times never generating article praising Asian academic acumen.
12
@Sean Can you explain why the NYT should print an article "praising Asian academic acumen"? Is this news? What's the point of the story - to praise Asian academic acumen? Why? Who / what else "should" the NYT be praising? My point: none of this is news.
1
@debra
I've always told my daughter to imitate those who do well ...
A story about those who do ...do well ...
would be VERY welcome to me ...
I've also told her to observe those who DON"T do well ...so as to NOT imitate them.
5
@debra
Times constantly engaging in selective praise regarding favored so called marginalized. Example: constant ad nauseum worshipping, literally demanding LGBT acceptance--mere John Locke(ian) tolerance never enough.
4
I'm not sure how to interpret this. Is there some systemic discrimination built into the exam that selectively doesn't allow black or other minorities while they take the exam; or is it just that those students not selected were just not up to pa r?
As a Bronx Science alum ('72) I can only remember 1 african american classmate when I attended. But being unaware or not properly educated in systemic discrimination, I didn't see that those ratios were not equal and also never asked why. Still if there is no discrimination in the ability to take the exam, or no prejudice in the exam topics and questions, then one would only surmise that those not selected did not meet the academic requirements, which had nothing to do with race. Correct me or educate me if I'm missing something.
9
Some children are simply smarter than others, just like adults, I have a hard time figuring out why everyone is so astounded that there will be skews by ethnicity, race and gender.
Contrary to what many people want to believe, we are not all equal, not even close.
We all walk up right, that's about the end of it.
16
Only 1 asian player got into NBA while 99% of players are black. I don't think it's fair.
35
Just another scheme to deny admission to children of Asian immigrants.
21
Many comments are focused on parents. Yet parent engagement in NYC is abysmal. How does a poor mom or dad who does not speak English have a meaningful conversation with their kid's teacher? They cannot. How do they learn about enrichment opportunities when their neighborhood network is weak? They cannot. Quit blaming the families - start supporting them. Level the playing field...don't change the game.
4
Lots of Asian parents speak no English. I had students who spent part of their life acting as translators for their parents.
Don't blame lack of English -- the Asian kids get in anyway.
Still, I am a proponent of immigrants learning English.
13
@LexDad. But isn’t that the situation for many of the Asian kids who are admitted to these elite schools? Their parents speak no English. Many are poor. But when NYC offered free test prep they were the overwhelming majority who made their kids spend their weekends at these classes.
9
Providing services to and encouraging the engagement of low-income, single-parent, substance-addicted and non-English speaking families are crucial to improving black and Hispanic education outcomes as much as good teachers and schools. Home support is what most Asians have so that is a real differentiator.
4
Most of the academically accomplished black kids in NYC are offered a full scholarship, room and board plus expenses to prestigious private schools.
Why would they travel 2 or 3 hours a day to compete with the hardest working and brightest kids at the working-class sweatshop known as Stuyvesant, when they can rub elbows with rich liberals at Exeter or Trinity?
24
Every time I read articles on this issue, I think the same thing:
1. Why aren't all NYC public high schools good or at least decent? We pay our taxes and yet funnel the best and brightest into a handful of high schools and write the rest off as 2nd tier?
2. Why aren't we focusing on the role of parents and the need for a culture of education in the home?
I grew up in this city, came from a working class immigrant family with uneducated parents that demanded high grades or I suffered the consequences. I didn't test into a specialized high school, but I did fine, went to a good college, and built a prosperous business. Focusing on a handful of schools is going to only help the smallest percentage of students, no matter how you redistribute, integrate, or whatever. Fix the whole system, starting at the family level and everything else will fall into place. There is no reason whatsoever why every neighborhood school can't offer a top notch education. And, also, bring back vocational skills. Plenty of good money and satisfaction to be made when you actually know how to do something.
15
Vouchers would allow parents to without financial means to put their kids in better safer schools. This would lead to more graduates of those schools , many of whom would certainly be
"diverse", to be accepted into elite schools. It would also lead to an improvement in public schools due to competition. The teachers unions will never let it happen so the only answer they have is lower the bar. Who cares about the children?
@btb Thank you Betsy for your insights!
2
@ellie k.Would you care to refute any of my points with reasoned argument?
So the nfl nba and baseball all should be 68% white
Why aren’t they?
13
The culture of victimization as encouraged by the media is a major factor in holding black students back and reducing their motivation to succeed. The media and black elitists have convinced many blacks that their participation in our society will inevitably result in failure.
12
The real issue here isn't "Who was better prepared?" it's "Why?" And those who are only paying attention to the former are obfuscating the later.
9
When I was at Bronx Science in the 1980s, racial diversity didn’t seem like an issue. In fact, there was great socio economic and racial diversity within my class of 800. There were upper middle class and even wealthy kids (who could have gone to private school but whose families thought it was a better deal to pay nothing for an equivalent level of education at Science), middle class kids and lower middle class to working class/poor kids at Science. Fast forward to today, I do find it disturbing that African American kids are not as well represented as they should be. I don’t believe the test has changed so I have to assume then it must be the public school system and environment in general, aggravated by increasing social and income inequality, that, unfortunately, hits minorities the most (including Asians!). Changing the admissions standards will not solve a problem for which the root causes are deep and complex.
7
Was the criteria for admission known in advance? Did everyone take the same test? Did different standards for admission exist that distinguished among the various ethnic groups? Did everyone have an equal chance to take the test? Were the test graded anonymously? Did the test cover subjects not projected on the prep materials? Were factors for admission considered that were not part of the test?
Until these questions have been answered, once cannot say if the admissions process was biased.
5
This reminds me that some years ago there was a mixup of SAT scores at Univ. of California Berkeley. The students who got mediocre scores got admitted and the error could not be corrected because those students already got offers.
It seems that the students who got in by error did as well as those who had high SAT scores.
This and other factors (some higher ed institutions have given up on SAT completely) show that those tests are not predictive of future student performance.
I wonder if this might not also be the case for the specialized high schools? I wish someone would do a research project by letting in some students who didn't do well on the tests and then compare performance over the years.
2
In my generation, Stuyvesant was mostly Jewish, as I am. Now it’s mostly Asian. Good for them. They worked the hardest and they did the best on the exam. Period.
25
So I am curious why gender has not been quantified in this article as well. Is there gender balance at these selective schools and how does that relate to whether the student is black, white, etc? I notice only one obviously female student in the photo accompanying this article. Gender is often the last injustice addressed, no matter what the student’s color or ethnic group, yet it affects half of the available student population across the board
4
@Nilgün Tuna Stuyvesant is not gender balanced. It is predominantly male. My daughter is a Stuy graduate and in some classes there would only be a handful of girls in them.
2
@karma
As of 2016-17, 1911 (56.7%) male and 1457 (43.3%) female.
https://data.nysed.gov/enrollment.php?year=2017&instid=800000046741
Of course, take a look at some of the elite non-SHSAT schools, where "multiple factors" are used to determine admission. Beacon is 64% female; Eleanor Roosevelt is 60% female; Bard Manhattan is 62% female; Bard Queens is 59% female; Baruch is 60% female. Is there a bias in those systems?
4
@Nilgün Tuna
Hard real physical science STEM: men dominating. Soft, touchie feelie, victims "studies" pablum women ruling.
3
I am the first of my clan (six families) to go to college and my older sister is the second... we are both Ph.D's and retired university professors....our mother had to quit school in the ninth grade to work the farm...but she knew education would be our highway out of being poor working class....and she was right... may she rest in peace...
8
@AMON RA
And you worked very hard personally to make the most of the educational opportunities that were provided to you.
1
@AMON RA
Yet so many professors wind up posing as "working class hero" wannabes.
2
As a Haitian-American (who strongly identifies with African-Americans) 1980s graduate of Bronx Science, these statistics are painful. Inequality in education though is painful for NYC as a whole and the entire country. I don’t have enough room to list the ways in which institutional racist education policies in NYC impacted members of my family who immigrated to NYC in the 1960s from Haiti. Despite these barriers, there were a few progressive policies and our own sacrifices that allowed my family in one generation to move from living below the poverty line to being in the upper middle class as property owners/investors. Those progressive policies included access to banking (not loans, just the opportunity to have a savings account), neighborhood public libraries, pre-K, free breakfasts/lunches during the summer, standardized tests for which one could sit without being chosen by one’s school to take that exam (the opposite example of this is the unfair requirement that one must be picked by one’s elementary/intermediate school to sit for the Hunter College School entrance exam, which was the policy in the 1970s), free bus/subway passes and paid internships with NYC gov’t agencies.
Institutional racism, including in education, undermines the economic/social development of everyone. Along with my community and my church, Bronx Science not only prepared me for higher education through graduate school, but was my ticket out of poverty. I want this opportunity for every child.
12
There are a lot of "blame the parents! " comments here. I also agree the solution needs to start long before high school, but before simply chastising all these parents, look at their reality, and then ask if we ahould simply relegate promising children to a n unpromising future because they lost the awesome-parent lottery through no fault of their own.
Blame anyone for anything, but that doesn't fix the reality or solve the problem. We can do better if we try harder. I have no children -- other people's children are my future. All of them.
Here are some realities to consider. Circumstances of parents vary. Children may have mentally ill parents, parents with addiction, parents caring for disabled siblings or elderly/ill relatives, parents who have to work three jobs and commute hours on public transportation, a parent not much older than they are, a parent who abandons them, a parent whose working hours mean they can't supervise, parents who become homeless, who have minimal education themselves, who simply don't know how to support their child's schooling because they didn 't grow up seeing it.
The children themselves may have to work, keep house, or care for siblings or disabled family members. They may not be getting enough food or the right food.
Self-righteous scorn may make you feel good. It accomplishes less than nothing.
5
@Naomi
My grandparents worked hard and read to my parents.
My parents worked hard ...read to me.
I worked hard and read to my daughter ...
I take offense at this Life's Lottery nonsense ...
3
@ron You work hard to benefit your child. Good on you, and thank you for doing your part raising her right.
Your daughter was born to you. Lucky her for having such a dedicated parent. She didn't earn a good parent; she just won the 'awesome parent' lottery!
Some children are not so lucky, and end up stuck with not so great parents. They didn't do anything wrong, they were just unlucky.
Nothing offensive here. It's just reality.
Like @Naomi, I do not have children of my own, so I also see all children as my future. I need them all to succeed, not just the lucky ones born to good parents like your daughter. So I'd love to see us as a society invest in helping unlucky kids whose parents are failing them. Does it feel unfair to you that you are spending all this energy on raising your child while someone else isn't lifting a finger so we have to help raise their child? get it, but I don't care. All I want is the best possible future generation, regardless of who decided to have children.
2
Are there only 7 black kids who qualify? Hard to believe. So what's going on?
2
@debra Compared to the Asian and White students, yes. They don't have standards that the Black students didn't meet, it's competition.
3
The visualizations on this article don't tell enough of the story, imo. You're showing admission offers by race, but the tells us nothing about the applicant pool. Of the 7 admitted black students to Stuyvesant for example, how many black students were declined? What if those 7 represent a 100% accept rate? Or a 1%?.... completely different story. This data needs a lot more context, but I guess that makes it harder to generate hot takes.
11
7 of 895? What are the possible reasons for this?
1) Black children aren't as capable as white children.
2) Black children are being limited by our culture and society.
3) There is no third reason. And if you believe in the first, not only are you wrong, you are, without exception, a racist.
7 of 895 is a ratio that is an unequivocal moral condemnation of the inequality in our society. And rather then being defended, as so many people of privilege have done in these same comment sections over the years, it should be a clarion call for us, all of us, as a society, to try and fix a system that is so obviously broken.
And the prison population tells the same story.
This country needs to decide which of two paths it wants to go down. Equality or Elitism?
I would suggest that human history has long proven which of these two is more prone to survival, as the dustbin of history is riddled with the failures of unequal, elitist cultures.
The health, welfare, and longevity of any society is inversely proportional to it's inequality - because equality and inclusiveness builds strength (and character). This is a fact.
So, I hope and pray that moving forward we make the right choice, because if we don't this ship will founder.
Food for thought.
5
@Chicago Guy, The weight of the evidence, plus Occam’s Razor, suggests that number 1 is the factually correct answer, no matter how pejoratively you label anyone who believes it. There is an extremely well-documented (and stubborn) 15 point gap between the average IQ scores of black and white Americans. Many redesigns of IQ tests designed to reduce this gap have failed to change the outcome. (Culture free tests, culture fair tests, non-verbal only tests, etc.).
Furthermore, Asians outscore whites on these same tests by a 2-6 point margin, which is exactly what you would predict after looking at academic achievement scores of all types for these groups.
7
Why are we not asking why more NY High Schools cannot offer high quality education?
AOC raised this at at town hall meeting. IT is the real question. https://twitter.com/freedlander/status/1107014149819846657
6
@Aravinda- Exactly!! This is crazy... Great for these Schools!! They're wonderful!! Maybe some of this passion and attention can go toward assuring that every high school is safe, provides an excellent curriculum, values and nurtures its students abilities..
3
I taught in a public school in a poor neighborhood in Brooklyn. So many of these commenters seem to have forgotten that across the country, but even more so in NYC, schools are segregated by race and funded based on the wealth of the community. This problem isn't a "cultural" one where black and brown parents don't value education as much as white and Asian ones, a racist trope I see repeated over and over in these comments. The problem is a racist, classist system in which those with money have access to the tutoring and test prep services that passing those exams requires. Those without access to the proper resources may love education and spend all of their time trying to get ahead, but they will still be at a disadvantage. As AOC remarked, the solution to this problem isn't to "fix" the admission system to elite schools. It's to address the fact that poor black and brown kids in NYC are forced to attend crumbling schools that fail to educate them.
8
I wouldn’t put another dime into the Public School system. It would be like flushing money down the toilet! I’m a 62-years old Black woman and the Public School system was bad when I was a kid. I went to a parochial school and had no problem passing the test and getting accepted to Bronx Science because I went to a school where I actually learned something! $21,206 was the last figure per student that NYC spends on education. Sorry, but if the Public School system can’t educate students on that whopping sum, then the problem is not lack of money! Time to dispense with this tired, old argument. Get rid of the unions. They’ve caused more damage to the public schools than anything else.
The Public School system has become nothing but a SuperPAC for the Democratic Party and our kids are suffering for it. “Diversity” policies only set kids up for failure when they can’t keep up with the work (I worked for a State University years ago and saw firsthand the damage “Affirmative Action” policies inflict on our kids!) This makes me hopping mad! How long is it going to take before people wake up to the fact that the Public School system in its present form HAS FAILED! Time to expand School Choice and vouchers and anyone who does not think so is a racist who does not believe minority kids have a right to a quality education!
6
Very good said, could anybody transfer this to Mayor and Chancellor?
1
Are reporters certain that there is no cheating on the admission test, no substitute test takers, no friends taking the test together?
1
If we solely focus on integration, wouldn't this equate to complaing about a football team with too many good black athletes and not enough Asians so we should change that order? or is it that in sports, it's okay to not care about racial equality because it makes money, especially for white owners and coaches?
We shouldn't downplay the fact children that excel in any form, especially academically, usually will go on to better the world for everyone as an adult. Thus we should help elevate all schools rather than strip the deserving one of opportunities while ignoring the majority of have-nots.
3
Why why why is the focus of your negative slant on the black students. It’s annoyingly typical.
The fact is white students far outnumber Asians AND have most of the same financial advantages, if not more. Yet Asians got 3 times the seats whites got. What does that tell you? That is clearly worthy of dissection.
I am a black citizen and a native New Yorker (who got into Bronx Science, by the way, but whose parents preferred private school for her). What I care about is:
A. Why is a PERFECT score needed for admission. That is arbitrary, absurd and bad policy.
B. I honestly admit I have a problem with my tax dollars going to educate this majority cohort. Sorry, but I do.
2
@dbEsq a perfect score is NOT needed for admission
5
If we want to see more black kids earn their way into these selective high schools, we need to focus on the root cause of the problem: Out-of-wedlock births, and not just among blacks. Kids growing up in single-parent households are at a terrible disadvantage.
Brookings argues that maybe it’s time to bring back shotgun marriages. Maybe then the boys impregnating girls will think twice if they can’t escape responsibility.
https://www.brookings.edu/research/an-analysis-of-out-of-wedlock-births-in-the-united-states/
5
Shocking that children of the cognitive elite voluntary immigrants of other countries will outperform Black and Latino kids. Even more shocking when Asian families, especially Chinese, arrive with hundreds of years of "the test is the thing to prepare for" behind them. Even more shocking when East Asian immigrant neighborhoods are full of dozens of test prep centers that target East Asian families with their advertising... letting all who live in these neighborhoods know that "the test is the thing you must prepare for." Not shocking. But the test prep centers concentrated in East Asian neighborhoods & East Asian parents prioritizing the test, combined with a test that can be readily prepped for create a test prep race that most Black and Latino families will opt out of...if they were even aware of the test.
4
To say it this way strongly suggests a test proctor was tossing out results from African-American applicants.
The reality is just as damning, that the US has spent three centuries refining a social and economic structure that systematically disadvantages, jails, and kills African Americans so that not too many qualify for these selective schools.
But that one doesn't make a snappy headline. And it also doesn't lend itself to our favorite solution to tough problems like institutional racism -- just jiggering the results and declaring victory.
3
I’m bothered by the headline. It implies that there was some “rigging” involved to keep black students out of these schools. Why doesn’t headline read “Nearly three quarters of students admitted to Stuyvesant are Asian”? That headline would imply something quite different. And neither implication is really the truth.
11
Why are Asians and whites clumped together and blacks and Hispanics? What story does it tell when they’re individualized?
2
@DL. In ALL academic achievement tests during the past thirty plus years, Asians Are on top, followed closely by whites, then there is the huge gap (about two grade levels) between whites and hispanics, and finally, at the bottom of the graph, blacks trail hispanics by a relatively small margin.
4
My granddaughter just found out yesterday she got into Stuyvesant; one of the 197 Caucasian students. She did it through hard work; studying daily and weekends, taking countless of previous Shast tests in addition to maintaining her top grades at a double curriculum school. Doesn’t matter if you are black white green or orange; it comes down to your desire to achieve what you want and doing it. Parental support and guidance helps as does tutoring. We call this achievement via merit. Hard works earns rewards. Nose to the grindstone/Grit/etc. Stop bringing down the high achievers by trying to include everyone. Start by fixing the lousy public school system.
22
Where are the green and orange people you’re referring to.
@LaFronde...HA! it's an inclusive meaning "no matter the color of skin"....should have included purple , I was being random....
Don't touch Stuyvesant High School. Nothing is wrong with Stuyvesant High School. DeBlasio & AOC should keep their grubby hands off the city's crown jewels.
The problem is with the other high schools in NYC.
Not everyone is a genius. Let that soak in for a minute.
Now, the goal is to teach the vast majority of children in NYC how to Read, Write and do Arithmetic (NYC has not achieved this yet).
Anything beyond that is a bonus.
25
As a former Bronx Science math teacher, I submitted a formal proposal to the NYPL to teach a SHSAT prep course for free at the Schomburg Center as my own small way to address the diversity issue. My proposal was rejected. There's nothing else I can do.
16
@Hal
Thanks for your efforts. This should be a NYT pick.
5
You lefties who continually lean on it’s the lack of money and affluence and tutors that keeps black kids from succeeding wake up go to china town. See how the lack of wealth and pristine living conditions and add to that huge language and cultural barriers keeps Asians from succeeding in school. ....It doesn’t. They choose books over Jordan’s and choose home cooked noodles and rice over McDonalds and Cokes. They choose to make their children’s life better through education hard work and sacrifice. Yes call it a simplistic and possibly even racist argument but that doesn’t make it false. Why do liberals treat and class Asians as if they aren’t a minority with the same or even higher hurdles than blacks. Is it because their choices and outcomes are so stark in comparison to blacks in the same circumstances and would not fit the current memes of the politically correct universe.
25
If admission is solely based on scoring high enough on an entrance exam as the article suggests, then acceptance to these schools is not "offered" it is "earned"
18
It seems like a cultural issue to me. Skin color does not mean anything about one’s inherent academic abilities. Many Asian families take pride in hard work and studying. Many black families do not.
6
There are thousands of Asian kids who also don’t get into Stuyvesant. Are they being discriminated against? Don’t be ridiculous.
7
Terrible reporting. It appears to me that Mayor de Blasio and Chancellor Carranza are gaming the statistics in order to draw public condemnation, even though these are far from the actual final numbers. Sadly, the New York Times seems to be playing right into their hands.
In fact, the Department of Education is setting aside a growing number of entry spots for children of color to enter Bronx Science and Stuyvesant Fall 2019 via the Discovery Program, aiming at 20% of all seats for Fall 2020.
Those seats will be announced in a month and presumably be active for this Fall. (And ten percent of the seats at Bronx Science would be roughly another 80 children. The DoE announced 12 black students for this fall.)
By announcing a very low number right now, to great press/condemnation, then growing the number later, the Mayor and Chancellor seem to be working to build hatred for the SHSAT entrance examination, which they have been fighting for a few years now.
12
@Ben Brilliant post... that never occurred to me but you are probably right.
2
It's typical for politicians to attack good schools since it's easier than building up worse schools and as a bonus you can benefit from antipathy against the wealthy.
The result is that the good schools are made worse overall, the wealthy shift to other schools, and the groups that the measure was supposed to help aren't left in a measurably better position.
If the goal is to reduce inequality, it's at best useless, at worse directly counterproductive.
2
I'll bet AOC would have a definitive position in this if NYC was a conservative town!!!
1
I am a Black American and I graduated from Brooklyn Tech in 1996. When I was going to Brooklyn Tech, I had many classmates that were Black. In this sense, I was not a rare individual. According to the statistics I see now, about 1 in every 19 students entering Tech is Black. That would mean, on average, 1 or 2 black students per class. That was not my experience at all back in the 90's. I would request that the Times investigate what has changed. It almost feels like an extension of gentrification. Why has the number of Black students declined so much?
I think we, as a society, need to start reconsidering what we value and celebrate. The powers-that-be have created the rules, and created a society in their own image. They set the standards and dictate what is seen as valuable and what is not. The European mind has created these societal structures. It only makes sense that the rules they create will play to their strengths. Although I do find it amusing that the Asians are beating them at their own game- the meritocratic game. And still, in Western society, Asians are an underclass. What does that say?
What I propose, ultimately, is a diversification of what we consider valuable. Do we want to create a society of robots that are really good at memorizing and regurgitating the information that is being fed to them? Who does that benefit? Of course, it benefits those who already have power- those who want to maintain the status quo.
3
@Derek B, yes, the “European mind has created these societal structures. It only makes sense that the rules they create will play to their strengths.” Are you implying that African Americans do not have the same strengths as Europeans? That their minds are inherently different?
You want to diversify what we consider valuable. Well, we do. We have performing arts schools, we have athletics, we have humanities oriented schools. What this particular school is designed to do is to provide a superior science education. And that means taking a test that demonstrates whether you are ready to perform at the highest level in that particular area. Changing that would completely change the school. Then attending would be less prestigious and no one would care what the racial make up was.
4
@Derek B Asian Americans are the highest earning and most highly educated racial group in America, and this becomes even more pronounced if you look at specific ethnic groups like Koreans and Chinese. Asians in America are not an underclass by any stretch of the imagination. China and Korea have had systems of standardized testing for thousands of years, so there is nothing specifically European about the current system.
4
And if after this change there is still so many Asians doing so well, Deblasio will propose another change. He will not stop until there is an equal number of all races in all schools. That, my friend, is his definition of equity. How dare Asians do so well when they’re the newcomer.
10
NYT, stop pretending that Asian Americans are not also a minority group and pushing them to vote for Trump with articles like this! It’s bad enough New York now has a mayor who only likes to address the shiny object (i.e. disparity in education outcomes like high school admission) rather than doing the hard work (i.e. education input like improving K-8 and public schools). I’m glad the Asian American community has some political representation within the Democratic Party in New York and can voice their position in the process. I can only imagine how, in many parts of this country, they flee only too quickly to the GOP for reasons exactly like this.
13
This is an issue of access to intensive test prep. For most kids, passing the SHSAT is a matter of learning how to master it. I do not buy for one minute that only 7 black students in the entire NYC Public school system are bright enough to attend Stuy and succeed. For those who say "there's free test prep!" "They can use Kaplan books!" this is not remotely the same as spending months (and in some cases YEARS) in expensive classes with tutors who understand the system. The FREE PROGRAMS offered by the DOE are a joke, as the Times reported in the last year. A few weeks with a disinterested instructor is not helpful.
In debating the merits of keeping the status quo, I have heard supposedly liberal, progressive parents says "You know, parents have to make a choice between buying their kids expensive sneakers or paying for test prep." So you know, maybe there should be a two tier scoring system with a slightly lower cutoff for kids who haven't been prepped. I find this whole situation outrageous. We're punishing some very worthy kids because their parents can't or won't pay for test prep or don't even know exist.
We see the same paradigm play out in the application process to elite universities. Ironically, the same white parents who are screaming about keeping status quo on the SHSAT because it does a disservice to Asian kids who have earned their spots are the same people who scream that Asians are over represented in elite universities. Pick a lane.
2
This is criminal. The homeless chess champion is just the tip of the iceberg of potential NYC is squandering.
1
This is absurd and pathetic. One thing missing is the perspective of black students and parents in this debate. I’m sure there is a lot of soul searching on why their kids are so far behind they’ll never come remotely close to parity. Everyone is saying that these kids don’t work as hard or care about education as much. That is grossly inaccurate but people are comfortable buying into that. So only 7 black kids in all of NYC care about education enough to get into Stuyvesant? Really? Look at all the videos of teachers denigrating and abusing black students, and how biased school discipline is. This does go beyond testing because certain students, regardless of income, are considered more worthy of investment and resources because they’re considered less troublesome while others are deemed not interested in education so why bother. These numbers show the institutional inequity of the system and goes beyond individual students not being good enough or testing well. As we’ve seen in the past week, tests can be gamed and scores raised, so.There isn’t enough outreach and test prep emphasis. What type of school system is built around not increasing access for black and Hispanic because it’s upsetting Asian parents? Why is this being framed this way to put people against each other and make people the villain for pushing for more access and equity.
2
I don’t recall anyone questioning the legitimacy of these tests or accusing them of being racist when poor Asians had to face them? It’s only after reality hits that people realize that some groups clearly place more value and limited resources into meeting a high standard. Asians are not smarter or superior to anyone, but with our lack of resources and political/social strength, we only have education to help us.
Being poor and a low income minority didn’t stop Asians from meeting the challenge and maybe that’s the problem. And now de Blasio wants to throw Asians under the bus to make the evidence fit his conclusion.
10
DNA discoverer, James Watson lost his professional standing and his reputation for suggesting that, to the extent that intelligence related to academic achievement is a heritable trait subject to the laws of natural selection, there would be small variations among people groups based on long term local survival factors. The much maligned "Bell Curve" purported to map precisely this variation between people groups using available test instruments and displays very similar outcomes to the admission test results graphed in this article. If a test instrument is designed to single out the top 5 percent of an academic population for special treatment and the various people groups within that population vary by 5 percent or so, then you get exactly the results shown. Of course the test instruments are flawed, culturally skewed to a western European worldview and values, and poorly correlated to multivalent intelligence factors. Still, they represent the academic selection process that has been the norm in the U.S for the past 100 years.
4
"At Stuyvesant High School, out of 895 slots in the freshman class, only seven were offered to black students."
I am amazed at how many commenters don't start with this fact and say for this outcome to have occurred the system must be fundamentally broken. It's not the exam, it's not the kids, it's not their parents, it's the system that produced these results and it's the system that needs to be fundamentally overhauled. This will take money, time, and most importantly people with imagination and vision.
6
As someone not immersed in NYC schools, can anyone tell me if there is, as the article seems to imply, one exam for all eight of these specialized schools? Some seem to be STEM schools (those most discussed it the article), some humanities, some arts. It wouldn't seem that one exam would optimally identify the best candidates for all these schools.
1
There are different cutoffs for all the schools but the same exam. It’s worked and been fair for very long.
1
@LJ Stuy grad here. One exam for all eight schools. When you take the test, you rank the schools you are interested in (you don't have to rank every school). If you miss the cutoff for your first choice school, you'll be considered for your second choice, and so on. So someone who is singularly interested in the humanities could opt for a school like Brooklyn Latin and no other schools. With that being said, despite being a STEM-focused school, Stuy's humanities courses were top-notch, as I'm sure is the case at the other specialized high schools as well.
2
If students can't meet the standards set, the pressure should be to help future students reach those standards, not lower the standards instead.
9
Those eight black students can hold their heads up high. I salute them.
17
Asia is a continent. It's time you broke down what regions or countries they come from. A Vietnamese American has very different circumstances from Chinese, Japanese or Korean Americans. Have you been to these countries and seen the disparities in development of these countries? In addition, is a Russian or middle eastern person Asian? Yes, but they come from drastically different cultures and socioeconomic backgrounds.
7
The real problem here is the poor grammar school education provided in NYC in black and latino neighborhoods. This administration should be focused on providing a quality education throughout the city.
6
@anonymous
But no educational reform will work if a significant number of kids in the school come from homes and communities that don't have cultures that value academic achievement and intellectual rigor.
4
Admission is based entirely on merit. As it should be. Otherwise we'll get the Deblasio version of the college admissions scandal we are all reading about. There is nothing more equal or fair than admissions based on hard work.
10
So lets ignore the fact that the entrance is based on your test scores and has nothing to do with race. No student should get passed on the chance to go to one of these schools so that another with lower scores can due to race. But unfortunately that is the thinking of the Liberal Idiots in office. My sister went to Stuyvesant and I got accepted but Went to Xavier Freshman year and then transferred to Brooklyn College Special Program Sophomore year as it had more advanced Science programs
7
I see the only solution as being to completely repurpose these schools along with Bard, Millienium, NEST, and Beacon as regular public high schools and disperse the students and faculty throughout the public system. My son has had an education for the past 6 years at socially and educationally diverse schools-Park Slope Collegiate and Murrow High School and I don't believe it has hampered his collegiate or professional prospects in the slightest and he has the enormous benefit of his exposure to many different types of kids. The creation of elite schools is clearly to please parents not for benefit of the kids. Will it cause challenges for some of these students and teachers at the elite schools to be at normal schools? Maybe, but hey, welcome to the real world.
1
They are elite schools if only one black earned their way in and no whites would you write a different headline. I don’t think so. Why is it so abhorrent to the left that some things in life can be based on merit not skin color. Here is a simple fix that no one on the left ever considers make a thousand elite schools. And maybe in that last one you will run out of truly qualified students and you can cram all the almost qualified blacks whites and other non Asians into it. Then they could feel good about getting C,s at an “elite” school.
3
The Mayor should look at middle schools and parental involvement. Hold their principals responsible for getting more black students accepted.
3
How is it merit-based when people are coming from different backgrounds, some from ghettos with violence, without parents, with drugs, parents without jobs etc, while others come from wealthy ones with all manner of amenities?? How is that merit-based? How are those kids all expected to pass that “test?” These “tests” are merely gimmicks to exclude black people from these schools, because black peoples neighborhoods are not going to change any time soon, so they’ll never be able to catch up to these “tests!” These tests are, ironically, literally “literally tests” to exclude black people just as in the south after the civil war!! It’s never going to change without affirmative action or direct integration, because the neighborhoods and jobs and violence and drugs are not going to change any time soon! So, it’s not fair to expect poor black people to somehow do well on these tests!! It’s simply a trap to make black people and white people think that there is “merit” to the system, when all it is is just plain old racism!! It’s just an old racist system cleverly mascarading for the 21st century as a merit-based system! You cannot have a true merit system when some people are coming from ghettos!! Anybody who claims to have a merit system in such an environment is merely mocking poor people!!! You can’t have some kids in great green neighborhoods with arts and libraries etc, and others in ghettos and say both are the same!
@Frea "Others come from wealthy ones with all manner of amenities?"
This is not the case for Stuyvesant students at all. A huge portion of the population (one where white people are in the minority) is poor. Not defending this system, but this is highly inaccurate.
8
You're probably right about the lack of a level playing field, at least the extremely unequal distribution of advantages and disadvantages. While I don't so readily agree that it's a deliberate conspiracy against black people, the outcomes are similar to what they would be in such a case.
I hate to say it, but, on the assumption that admission is to be competitive, probably the only solution is to place a grid (like transparent graph paper) over a map of the city. Then select the highest performing student (according to whatever criteria you decide to use) from each box. Won't be perfect, but it's as close as you will come.
@Frea Are you saying the system is rigged in favor of Asians?
2
Asian families, especially Chinese and Koreans, typically raise their children in ways that would be considered extreme by most other ethnic groups. Walk through any Chinese neighborhood in NYC and you will notice "learning centers", which are basically Saturday schools for test prep and academics in general. Many of these students spend every Saturday and summer vacation at these centers, not only preparing for the SAT and the SHSAT but also as extra re-enforcement for regular k-12 schooling. These are not rich neighborhoods, and the students typically range from middle to working class backgrounds. Forcing their children to spend every Saturday at school is not something that most parents can or will do if they don't belong to such a culture. So of course kids who spend half their lives preparing for these tests are going to do better in them than everyone else. Why is this a problem? I personally don't think that going to an elite high school has any moral worth attached to it. Going to Stuyvesant doesn't mean you're a better person, and it's certainly not the only path to a meaningful and successful life, but if that's what you want for your kids and they put in the work, they deserve the spots, not people who didn't do the work. If individual Black or Hispanic families want this for their kids, the article mentions that there is free test prep available, in addition to the learning centers which are not that expensive and are fully open to non-Chinese students.
17
I'm not sure people have any understanding how rigourous this education is coming out of Science, Tech and Stuy. Very few in the city can actually handle the academic stress of it. Its way beyond what most people get in Under Graduate School. Way beyond. So its simply not fair to have anything but the brightest kids in NYC attend. So it doesn't hold anyone back. Admitting marginal students of any background or color is a huge detriment to those who made it in on merit.
12
@Jim
I went to Bx Science. College was *easy"* compared to high school and I got an engineering degree!
7
Why are Asians prohibitively outperforming Hispanics?
6
I went to a high school in TX that had similar demographics to Stuy -- 50%+ Asian, and the non-Asian students were also immigrants or children of immigrants from Russia, Nigeria, Lebanon, Poland, and other countries with a strong focus on education. The entrance exam was the easy part. If you can't pass that, you were never going to pass your classes.
I think the most important question here is not really about race, but why are children of immigrants outperforming multi-generational American-born (black, white, whatever) kids by leaps and bounds? What's broken in American culture and the American education system that leads other countries to do so much better than us? Whatever the answer may be, I can guarantee it doesn't involve easing our standards.
13
Social engineering at its best. Then we ask our self about the social determinants that exacerbate health, economic disparities. All because of the lack of access in historically disadvantaged populations in the city.
2
Open admissions was tried in the past. It was a dismal failure, Let's try it again, maybe the results will be different this time.
3
The Specialized High Schools are reproducing racial inequality in New York City and should be shut down if this problem is not fixed immediately. The students, their families, communities, and allies should take them over physically and refuse to leave until the city and state make the reforms necessary to ensure justice in access to education.
There are plenty of Black and Latino students in NYC capable of the most rigorous academic work. That they are outscored on the SHSAT does not prove otherwise. A distribution of half of admissions to the top performing students in de facto economically and racially segregated middle schools would produce a much more diverse student body which would in turn produce a much more rounded educational experience for all of the students at the Specialized High Schools.
The intransigent insistence on the present system of admissions as if it is sacred is nothing more nor less than the self-interested defense of privilege.
I say this as the parent of a white child who qualified to attend Brooklyn Tech.
1
I send my kids to private school and pay a fortune. They get a spectacular education and, more importantly, are good young people. If you don't pay tuition you should be entitled to nothing more than a basic education. Its time everyone learned that nothing good in life comes for free.
6
@Christopher Take it from someone who went to Tech. If a kid cannot make the admissions threshold on the test, they should not attend. They will be miserable with the amount of work expected, the level of work, and the content. I would prefer to see the level of all NYC schools elevated so that more students could qualify.
8
@Christopher
"The intransigent insistence on the present system of admissions as if it is sacred is nothing more nor less than the self-interested defense of privilege."
Judging by the student population, you're fighting against "Asian privilege" then, right? Didn't know that was *a thing.*
6
Here's a novel idea: study harder. Or how about offering kids the tools and studies they need to improve themselves? And how about getting the parents on board too. You don't dilute a test or schools for exceptional students, and expect that school to remain exceptional. Life doesn't work that way. This is a challenge for kids of all races to learn to compete. That's the way to success, not the DeBlasio way.
15
First and foremost, congratulations to these gifted and studious african-american teens! This is a spectacular accomplishment that we should celebrate while it still means something. Many of these kids beat long odds to get there. Others, maybe less so. But regardless, this is what makes America great.
And to all those who applied and failed--keep it up, and your day will come. That's what makes America great too. Meanwhile, you'll have to ignore occasional NYT articles whose primary takeaway is "statistically speaking, black students can't achieve at these levels." Well, statistically speaking, white and asian and latino kids can't either. It's a very tough test!
Given all the other variables at play (home situation, health, language, employment, income, gpa, other activities, etc.), I question why we have to put race front and center in every one of these analyses. These aren't exactly controlled experiments.
Congratulations again to the kids.
9
There are many ways to provide additional assistance to students to help them with their basic Math and language skills, but they have to be motivated to learn, and practice, practice, practice, and a willingness to backtrack and relearn the materials that students have not yet mastered.
Besides devoting more resources to improve the rest of the public school system, NYC should consider programs that would change the focus and priorities of students that are under-represented. Students who want to get into these special public schools have to be willing to spend the time and effort to study. While one can attribute that to some extent to the lack of resources and information, it is also the case that many professional and financial successful African Americans achieve in areas not generally associated with academic success or because they are proficient in math and English.
But not every one can become the next Oprah, Jay Z , Michael Jordan or Beyonce, and introducing other successful role models in businesses and the sciences at an early age may encourage young students to focus their energies on academics.
3
Not surprising and nothing new. The agenda of white supremacy continues and now includes Asians
4
I have never understood why diversity in and of itself should be a higher priority than admission based upon merit which is apparently the rule in these schools now. The entire country prospers when the best and the brightest are educated together. When diversity is sought independent of ability, the curriculum is inevitably watered down and the brightest students suffer in the long run. I give New York credit for resisting this change.
23
The article doesn't make clear that the specialized schools have different cut-off scores for admission. You need a much higher score to get into Stuyvesant than to get into Brooklyn Tech. It would be interesting to see the breakdown of the scores by race.
5
The debate on this issue tends to blur together a number of separate issues, which may be better examined individually:
1. Should the city have a system of elite high schools, intended to separate out the best and brightest and provide them with a more rigorous and challenging education, better suited to their academic abilities?
2. If so, is that system seeking the brightest students, the best prepared students, or some combination of the two?
3. Is the test that is currently used the best way to identify those students?
4. Is any alternative proposed a better way to identify them?
5. Are there underlying problems with the lower schools that leave otherwise capable students unprepared for the rigors of the specialized schools, and how should those problems be addressed?
6
This article does not provide enough information to draw a meaningful conclusion about the headline result. We are told that 7 black students were given offers to Suyvesant, but out of how many exam takers? If the percentage of black test takers is similar to that of whites and Asians, then the solution is getting more black students to take the test, not scrapping the test. Other articles have cited the cost of test prep [which somehow low income Asian families seem to be able to handle], and the article states free test prep was expanded. But there are no data on how many black students participated in the test prep, nor is there any information on what steps the city took to ensure that black families knew about this opportunity. It absolutely is horrible that only 7 black students were offered admission to Stuyvesant, but the response should be a thoughtful, comprehensive review of the factors contributing to this outcome that makes use of data, not opinion. Instead, Mayor de Blasio and others have seized on one simple target, the SHSAT, without even discussing other factors and taken a kneejerk response of eliminating it.
6
Sorry, it's not eliminating the test, or watering it down. It's not about admitting Black (and Hispanic) students, who are ill prepared. It's about improving education and social conditions in poor black neighborhoods. (One does wonder why middle class blacks and Hispanics, who go to good schools, and have solid, professional parents, are not admitted.) If we can't get our act together to offer top notch education, counseling, and challenging after-school activities to kids in poor neighborhoods with failing schools, then the onus is on our government and morally abhorrent lack of public support for failing schools. We need to support dysfunctional families, as well. The issue of Asian students is a dilemma. More than any other ethnic group, Asians stress education above all. Children are rigorously encouraged, tutored, and exceptionally prepared to get into exceptional schools. This cultural characteristic favors Asian students. Risking lawsuits from Asian parents, we cannot allow these cultural characteristics to dominate opportunity for ALL our students.
3
We should want more diversity at these schools; it would be better for all. So how about offering free exam prep and materials to the 20 percent who are on the cusp of entry but are underrepresented. Parents should be notified that their child is on the cusp and their participation matters for gigantic future rewards.
3
Why should we want more diversity just for the sake of diversity? These schools have a curriculum. The exam measures a child's ability to excel at the curriculum. You do well in the exam you get a seat in one of the specialized schools. You don't, then you go to a regular public school and have the opportunity to shine there. If you scrap the test then you have to change the curriculum so that the more diverse student body doesn't fail out.
9
@BG
As a professor, I can tell you the diversity you want and the diversity you get are two different things.
Students who are not ready for the material struggle and suffer. It's demoralizing for them and for me to watch them fail.
You can offer all the test prep you want. The problem starts in the home long before they get to high school.
8
We should demand more resources channeled towards k-8, universally across the city. This will ensure more students from underrepresented groups will do well when it comes time to sit for the SHSAT. On a side note, no mention of Success Academy in this article, and how a vast majority of Success students are black/Latino.
2
This is a terrible indictment of the awful elementary school system run by NYC. Especially when it comes to minorities, the number of students who don't reach their class level of reading and math is at a third world level. The problem is not the selectivity of Stuyvesant, the problem is that the public schools can't educate minority students properly. Given the amount spent per student, money is not the issue. A total lack of leadership and a pretty mediocre bunch of teachers is the problem.
9
No time for the ‘Blame Game’. The selective test is objective as it should be — study hard, do homework and thrive — just like the real world. We spend more on education in the NYS and NYC than anywhere else in the world. It is free and open to all. It is a family and personal choice to take full advantage of it. Millions of immigrant groups have come here, most with zero English language skills and make it. Look no further than at the number of minorities, mostly Asian in the selective schools, almost all from disadvantaged backgrounds. Requires focus, effect and most importantly parents who keep their kids in the game. You can blow off school, make excuses and live with consequences, personal decision. Overall society is not responsible for raising children, parents are.
19
You and your family value eduction and its a way of life. Instead of TV you read. Your family must also encourage you and allow space to learn. Its not a question of race or economics its a desire to become better, to value learning. Yes, poorer areas lack these values often and it makes it more difficult. If anyone , regardless of race or economics passes the tests they are included. The schools they attend must have the same opportunities to learn but it really is a personal choice to succeed.
6
It isn't solely a personality choice. If your parents don't read to you and don't encourage academic persuits, you are significantly less likely to read instead of watch TV, study hard, etc. You can't tell 5 year-olds to pick themselves up by their bootstraps and expect it to work. To effect significant change you have to address the whole system.
Why do "low income" Asian students get accepted and not others? Who's "fault" is it that Black students are not making the grade? This is not an issue of diversity or integration. It is whether hard work will be rewarded.
28
How do charter schools play into this? Why aren't they sending more kids to specialized high schools?
2
To fix this problem, start with some attitudes in the black community. When studying and doing well in school is disparaged as "acting white" we shouldn't be surprised at these results.
28
". . . seven were offered to black students." Offered? Those students earned their entry. By using the word 'offered', the writer is making it sound like Stuyvesant was doing those kids a favor. Those students did themselves a favor.
12
If a student did not sit for the exam then he/she should not complain about the exam results.
That is, the really basic question is why did Hispanics and Blacks chose NOT to take the exam? The fact that 70% of all students in NY City are Black/Hispanic raises questions. The article does not say the total number of Hispanic students who took the exam. If I assume an equal number of Black and Hispanic, then (2*5500)/27500=40% of the exam population were Black or Hispanic. What happened to the other 30%.
Should the exam be required for all students? and given on a class day? not on a Saturday?
From an editorial standpoint, why is black is not capitalized, but Hispanic is in this article?
5
Don’t all students have to take state exam tests so why isn’t this required for all students? Why didn’t they take the test and why isn’t it offered during the school day? Who just missed the cutoff and how is it decided? There should be more deep digging on this subject.
Why is American liberalism and progressives so enthralled with mediocrity. I realize meritocracy is not as fair as it used to be but mediocrity is not what made America the place everyone wanted to get into. Good work mayor start with the education system and our children and make everything gray.
5
From the look of this photo it also seems the school is lacking in female students.....but I guess that's a discussion for another day.
3
Arguably, Erasmus, Lincoln, Madison, and New Utrecht in Brooklyn, all historically neighborhood high schools, have had many more people of accomplishment, including nine Nobel laureates among their alumni than the three darlings, Science, Stuyvesant, and Tech, combined! Try to figure out why?!!!
4
Why strip minority high schools of their best students to send them to one of the 8 selectives? Who will be the leaders? Why would a black want to be in the 'bottom' of Stuyvesant's class and be treated like an inferior for four years? The data says those kids do terrible in the college entrance game. Let them be stars at their schools, and graduate in the top ten percent of their class. That is how you go to college with 'swag.' Bill would be better off helping elite kids at the tough schools improve their scores and counseling. Shoe-horning them into places with phoney entrance metrics like the SHSAT makes no sense; no sense for the kids, no sense for their schools, and no sense for their communities stipped of their best talent to achieve some nebulous integration goal.
3
The only moral approach to rationing access to these public schools is the meritocratic approach, which does not have to consist solely of testing, but must include it. Lower form grades can be inflated, recommendations can be solicited, bribes can be offered, politicians can be bought. Ultimately the fairest selection is the one least susceptible to outside influences and is most predictive of ability to thrive in an accelerated program. That is not to say testing is completely fair in every circumstance, it is just the fairest of the alternatives. The testing should be done without accommodations, with proctors and verifiable identification.
I condemn wealthy parents who purchase slots and bribe officials and institutions. I also condemn those who would set racial quotas for admission. Finally, I condemn the parents and educators at pipeline schools for the abysmal performance of black students.
The graphs show the results at a dozen schools with varied curricula. It is astounding that blacks and Latino students are so unsuccessful. Latino families may have language problems, but American blacks have been in this country from the earliest days. The fact that Asian students do so well tells me that individual effort and familial support are critical. It is sad that other students do not have that drive or that support. But that lack is not the fault of the School System nor can it be rectified by admission to an elite school; where the unprepared student will fail.
3
Why can't the NY Public Schools do a better job
of educating all the students ?
7
The solution may be to privatize these selective schools and let the parents pay tuition to attend. Why should the taxes paid by Latino and African-American parents go to these schools if their children don't benefit of having a fair and equitable access ? Perhaps their taxes should go towards improving the quality of the other NYC public schools which are open to all.
2
@NJ observer
Then by your logic, why should anyone not white and hispanic pay any taxes towards a public school system that is 70% black and hispanic? I'm not going down that path and neither should you?
There is equitable access -- it's called a test. That's the way these schools always were.
5
Because the acceptance across races is obviously skewed then it appears that the admissions are racially biased, but they are not - the test is the same for everybody. There are no questions on the test that Asians just by the reason of their race should be expected to answer better than others. And there is no reason to believe that the black kids are stupid. But they are obviously far less prepared for this test. The bias against them is not in the test but in the preparation for it, in their school years before the test. That needs to be addressed to change outcomes. Eliminating the test could also change outcomes, at the price of lowering the admission standards to the current levels of preparedness by the average black NYC middle school kid, instead of rising that levels to the current admission standards. It is a cheaper fix that will just end up pushing white and Asian kids into private schools. DeBlasio may inadvertently play into DeVos hands. Why are the ordinary public schools in the city so under-resourced? My son (who is at Brooklyn Tech now) briefly went to a school that would be zoned to him based on our address. Compared to the school he attended in rural Vermont before that, that school was a dump: 80% of kids did not meet state targets for math and language, half were in ESL, school was understaffed, there were no programs like robotics, or orchestra, things we took for granted in VT, no sports, a concrete backyard with broken hoops, really depressing.
4
Here's a passage from an article about education in a certain country. Guess the country.
"As high schoolers near their graduation, it's common for them to get only 4 or 5 hours of sleep per night because of their rigorous schedules. After going to school from the normal hours of around 8am-4pm, students typically go home for a quick meal only to leave for night classes at a private school. When the day is over, they return home well after midnight before rising again early in the morning to start the new day."
Did you guess the country? Answer in next passage:
There is a saying in South Korea that "If you sleep three hours a night, you may get into a top 'SKY university; if you sleep four hours each night, you may get into another university; if you sleep five or more hours each night, especially in your last year of high school, forget about getting into any university."
Even in South Korea a lot of people think that it's crazy for kids to have to study so hard, and they have laws about how long the private school "hagwons" can stay open at night. But the hagwons cheat by covering their windows so that outsiders can't see that they're staying open longer than the legal limit.
That's the culture that a lot of our Asian immigrants are bringing with them.
6
I'm still annoyed about the A1 story "Virginia’s Racist History Clashes With New South Image". Can you imagine if this were NC or VA--the NYTimes would be so far up its high horse... I feel like, in fairness, this article should have been titled "NY's Progressive Image Clashes With Insidious Systemic Racism."
Less than 1%? Seriously? Please--before you start throwing shade on the south with stories like the one referenced above, let's acknowledge that at least southerners are grappling with the issues. Here, four out of the five "NYTimes Picks" for responses are folks saying "there's a problem, but don't get rid of the entrance exam". I read this as "oh, I feel bad and someone must do something, but I vote for nothing substantial; my group's unaffected..."
Liberal elitism at it finest, and a big part of what divides us. Charlottesville, whose gifted education system the NYTimes also critically highlighted, has begun to grapple with that issue head on (https://www.dailyprogress.com/news/education/paradigm-shift-sought-to-address-disparities-in-gifted-learning/article_396d4fdc-37b0-11e9-b230-1b95a49c2b8a.html) and they had much better representation than Stuyvesant to start.
Here's your chance, NY. Will your response to the issues you raise about yourself measure up to how others have responded when you raise issues about them?
If not, the editorial staff really needs to take a look at how they cover states that are grappling with issues. Especially in front page stories.
4
After all these years of Head Start designed to promote school readiness, are we to understand that the time, effort and money -- lots and lots of money -- has been wasted? Has it all been a sham, a scam, a pipe dream?
But the elite schools will go down the tubes. No surprise here. Follows naturally after the scuttling of the NYS literacy test for aspiring teachers after it was pointed out that black and Hispanics were failing at much higher rates that whites and Asian-Americans.
Can't have smart people running things. Too unfair.
6
The wording in the Times article "...The question of how to racially integrate the city’s elite high schools underscores how hard it is to tackle educational inequality and discrimination.." shows exactly why integration is so difficult. It is not about "educational inequality and discrimination." It is about Hispanic and Black students inability to pass high enough on the exam, period. Many whites have not passed the test either.
4
Those in favor of racial quotas or dumbing down the admissions tests are suffering from the "Harrison Bergeron" delusion. Based on a dystopian short story by Kurt Vonnegut, it illustrates the utter folly of orchestrating the equality of outcomes over the equality of opportunity. If Science and Stuyvesant admit dozens of under-qualified blacks and Latinos, truly qualified Asians and whites will leave in droves and find or establish other Sciences and Stuyvesants by another name. It will take some time, but it will inevitably occur.
I guess the point of all the statistics in this article is to shock the conscience. If you really want to be shocked, take note of the fact that Bronx Science has produced more Nobel Science laureates than all of the blacks and Muslims that the world have ever produced. (The score is 8-3, and all of the Bronx Science winners were Jewish.)
10
A plethora of test prep available on every ordinary smart phone.
5
Minorities are angry because they're not getting what others have, which is access to an elite NY public school and a better chance at life thereafter. I get that, I would feel the same in their shoes. The mayor is happy to add fuel to the fire in order to gain political support from Blacks and Hispanics at the cost of losing Asians with little political clout. And who can argue against the unfairness of only 7 African American kids out of 895 total student enrollment.
But another way of saying that these elite schools are so much better than the remaining NY public high schools is to say that the remaining schools are so much worst that these elite schools. We can undo the history and quality of these schools or build up the quality of the other schools. Both will offer greater equality. The first is easy and quick and will make a few schools worse. The second takes much more time and money and make the entire system better.
The entrance exams are demographically unfair, but they are appropriate. They measure a student's potential success at a competitive academic environment regardless of race. At worst, they measure a student's preparedness to pass the exam regardless of race.
Are your children willing to sacrifice mall, TV, and play time to study? Are you as parents willing to sacrifice vacations, eating out, or spend more money for less housing to get into a good school district and pay for prep classes? Most Asian families answer "Yes!"
6
I would imagine that the small number of Black students who gained admittance to the elite schools in New York City take pride in their accomplishment. I'm not sure that will be the case if the mayor establishes a quota or set asides for Black students. This reminds me of the impetus a few years back to do away with blind auditions for African American musicians.
7
To do away with the entrance exam at Stuyvesant is against the National Interest of the US that is in a winner take all competition with China on Science and Technology
That China is winning. See for yourself
https://www.economist.com/sites/default/files/imagecache/640-width/images/print-edition/20181117_CNC757_0.png
Go on to dismantle merit based education in the US if
you want the US to lose the competition with China,
The PRAC is already leading in A.I and quantum based communication, and has a well though out plan to overtake the US in science by 2025.
6
And one more comment:
The consensus is that the SHSAT exam is unfair because wealthier families can afford the costly and frankly esoteric test prep. (Why don't you have a go at a scrambled paragraph!) But let's look at the socio-economic background of the applicants vs. admitted instead of just race. I have a hard time believing that the vast majority of the 66% Asians admitted to Stuyvesant could afford that test prep. We need to look at the other environmental factors that can lead to the imbalance. And how about curbing the regrowth segregated schools -- otherwise known as charter schools. I'd like to see the SHSAT results of their students as opposed to the real public schools and finally burst that bubble.
1
@Dennis you are out of date. Most material that was not covered in school curriculum has been removed from the test, intended to make the test more accessible to students who did not do much outside preparation. There were no "scrambled paragraphs" this year.
2
The student mix looks quite diverse in the graphs embedded in the article -there are many Asians ...even more than white students in some cases. (And "Asian" itself represents dramatic ethnic and cultural diversity: Think of a Pakistani Muslim student versus an atheist student from mainland China. )
7
Why not just increase the size of the freshman class, so there is no fall off in the number of kids from any other group, but there is space for more African-American and Hispanic students? I'm sure there are more qualified students then there are slots. (Ivy league admissions directors will tell you they could create six or more freshman classes from the pool of qualified applicants.)
1
I noticed staten island tech admitted 1 black student. so I looked up staten island demographics. 10% black. 304 kids admitted. so they needed to admit 2 more to reflect their demographic. another misleading NYT article? elite schools are for the elite student. if non elite students are admitted to "diversify" the school and education standards need to be lowered to accommodate non-elite students, then the school is no longer an elite school. admissions should be blind as to race and gender. no boxes to check off. just an application with a number and a test score. THEN, mr. diblasio needs to FIX the NYC school and education system so everyone is capable of competing for entrance into the "elite" school. that will take time and effort. is mr. diblasio up to the task?
4
Of the fifteen students in the cover photo, only two are grils. Is there a gender issue going on here we should know about as well?
2
@Sandi
No gender issue, like 55:45 ish...more boys though, but not much difference.
1
Instead of focusing on how few black and Hispanic students got into the selective high schools, how about focusing on how few black or Hispanic students were prepared or qualified to get into those schools? Are their elementary or middle schools inferior to the Asians? If so, fix them. If not, then deBlasio is looking at the wrong problem.
5
The intent of the school is to find the most academically gifted students and they are succeeding at that - so why is the system broken? Because politicians have racial quotas?
To those who say the test is a biased filter - THATS EXACTLY WHAT A TEST IS - a filter biased toward those who learn the material.
10
This is not an exam and race issue but a family issue. If education and support is not stressed in the home, it won't happen in school. Years and years of failed experiments are there to see. From the ruining of City College when the doors were opened to all, to the closure of high schools due to poor graduation rates in black communities. it is a frank assessment of what happens when education is not valued in the home. Where is the black leadership on this issue other than saying eliminate the obstacle by abolishing the exam?
7
It is quite amazing that low-income people-of-color, many of them from immigrant families, have achieved this kind of success in nyc public education. Maybe the city would be wise to study the Asian communities from which these students have come. Let's learn more about how their communities, schools, families etc. all helped and see if there are some things the rest of us could learn. Instead, Diblasio and the NY Times, act as though they are blind, feeling around in the dark and all they can fixate on is that the test has to be the problem. It should not be so difficult to identify some factors here that are responsible for the astonishing success of the Asian students. Can those factors be implemented in other communities of color - particlarly amongs African-American and Latino communities? Maybe. But the first step is to study, indentify, and implement -maybe start with a particular school zone or small number of schools. Track progress closely, identify barriers. BAsically, do the hard work of social policy and develop some solutions that don't rely dumbing-down education or finger-pointing at Asian-American families.
10
I am black, and I say leave the test alone.
I don't live in New York and didn't grow up there so maybe I am outside my lane in speaking on this subject. But where I did grow up, there was a pretty significant and pretty consistent under achievement by just about every black student. I was one of them. Liberals are quick to point to poverty or under resourced schools as a cause, and I am sure there is much truth to the fact that resources follow white kids and that this fact locks in educational disparities. Still, I believe the biggest cause by far is cultural. I grew up with two parents in my household. Both my parents went to college. My family was pretty solidly middle class. I (and most of my middle class black friends) simply did not see academic excellence as 'black'. Now don't get me wrong; we did enough to pass. We wanted to go to college. We didn't want to be seen as dumb. But there was a casual acceptance of academic mediocrity in most of us. And to be honest, our parents didn't really embrace intellectualism either. There was a mentality of distrust of eggheaded intellectuals, an ingrained sense that white people were deficient somehow because they wanted to analyze everything. If I had a dollar for every time I was told by an adult that 'common sense' was superior to book sense (as if one could not have both), I would be rich. Culture is key, but nobody wants to own that.
44
@Chris
I agree. Culture is key. Some Asian American cultures make education paramount; hence their educational success. Some of black culture undervalues, opposes, or even actively undermines education. The idea of multiculturalism is a big part of the problem. Our liberal culture has uncritically embraced multiculturalism instead of embracing acculturation into the main values of American society which you can call “liberal democracy” the values of individual responsibility, freedom, economic and social mobility, education, self improvement, etc. Years ago I taught at a community college where the white young Turk professors railed against the teaching of standard English to blacks as racist. In supplanting black English we were racist. One result is that today I hear blacks speaking or singing (rap) a language that marks them off as culturally interesting but culturally unclear and educationally dysfunctional. Culture is key as this clear writer suggests.
1
It's not racist. It's the Public School education system. It focuses on memorization of information and taking standardized timed testing. You can have good grades in coursework. But not make the cut if you don't test well. Also in 1968 there were only 3. Brooklyn Technical, Bronx Science and Stuyvesant HS. You had to pick one of the 3 to apply to and only got into that one. When they changed to using SHSAT where they create a list and top scores get to choose it became a mess. A more generic test is always harder to prepare for. Also during this time teacher pushed back against Common Core curriculum and standardized testing. The very thing that would require under performing grade schools to provide the same preparation that they more economically advantage Schools get. In that respect widening the gap was intended. Many parents sided with Teachers that insisted they didn't need to change. I got into Tech for 1969. But it took practice in G3-G8 on those standardized tests that parents are told to protest. The same teachers that say College should be Students only goal
1
Congratulations to ALL who were admitted. You are commended for your hard work and perseverance. Your parents might have sacrificed to send you to a test prep class, or you might have been teased for having devoted too much time to school work, but do not doubt that the hard work were done by YOU and that your achievements are real and well-deserved.
7
When I was a kid (in the 1970s) nobody prepped for this test and that made the playing field a bit more level. I knew nothing about the special high schools but my 8th grade guidance counselor invited kids to apply for the exam based on grades and standardized test scores. I scored high enough to get into Stuyvesant and Brooklyn Tech but my parents discouraged me from going. Too many boys (the school had just opened up to girls) and the subway trip was too long. Sadly, my parents had no idea about what these schools could offer a working class kid. I suggest the University of Texas admission policy: Top 10% of the class from all the high schools.
3
No good evidence that prepping helps. No decent peer reviewed study every published that proves it. Anecdotally I also see no difference- my friends spent thousands to no avail
Reading comprehension and math skills can not be taught as some trick. Maybe a few pointers can boost your grade a little. That’s it.
The prep biz is a total scam. Pure capitalism separating fools and anxious parents from their money.
2
Lets fix the root of the issue, and not change the standards to reflect affirmative action. In the long run, affirmative action is actually damaging to minorities as it sets lower standards and leaves their own accomplishments in doubt, even when they are true accomplishments.
2
The Times, and some others, seem intent on presenting this as a racial issue, with the focus on the low numbers of black and Hispanic students admitted to these schools on the basis of the test.
Yet, Asians are admitted at a far *higher* percentage than NYC racial / ethnic demographics, while whites are admitted at a *lower* rate than demographic numbers in NYC. Neither admission rate is "representative" of overall population demographics. Surely, that's as much a part of the story as the low rate of black and Hispanic admission?
So why the heavy focus on the low numbers of black and Hispanic admissions? (That's even the heading of your graphs, which show overall admission numbers.)
My point is *not* that the low rate of admission of black and Hispanic students to the specialized high schools isn't a real cause for concern. But rather that the spin on the admissions numbers seems to stress that aspect alone.
Also, for all the flaws of a "one test alone" model as sole criteria for admissions and issues with the test itself, this approach doesn't allow for the sort of discrimination that other sorts of admissions models bring into play. Surely, that's relevant too?
12
If the plan is to continue to keep the rigorous curriculum of these schools unchanged, then making them easier to get into is counterproductive. No amount of tutoring will make the vast majority of unqualified kids successful and admitting them will actually cause real harm by stressing them out trying to win a game they have no business competing at. Dropout rates will go up and mental health issues will increase. Give disadvantaged kids small class sizes, longer days, a longer school year and dedicated teachers in a school that's near their homes, where all parents have to pay (gasp) something. When real money, even a few hundred dollars, is on the line, few will allow their kid's education to be frittered away. Nothing will change if parents don't have real skin, aka $$$, in the game.
5
We are not all gifted. We will not all score highly enough on a challenging exam to prove it and earn a spot at an elite school. What makes these schools great is that they are filled with kids who can outscore you and me. If you want to take kids with lower scores and give them the spaces that higher-scoring kids would earn, you are rigging the system. I am comfortable that other people are smarter than I am. These are special schools for those kids. I can’t say why certain kids do better than others, but I know it would be unfair to give their spots away because there were too many or too few of some kind of kid.
13
Question - is the word "specialized", as in specialized school, anything other than a euphemism for privileged and/or segregated? Are the administration of tests to access an "elite" public school anything other than a Brown v Board era work around the maintenance of what in previous times was described in Plessy v Ferguson as Jim Crow separate but equal?
I'm all for young people getting a great education but that means "all" young people. These "specialized" schools are just a means of gaming the system of public education. Inculcating that level of hypocrisy into the life experiences of young people perverts the concept of "education" not to mention, its corollary, democracy.
This is where the young learn firsthand that freedom is a fable, justice is not just, and equality is anything but.
1
@Robert NYC has over 440 high schools. The 8 referred to in this article are the only ones with a single admissions criteria: the Specialized High School Aptitude Test (SHSAT). When students take the test, they rank the 8 by preference. When the tests are scored, they are ranked and the top-scoring student is offered their first choice school and on down the list until the first school is full, at which point any student who listed that school first is offered their second-choice instead. When all the seats at all 8 schools have been offered out, that's the "cutoff score" for that year. This is done by computer matching.
Simultaneously, kids have submitted applications for the other 432+ schools. They can rank up to 12. All the other schools have their own criteria, from lottery-based, to their own test, to portfolio and interview, to a simple good-grades-and-attendance-requirement, and may include geographic requirements (must live in X district or borough.) These schools rank in quality as well: from as good as the best private prep school, to Welcome Back, Kotter. Most are pretty good. There's also LaGuardia performing arts academy, which has its own audition process.
In early March, each 8th grader gets a letter listing their matches. If they scored well enough to get a specialized seat, they have two schools to choose from: a specialized, and a "regular". If they auditioned for LGA, they have a third option.
2
The test is designed to assess a child's ability to excel at one of the 3 specialized high schools. That's it. The child may be talented in many other ways and I'm sure there are other educational institutions that would love to have them. Not every school is the best fit for every kid and trying to shoehorn a young person into a school where the curriculum is too advanced for them only hurts the student.
4
@Robert
“Democracy” meaning curious students thirsting for knowledge stunted by disruptive sometimes violent seat takers?
3
The tendency here to accept that a single test can be a good measure of "ability" is as astonishing as it is sad. Imagine, if you able to, a great writer who happens to be terrible at math. Does he or she lack ability? At most, they might lack a type of ability, one given great emphasis on this particular test. The test is a filter that many choose to see as an acceptable measure of ability, but let's not confuse this filtering with the measurement of "ability" itself. The test is a mechanism for the production of a certain type of ability. It does not test for musical ability, for poetic ability, for culinary ability, athletic ability, etc.
I've taught literature in both high school and college for nearly 30 years, and I can tell you that discussions of complex books - novels, economics, philosophy - are more lively, more rewarding, more intelligent the greater the diversity in backgrounds of the participants. It makes sense, as the complexity of human life can only be adequately addressed, only be adequately recognized, by a complex field of students. Discussions of literature at Stuyvesant will undoubtedly be diminished, damaged, by the lack of varying points of view, especially the lack of black voices.
I do not understand how teachers and administrators at the school can celebrate its mode of organization. (Though the obvious answer is that many do not value the complexity of human life and prefer the elegant simplicity of math - a question of value, not ability.)
5
@High School Prof. wouldn't you say that the person who has stellar writing and math skills (i.e. someone who excels at ALL things the tests addresses) is a better candidate than someone who excels at only one? If the school cares about musical, poetic, or culinary ability they would figure out how to test it.
In addition, high stakes testing is a fantastic way to weed out the truly exceptional (someone who does things correctly the first time always) from people who have adequate skills but can't perform under pressure, or people who really only know a subset of what they are supposed to.
2
@Ben, I admire the discipline of math. But I think it's past time "we" re-evaluated the type of world we have created as a result of the triumph of technical reason (roughly those fields dedicated to math and science).
Technical reason has given us the atom bomb, napalm, and drones - generally speaking, the military industrial complex and its cousin the security state. Technical reason has also given us the unrestrained "growth" and material production that threatens to ruin the ability of many, if not most, human beings to live on the earth. The critique of technical reason - the only force that might restrain its power - does not come from within technical reason itself. Mathematicians and scientists spend little time in class talking about the uses to which their fields' insights are put. They simply teach algebra or physics in a "neutral" manner and without concern for the types of systems such knowledge may give rise to.
The only force that can restrain human beings' tremendous power over matter itself is the ethical thinking built into the humanistic traditions of the past few millennia. I could cite elements of religion, philosophy, literature, etc. - in short, the humanities - as the body of knowledge that has tried to act as a "voice crying in the wilderness," trying to warn humanity about the dangers of its greed, its lust to dominate people and matter, if not nature itself.
So, no, I wouldn't organize a school having given too much weight to math scores.
1
@High School Prof. - Regarding teachers at Stuyvesant "not valuing the complexity of human life", my sophomore year English literature teacher at Stuyvesant was Frank McCourt, who won a Pulitzer Prize for his book "Angela's Ashes" so I think he had held great value in the complexities of human life.
1
The fact that this city most needs to face, and embrace, is that you have a wealth of gifted black kids living all throughout it. It is a fact. They are there. The question is, what happens to a gifted elementary school student who is never identified as gifted? And many black and brown kids aren't. In NYC, white (and I assume) Asian kids are swarming the gifted programs in the lower grades. How do we as a nation invest in this pool of talent instead of convincing them before they reach the third grade they're nothing much? Can we imagine for a second what a richer nation this would be if we invested in black kids? The fact that we don't breeds generations of detachment and cynicism around an educational system that doesn't serve black families.
Testing is a poor gateway to a stellar education. It never tells the whole story of a student's potential; it rewards those who have managed to learn to perform and ignores the potential of everyone else. I agree with what others have said -- if you're going to bother to have a school at all, make it a great one. Invest in every student. Make sure students whose parents aren't able to support them through school are supported by someone, so they're not adrift. Do it for the love of it, and because this country will, as a whole, be so much better and richer for it.
7
@Michelle It's difficult to take someone seriously when they say racist things like, "white (and I assume) Asian kids are swarming the gifted programs."
1
@Ben Okay, then don't take me seriously. But it's not racist, at least for the white kids -- the Times reported this several years ago. That's where I got the information. I added Asian because of the information provided in this story. I didn't pull it out of the air.
There may be a cultural component for that majority Asian percentage. I can’t speak for other minorities, but as an Asian American raised by Asian immigrants, my parents were pretty strict in prioritizing education. In my case, I was constantly drilled in basic arithmetic and math concepts outside of school. When I was in elementary school, beyond regular homework, my parents created sheets of custom made math problems for me to work on. I hated it, but as a result I was pretty good in my math classes compared to the average student and it was easier to absorb new material to stay ahead in higher grades.
This seemed pretty common with other Asian families, at least with the families my parents were friends with. At gatherings there was always emphasis and praises for academic achievement in children. It wasn’t necessarily math, but could be something else like learning a musical instrument, the ability to speak multiple languages, etc. It was a point of pride (otherwise shame) for parents to tell other parents what their own child is good at or, if older, what their child does for a career. So there is enormous pressure on not just Asian students, but also Asian parents, to focus on education. This of course isn’t true of all Asian families, but there is definitely a significant subset with this mentality.
Is this mentality different for families of other racial backgrounds? Again, I can’t speak for other minorities, so I don’t know. Just wanted to share my experience.
17
I would not mess with this...it's a pure stat-driven test...i haven't seen any gender breakdown but I'm going to assume that it's overwhelmingly male. Yes, make the other public schools better -- who would be against that? -- but don't water down a school that's a success on every level to bring in kids who will likely have trouble with the day-to-day academics. i have a daughter who's a sharp cookie and now in college at a leading tech school. I doubt she could have kept up at Stuyvesant.
7
@Southern Hope
No, that's ludicrous. They are not exactly 50/50 gender mix, but they're very well balanced. You can look up all the demographics of our schools at Insideschools.org.
@Southern Hope why would you assume its overwhelmingly male? Women generally outperform men in academics on average.
3
Quota systems for admission into any educational institution is absurd. Bronx Science, Stuyvesant, Brooklyn Tech, etc. are all "elite" schools. That means the curricula in those places is more rigorous than normal. Students who can't keep up with the curriculum will face disappointment and will eventually drop out. We do them no service in smoothing the way.
18
What are the demographics of those who took the SHSAT test? I suspect that a disproportionately greater percentage of Asian-American students took the test, while disproportionately lower percentages of African-American and Hispanic-American students took the test; such skewed initial conditions would contribute to a lopsided outcome, such as evidenced. Efforts should be made to strongly recommend participation from all groups, starting in elementary school.
8
I'm a graduate of Bronx Science. First to graduate HS in my family. Parents from Puerto Rico but I was born and raised in the Bronx. While there weren't a lot of people that looked like me, I never felt that I didn't belong there because I did the work to get in and everyone else was on equal footing. Very different experience in college and later on in medical school where I was often reminded that the reason I was there was most likely because of affirmative action.
Leave the SHSAT alone. Fix K-7 education (never mind 8th grade because by then it's way too late). Stop suspending kids of color for small infractions, and figure out ways to engage them better in their studies. Figure out how to partner with parents and other family members. Messing around with SHSAT and the requirements is not going to help these students when they get into the school or when they graduate.
84
@NYFMDoc
Congrats on your success.
When a school system is overall mostly minority, you can't argue the policy of suspending students is racially biased. As a product of a big city school system, you must recognize the major problem posed by disruptive students. (I've taught in LAUSD schools.)
If anything, I felt students were given many more chances than they should have been -- and continued to disrupt classes for other students to an unconscionable degree.
It sounds like you have two parents. That can make a big difference in both the disciplinary and academic realms (and many these days would call you "privileged" for that).
But you're right to say 8th grade is too late to "fix" education. I think the cutoff is actually far below that.
But the answer is to focus on inputs for minority students and not just on the outcomes of how many of a given group are selected by elite high schools. DeBlasio's proposed "solution" is more than an affront to Asians; it's destructive of the educational process.
I'm pleased you took a stand on the issue of the test, regardless of what it was.
Maybe the darling-of-the-moment, AOC, can show the same fortitude.
5
To my fellow SHS grad from a different time,
Funny how privileged white liberals purport to speak for blacks and Hispanics on this issue but keep ignoring blacks and Hispanics when they do speak for themselves on this issue if what they say aren’t in line with their pre-conceived narratives.
2
@NYFMDoc
At my predominately white high school, 'students of color' tended to be more defiant, more disruptive, to fight more, to challenge teachers' authority more. Now this isn't to say white kids were angels. White kids drank more, smoked more, took more drugs, could be just as hateful and mean to each other, but they did not tend to act out in ways that were as direct a challenge to school authority. My high school was about 30 percent black and usually at least 80 percent of suspensions were of black kids. But like 95 percent of fights involved at least one black kid. Every time I heard a teacher cursed out, it was a black kid cursing. Black kids slept way more in class. The white kid might be high on acid in the back row, but he wasn't as openly disruptive. Nobody wants to talk about this but I have seen it repeatedly. I see it in my son's schools now.
3
There are several problems that cause this. One is that a good many students of colour equate doing well in school as acting white and do not wish to deal with peer pressure. The fact is part of the problem is also caused by the absurd Bloomberg/Klein decision to destroy the traditional high schools that offered them same courses as the specialized schools. I didn't go to a specialized school but I took the same courses as a friend who went to Science. If it was important to get in, many students could work harder to do well on the exam Nothing is stopping them
19
@JEFF S
"One is that a good many students of colour equate doing well in school as acting white and do not wish to deal with peer pressure."
That's pretty uncommon among students of the color yellow.
1
A small (yet significant) tactics to note in the charts here -- NYC Dept. of Education uses similar blue colors (very hard to distinguish if not look carefully) to mark White and Asian students, while using distinct colors (Red vs. Orange vs. Khaki) to mark Black, Hispanic and Other students. What I can guess the reason is because they wanted to create a huge contrast between say, White & Asian vs. Black & Latino, in order to amplify the problem and support their legislature. (Richard Carranza, who posted "angry White parents" in town hall meetings, is the Education Chancellor - imagine that.)
If you changed Black to red, Hispanic to purple, Asians to green, White to light blue, the problem may not present much of an impact as it seems now (at least visually). This is very shady for a "progressive" push. And you wonder why Trump got elected and people support him left and right.
15
I graduated from Brooklyn Tech in 1966 and there were 1600 students in my entering class in 1962. Memory fades after 50 years, but I remember one or two black students in each class which would equate to maybe 75 blacks in the entering class and multplied by four classes that could be about 250 African American students in the school allowing for attrition over four years. (The graduating class was 1200.) Obviously 250 African American students were not representative of the African American population of NYC in 1966 but it may have been more representative than the current numbers. I have no idea what the racial numbers at Tech are now, but if it’s less than 1966 there is something wrong with the admissions policy.
3
"...raising the pressure on officials to confront the decades-old challenge of integrating New York’s elite public schools."
Rather than trying to put a bandaid across the problem , let's look at the deep racism inherent the fact that the elementary and junior high schools are re doing their job to educate the students.
In many cases, it's a simple as allowing teachers to discipline students who are disrupting classes.
8
This piece reminds me of another item on NPR, about public transportation in Atlanta and how entrenched interests didn't want public transportation, containing Black and Hispanic people, even traveling through their areas, in case they might move in; so its construction was repeatedly blocked.
This piece also further exposes systemic bias against certain segments of society. It starts in kindergarten. If a segment of the student body is showing signs of underachievement, you step up, with extra resources and help. You don't just shuffle them off to substandard schools, with mediocre resources.
The reason this is going to be a tough nut to crack is that changing this culture requires people to pay more taxes to help disadvantaged people to get a fair shot. This is not the American way in the 21st century, I am sad to say.
10
My sons went to an International Baccalaureate program within Denver Public Schools, a highly rigorous program. DPS has eliminated the requirements for entrance and watered down the program to make it more diverse. The answer is that kids are being failed in elementary and middle schools--class sizes are too large and testing has narrowed the curriculum and take too many class days. Focus on the earlier years, provide more tutoring and counseling and kids will be better prepared for the more rigorous high schools.
22
@JaneF. Why not develope equal education across the nation, with rigorous teaching in every classroom. Rigorous applying to all students and every staff member. This country continues to operate as a bigoted, false democracy.
I am so tired of the NYT publishing articles on this subject. As evidenced by majority of reader comments, the only result of highlighting this problem is to encourage latent "liberal" racists to unleash a torrid of stereotypes about black students and their families (all bad) and Asian students (all good) that would make Trump, McConnell and the right-wing extremely proud.
13
Raise school teacher salaries to the level of top business managers, and hire top contenders. Provide students, all students, with the opportunity to be tutored in math, effective reading, test-taking, sciences. Make all this free to all school-aged children. Lowering the standards for those special school will deprive gifted students their opportunities to excel in life. We'd all be better off if we really took schooling seriously.
5
@SFR
Put
"Money and School Performance: Lessons from the Kansas City Desegregation Experiment"
into Google, and then read about the results in Kansas City of unlimited spending on education.
1
Another case of reality not conforming to the vision of the anointed.
17
Perhaps we would see more black students admitted to these premier high schools if their names, addresses, and race could not be viewed by those evaluating their admission forms.
2
@Karen Darnell
There is no evaluation of admission forms for these particular schools. The sole means of gaining entry is taking a test. It's a competition among the students who choose to take the test (thousands do and thousands don't), with each student listing some or all of the specialized high schools in order of their preference. Then the computer goes down the list of scorers (starting from the highest) and places each student in the school they listed first, if there is still room; if not, then the student is placed in their next choice, and so on until all spots at all of the schools are filled.
Perhaps you misunderstood the process because of the article's sloppy language, like using the phrase "offered admission" or that at Stuyvesant only seven spots "were offered to black students". The schools don't offer admission. The NYC DOE runs this system and the competitive test results (and the students' own choices as to which schools they rank and in what order) determine which school they are permitted to attend, if they choose. Names, addresses and race do not factor into this process at all, unlike at some other NYC schools or in college admissions.
19
@Karen Darnell
Admission to these particular schools is based solely on a single test score. There is no evaluation of anything except that score.
11
@DA1967 - thanks for pointing out that language. Lazy, Times. Lazy.
2
Another year that we all suffer from the crisis in black & Hispanic academic outcomes where 65-80% are failing state math & ELA tests. (https://infohub.nyced.org/docs/default-source/default-document-library/2018-math-ela---public---9-26-2018.pdf)
Many Blacks/Hispanics have fled to Success Academy where they are >90% of the students. There they have made dramatic improvements: >90% score 3 or 4 on same state tests.
Blacks taking the SHSAT declined steeply from >6,200 in 2015 to <5,500 in 2019.
This continued crisis in black/Hispanic outcomes in public
schools has happened on Mayor DeBlasio’s watch. What has he done to address this during his 6 years in office?
He wasted $780MM on failed school improvements. What happened to all that money? Why isn't there an independent inquiry by the City Council? He and his sex discrimination scandal-ridden Chancellor Carranza shrug & say he still deserves unfettered control of DOE.
Then they blame & discriminate against Asians, another diverse minority immigrant group with lower incomes than blacks/Hispanics.
About 12,000 students attend specialized high schools.
But who will help the HALF A MILLION black/Hispanic students who are failing math and ELA and aren't be even able to do high school let alone college math? What will be their future economic & career prospects?
Where is the outrage over the abject failure of Mayor DeBlasio, Chancellor Carranza and DOE to improve learning outcomes for all students?
24
Nine out of ten top basketball players are African American.
Nine out of ten top weight lifters are Caucasian or Asian.
Biased tests?
People are different. Cultures and social environments, priorities and ambitions are different.
Laws and reputations won’t change human nature. Human nature isn’t pc.
42
Asians are people of color too they just have immigrant parents who push them harder then parents who have been here many generations.
34
It is really sad when schools located in a black neighborhoods do not accept their own black kids. Are we going back to the 1950’s? That is really ridiculous! What are these schools telling the black kids, “ You are not smart enough to get accepted into any elite high school?” It is high time that the Mayor along with the governor and people of power change these so called rules which are keeping our kids behind. Our black kids needs a chance at having a proper education! We have to stand up for what is right. New York City is mixture of all races but why does it look like the black race don’t exist when our black kids are performing so well in school but don’t get to attend the school of their choice?
3
Alternative headline: In victory for diversity, 78% of Stuyvesant's 2019 class made up of underrepresented minorities
45
@Steve, an overlooked statistic for sure. My child is white she is one of a minority 15% white in her primarily latino school that is arguably the best performing public high school in metropolitan Miami. Is that a success story or a failure of diversity? It is all a matter of perspective.
9
Admission to a select high school is just admission to a select high school. It says nothing about the value of a life: the love given and received, the joy and delight in nature and the arts, the care and devotion given to one’s loved ones, the faithful execution of one’s responsibilities, and a thousand other ultimately significant things. It is just what it is, and when we see it as the measure of a person’s value, we create a mess. And a morally bankrupt society.
5
No one is saying it's the measure of a person's value! This is not about prestige! it's about getting a better education, and opening students up to more opportunities, such as acceptance to better colleges, which in turn offer a better education and open students up to more opportunities! You don't get that?!
4
there is a basic logic flaw in almost every reply to this article, and that is the assumption that if a student did not get in, they are unqualified.
But--there is no absolute score that gets a student in. There is a cut off line. If more and more students prep for the tests, that pushes the cutoff line up higher and higher. That does not make the student whose score is the same as a qualifying one from former years any less qualified now that the cutoff line has changed.
So the assumptions of lazy, unmotivated students are not borne out by the changing demographics--we simply don't have proof that some students are not studying just because others are studying more and more. And more. Why is no one questioning why children should be spending all their extra time studying? Wouldn't it be overall better if the test tested what was learned in school, as opposed to how much can be crammed into children's lives?
I find it hard to believe I'm the only outlier who is concerned about this.
7
@Leslie
Ok, I get the evolving cutoff argument. But I don’t think “yesterday’s stars, today’s also rans” are the issue. There are a limited number of slots at schools which have the educational resources for top students. It may well be a worthy goal to have a lower level of still competitive schools. But really, the indictment must be of the failure of parents and schools at the earliest years. Not every kid is a budding genius, despite parental hopes. We spend more on Title 1 kids whose horizons will always be limited than we do identifying and cultivating the gifted.
5
My parents were refugees with limited means. I went to my local (very mediocre) high school. I went on to public city college, public medical school and am now a successful physician.
What made this possible: my parents were educated and instilled in me the importance of education as a gateway to success. Educational achievement was stressed above all else (except for being a good and moral person). Everything else was secondary (extracurriculars, TV, idle time etc)
Parents need to stop giving lip service to education and make it abundantly clear to their children that it is priority number one
46
It's lovely for you that you had two parents and both were educated and had the luxury of placing education at priority #1. Unfortunately, black Americans have been systemically oppressed for generations and the generational trauma caused by the racial violence in our country has been an immense obstacle to overcome. And one that our government expects them to overcome on their own. So, bully for you, but your experience is not relevant to the problem here. @Jason
2
We spend our time, effort and money on our kids. Why the government want to stop SHSAT? Do we have to so liberal that govt will hand out everyone to school? Why dont they give everyone Harvard certification and be done with it?
If Black and Hispanic kids are not getting selected, why dont public school give them good help and support that they can go to specialized school? They have good potential. If they get good guidance from good teachers they too can go to top level school and college! Its not race but policies and lack of fundings lnot letting more Black and Hispanics to good school. Why dont government appoint Khan Turorial be in charge of prep class?
Govt cannot water down the way kids get selected. This will cripple our education system further more.
School need good mentorship and prep program for specially Black and Hispanic kids. They deserve more and less.
11
They deserve more not less.
Such a great comment, without the blame game vitriol. This is so basic but it seems like something the school system refuses to do this. You wonder where exactly all the money goes, because it’s not investing in the students who need the most help and resources. Too busy protecting their turf and fighting charters. These kids are just funding numbers.
2
I can’t wait to hear how the Rev. Al Sharpton spins this news. Don’t look for him to ask families to look themselves in the mirror and take an active role in the education of their children. It all begins with a parental commitment to education.
13
You lefties don’t get it it’s the students not the school. Sure there are some better “books” in these buildings but Put all these students who work hard and want to succeed in any building and in 10 years that “building” will be the coveted place to get your high achieving student into. Keep trying to fill high achieving “buildings” with dullards to make yourselves feel better and guess what it will be just a building in 10 years same as all the other buildings you house students in.
23
To be fair, the Times should also look into how many black students who otherwise would've qualified for Stuy who chose to go somewhere else, including to private schools that offer them generous scholarships, which are usually not available to Asian kids.
As for the 8 black kids who got into Stuy, they can take pride in knowing that they genuinely belong, and not just some affirmative action hacks. Changing the criteria to allow more black kids to get in would cheapen the accomplishment of those who genuinely qualified on their own merit, because everyone else would assume they are merely Affirmative Action beneficiaries, like all black elite college grads. Please stop trying to cheapen the accomplishment of these deserving kids who got in through their own merit.
25
7 black students being admitted to the elite schools is a travesty and an injustice. Sadly, the wrong conclusions are being drawn. These black students are being failed; by their families, their communities, by their local schools, teachers and their teacher's union. The answer is not to dismantle the elite schools and the few high quality middle school feeders. The answer is to stop failing these kids right where they live.
16
@thewiseking
This has nothing to do with the teachers' union, and everything to do with their families. They are being failed by their parents, more specifically, their parent and lack of parenting.
1
@thewiseking Read the article 7 black students were admitted to one of the specialized schools. More. still low, were admitted to Science and Tech.
These so called elite schools have had their share of cheating scandals themselves. It is rampant in the schools and starts at an early age.
https://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/06/26/stuy-cheating-scandal_n_1628434.html
https://nypost.com/2018/01/27/cheating-still-rampant-at-disgraced-stuyvesant-school
It seems elite is code for being good at lying, cheating and bribing.
3
The elephant in the room is that blacks don’t value education as much as Asians do, and they don’t study. Their low rate of acceptance to these elite schools is no mystery, but people wring their hands over it anyway in a useless display of ineffectual liberal guilt. To their credit the state legislature which is duly elected by the people of New York will have none of it.
28
@Edward
Do you think that the only reason blacks are so dominant in the NBA is that others don't value basketball as much as blacks value basketball?
The fair thing to do is abolish this kind of school. Let it be an all private school without public funding. For a publicly funded school to be this racist is unacceptable!! What’s the point of being public??? It’s to serve the public!! Why do tax payers pay for only the white Kidd to go to this school?? This is unfair!! Everybody is paying, so it needs to reflect everybody, not just some!!! If everybody is paying, then, it needs to take the best of every race! Those who don’t want some races there should go to a private school!! This is a PUBLIC school, it needs to reflect the public!! Black parents shouldn’t be paying taxes for white kinds to go to an all white exclusive school!!! There should be black kids too going there if black people are paying period, or black peoples money should be excluded from going there!
1
@Frei
I strongly disagree. Some of these schools educated earlier members of a disenfranchised group, Jews. The Jewish kids largely went to public schools, many did very well, and a disproportionate number have been very successful. Thousands returned to be teachers. Public schools must offer some ladder of mobility through skill acquisition, because this is a tough world.
2
@Frea
These school have entrance exam. That exam kids dont put your name or race. Its number.
1
@Frea
"Black parents shouldn’t be paying taxes for white kinds to go to an all white exclusive school!!!"
Did you happen to have a look at the NYT article?
Not one of these schools is even majority white, let alone "white exclusive".
1
Just like Jewish immigrants in the early 20th century, many of these Asian families come to the United States with virtually nothing and don't even speak English.
A new country. A new culture. A language they don't speak.
Couldn't one make the case they are MORE disadvantaged than native born blacks and hispanics?
Which begs the obvious question. Isn't academic achievement open to anyone who works hard?
43
Another relevant question: How many black middle schoolers face bullying for "acting white" if they focus on academic achievement?
17
@Working Mama
Who is bullying black kids for “Acting White”? Are you claiming school teachers and administrators do so? Are white kids or Asian kids teasing black kids?
1
Many people are looking at this as a desegregation issue. No one is deliberately denying or granting admission to any student based on race or ethnicity. That's now how this works. What is happening is that Black and hispanic/Latinx kids are not taking the SHSAT in sufficient numbers, and those who are taking it are not prepared for the exam.
It's important to understand that there are no hard cutoffs or quotas of any kind. Of all the kids who take the test, they are ranked from highest score to lowest, and beginning at the top, each student is given an offer to their first-choice school, until the schools begin to fill up. As the matching moves down the list, if a student's first-choice school is already full (with students who scored higher) then that student is offered their second-choice school, and so on, until every seat has been offered. That's where the "cutoff point" comes from--it's a floating score for each school and varies based on how well the entire pool of students did on the test. It also trends upward, year after year.
This system could not possibly be more fair. What is grossly unfair is that Black and Latinx kids are not getting a good education that would prepare them to take this test. Fix the elementary schools. Fix the middle schools. And create more excellent high schools in every borough, with a range of admissions criteria.
42
Bicker, argue all you want regarding if the test is "fair" the real story here? The exam admission results demonstrate what becomes of a child who receives absolute support from their family. There are numerous ways to raise a child, it's very clear Asian families work as an unit, their goals are specific, they realize that a child needs and benefits from guidance and discipline is an acquired skill over time not a last minute dash to the finish line.
Perhaps if a Pre-K or Kindergarten teacher reads my comment? a gentle suggestion: those parents who express interest in how the system works, nurture them as well as their child?
16
Few black students got in to Stuy or SI Tech. In part that is because each specialized high school's curriculum and location is preferred by different ethnic groups.
Here are the most recent 2018 self-reported SHSAT cut-off scores:
Stuyvesant 560/ 634
Bronx Science 526 / 642
Brooklyn Latin 488 / 505
Brooklyn Technical 498 / 574
HSMSE @ CCNY 519 / 620
HSAS @ Lehman 530/ 617
Queens Science @ York College 514/ 516
Staten Island Tech 552/ 688
Lehman and Bronx Science have nearly-identical cutoff scores. Same with HSMSE and Queens Science. But those school pairs have wildly different proportions of students by race. Why?
Kids of different ethnicities who get the same SHSAT score rank different schools higher so are more likely to get that school. This is in part because of where they live, in part because of cultural preference.
80% of Queens Science offers went to Asians. Why? More Asians ranked it higher than other SHSAT schools. No media stories have covered this but it is obvious from the acceptance stats. With a nearly identical cutoff, HSMSE has exponentially more whites and a small fraction of the number of Asians as Queens Science.
Half of Lehman offers went to white kids, few to Asians. The opposite statistic is true at Bronx Science. Why? Whites rank Lehman's history-focused curriculum higher, Asians prefer Bronx Science. Tho
20
@BxSciParent
Important observation. My kids didn't like the Stuy reputation and listed other schools first. There's a strong element of self-selection. The commutes are a factor too! Kids routinely commute 60 mins+ for these schools, but not all kids are up for that, nor are their parents.
7
Very sad but reflective, in my opinion, of the differences in numbers of single-parent households by race: Asian 16%, African-American 65%. Maybe when we can talk about this and there is real leadership in the black community to correct this we'll see a change in these statistics.
49
I sent this article to my daughter, a Sty alum. Here is her suggestion:
“I’ve always heard people say standardized testing is biased against black people, maybe that’s true. They should just make the test all math. No bias there.”
All math! What a heavenly test!
15
@Dessolena In that case, the Asian kids would score even higher.
4
Put our Democrat party pols on the spot. What is their opinion? Especially the ultra vague presidential candidates. What’s Beto’s opinion. See how much they all pander.
6
@Mel
Unless you give anyone the opportunity to study the issue and data, their opinion is worthless. Just because someone is running for potus doesn't mean they've got the educational experience to wade in on something like this particular school issue. Off the cuff opinions don't solve serious issues.
We already have Trump in the WH who gives out totally worthless opinions every day! He'll just give this problem to DeVos and she'll solve it by destroying it for everyone.
1
Would be interesting to see what were the common traits that those 8 achieving black students had. Could it be involved parents, delayed gratification etc.
19
@George
High IQ in the single most important determinant of academic success.
Another item on the long list of failures from this Mayor's administration.
"President DeBlasio?" - I think not.
By the way, can anyone guess where his son went to school?
11
And how he got to school everyday-by limousine, if I remember correctly. Does anyone remember what college he got into?
Bet there was a little favoritism there too...
2
...His black son.
2
More data please! Would be helpful to see how many talented POC get recruited into private schools thru programs like Prep for Prep, Oliver, TEAK, etc. To diversify private schools recruite POC in elementary, middle & high school. In 10 years private schools have increased POC percentages from 18% to 29% (#1). More black & latino children should be getting into specialized schools considering their % in the NYC school system. Would be interesting to know how many black & latino children aren't even taking the SHSAT test. For folks saying "more test prep for POC" there already are many free SHSAT programs for POC including the Hudson Guild, PASSNYC, Helcion Inc, and the DOE's DREAM Program.
One test shouldn't be the only thing determining entrance into specialized schools. Many very talented students don't make the cut because they aren't great test takers. Maybe some combo of grades, state standardized test scores, & 2 diff SHSAT type tests that students take spring of 6th & fall of 8th grade.
NYPost (#2),".. mayor isn’t counting at least 1,500 talented minority and immigrant kids from the city’s poorest neighborhoods currently enrolled in ritzy private & boarding schools — most for free — headed for scholarships at top universities."
https://www.nytimes.com/2012/10/21/nyregion/for-minority-students-at-elite-new-york-private-schools-admittance-doesnt-bring-acceptance.html
https://nypost.com/2018/06/09/how-nonprofits-are-boosting-nycs-brightest-minority-students/
6
@Kid
While much of what you wrote is well taken, I disagree with your point about not relying on one test because some students are not great test takers. If that's the case, how will those students succeed at some of these schools? Students take an enormous number of tests and quizzes, certainly at Stuyvesant and I imagine at most of the others. Students who are not good test takers will struggle in many of the classes.
2
@Kid - the kids going to prep school very likely wouldn't have gotten in to Stuy, etc. One can game prep school admission a lot more easily than the SHSAT.
2
Family circumstances and involvement and test scores have high correlation.
In this article in the Times, read about an ad-hoc experiment in a school in England. When poorly performing students moved in with high performing students from the same school, their test results skyrocketed.
"Moving in with A* families transforms underperforming teens" Underperforming pupils see their grades soar after moving in with high-flying classmates and following their discipline
https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/moving-in-with-a-families-transforms-underperforming-teens-6dgl3p39k
5
How many Black , White , Asian and Latino students take these exams every year? I would like to compare these numbers with the admission results.
Maybe the admission is low for Blacks and Latinos because they have little knowledge about theses schools.
4
As a black American I’m somewhat taken aback by the seemingly provocative headline. Be that as it may, I would hate for someone to scrap the entrance exam so I would have a better chance of getting into an elite school. What an insult that would be! Whatever happened to working harder?
49
I think the title needs a revision. “Black students EARNED only 7 spots.” How about the best, hardest working students earn their spots? Isn’t that equality? Everyone has the same opportunities, freedom, etc.... If you don’t like the results, work harder
25
I graduated from Stuyvesant in 1951. Many of the students were the children of immigrants--as I was.
Today, many of the students are the children of immigrants, although nowadays they their parents are likely to be from Asia rather than from Europe.
One of my best friends at Stuyvesant was an African-American. He and I discovered opera together.
11
To a large extent, the dismal statistics reflect inadequate educational funding and teacher preparation and the destruction of traditional black cultures through slavery, Jim Crow, and well-meaning, but under-prepared teachers. When will the time come when we can say with a straight face that the same amount of public money (at least) is spent on the in-class instruction of every child-- which should be the case according to several court rulings, but isn't? The slavery system left a deep cultural mark that individual effort did not count; Jim Crow and some of its remedies send the same message: You try hard and get beaten down, you don't try and you may be lucky. Such messages are hard for a culture to forget. The questionable treatment by the social, school, and justice systems adds to the problems, as does a definition of 'black culture' emphasizing pop culture, sports, and other pursuits making quick money?
Eliminating the test will not remedy the situation, but make it worse. Make the overall system better and give the under-prepared students real help -- but this is very difficult and painful for everyone involved.
12
@keko
I went to a Segregated School in Alabama for
one year.
My Grandmother was a teacher there.
She and her fellow teachers were as fine a group
of teachers I ever had.
There was strict discipline and a great deal of love
shown the students, but homework had to be completed or you stayed in during lunch and after school.
Most of the students were from Poor families
many had grandparents who had been born into
Slavery, some had Great-Grandparents who had been slaves. No one was allowed to be a slacker, no one was allowed to insult the teachers, disrupt the classroom.
That so few African Americans qualify for these schools says something about the schools they attend, the expectations placed upon them, the lack of support the Teachers receive and the failure of the parents to demand more of the schools and their children.
Stop using Slavery/Jim Crow as an excuse.
Start studying and taking school seriously.
17
@John Brown -- An attempt at explanation is not an excuse, even if it may be read that way. What good does it do to take school seriously if the school doesn't take you seriously as a learner, but insists on telling you you are good enough?
1
@John Brown
you speak volumes of truth
1
Stop focusing on the quality of the schools that lead to high school. Instead, focus on the home environment. What do the parents expect and prioritize? Whom do they celebrate and admire openly? What do they spend time, attention and money on? Asians (Southeast Asians, Chinese, S. Korean, Singapore, Taiwan, Vietname) in general reflect the importance of education and academic achievement in ways both subtle and overt in a consistent manner of time.
Many times I have heard non-Asian parents say "my daughter/son isn't good at math, but that's ok because they'll pursue careers that don't need advanced math..." I have never heard such sentiments from Asian parents. Advanced math is considered as vital and foundational as reading and writing for Asian families, which assume their children have the capability for such. And so they don't tolerate poor math performance from their children, since poor performance would reflect lack of diligence, not innate ability.
27
I graduated from Brooklyn Tech in the mid 1970s. So did my brothers (two older, one younger).
That means my entire family of African American boys all passed the entrance exam.
What prepared us for Tech was years of public education in "gifted" track classes. The differences between the qualify of education we received compared to that of students who were not so lucky became stark. (I also thank our mom and dad for early prep and continued focus.)
And it wasn't just us. A number of the kids that I had classes with in elementary and Junior High school also passed the entrance exam and attended Tech. So I'm reasonably assured in attributing our academic success not just to nature, but to the nurturing academic environment we experienced.
So the answer isn't to change "the test." That's just a symptom of the problem. The answer really is to change the fundamental level of education at the elementary and middle school levels so that ANY kid could be competitive.
That's a much larger challenge. And it will take longer to implement. But raising the bar of the education for all our kids will have the greatest impact in the long run.
48
@Briana
Honestly a much needed study in this problem is WHY the enrollment of Blacks and Latinos tanked in the past few decades. Subsequently WHY Asians soared in enrollment.
I think DB and others are taking the easy way out when they want to drop the test. Doing so, in light with the recent education scandal, opens admission to be gamed. When you expose many criteria, you open up more avenues for exploitation. A single entry point means you can curtail it better. Albeit more stress on the students, students can always retake it a second time.
I was one of the lucky ones who didn't need to prep and got in by being in honors programs which HAD these materials covered to an extent. The rest of it is luck and god given intellect to which I have no control of.
9
This is a tough issue. The NY school system seems to be incapable of providing a quality education to African American students even before they reach high school.
It's time to stop accepting excuses for system failures. We don't tolerate defective products. Why then do we tolerate defective educations?
The students are not the problem; a broken system is. The "production line" is broken and ineffective. NY parents need to demand more from their schools.
Finally, parents cannot be left off the hook so easily. Schools also need to demand more from parents. What most educators know but rarely talk about in public is that parental involvement is one of the most important factors in a student's educational attainment.
We know what works. The question is why we fail time after time to implement best practices.
9
The statistic that I would like to see is what are the demographics of those that sat for the test? It's one thing to throw out there that the pool of NYC students in the public schools is 70% Black and Latino but were 70% of the students who took the SSHAT Black and Latino? What are the demographics of those that qualified to sit for the test? And if the demographics show that less students who are Black and Latino qualified in the first place to sit for the test what can be done to help with that that doesn't involve lowering standards?
The problem with the Selective High Schools will not be solved unless they do the harder change -- fix the schools from Kindergarten on up. A summer course or a review course will not fix deficits that have arisen since the Elementary school. The schools have failed the Black and Latino populations in NYC.
A solution needs to be found that doesn't pit one group against another. Full disclosure -- I am the parent of a Stuy graduate who is Asian but did not take test prep to get in.
12
I commented earlier showing disagreement with deblasios plan to change the admissions process. My disagreement was due to ignorance of some of the real issues. I’ve changed my mind.
If one of the major issues facing black students is their parents telling them that the system is rigged against them and that only other black people will understand them, then deblasios plan to change the admissions system to a zip code based one is brilliant.
1
I moved to New York in January of 8th grade. This meant that when it came time to apply for high schools, I had no middle school record and was assigned to attend my zone high school. If my 4 months in my neighborhood middle school was any indication of what was to come in high school, I was very worried and determined not to go to that high school. We lived in a predominantly Italian working class neighborhood of Brooklyn. My middle school was adequately funded and there were some genuinely good teachers. The problem wasn't funding or bad teachers, it was the anti-school culture among students. My classmates jeered every time I raised my hand to answer a question, they jeered even louder when I got it right, and they would cheer when I answered wrong. One incident really stuck with me. During a field trip to a city park, I raised my hand and answered a question posed by a park docent. Another boy looked at me with genuine contempt and said, "Don't think you're smarter than me. If I studied as much as you I'd know the answer too alright?"
Properly motivated by my brush with the "average" NYC public school, I studied all summer, took the make-up specialized high school exam in August and got into Stuyvesant. The facilities were a little better, the teachers, were not much better, but the real benefit was that all of the other students were just like me. Nobody ever taunted me for being a nerd because we were all nerds. THAT is the real value of the schools.
123
@Simon
Retired teacher here- your experience is 100% spot on. Culturally based peer groups are huge factors in determining student success or lack thereof. In my demographically diverse school district, invested parents fought tooth and nail to get their students into the honors level classes that began in fourth grade, because they know that the nerds are the peer group heading for future success.
13
100. In the school where my wife teaches, other _teachers_ scorn her if she says something nerdy...
10
Increasing the number of spots for underrepresented minorities at these schools is a symbolic fix, it doesn't help the vast majority of minority students who are left behind at terrible schools. At the same time, it sends a message to Asian American students, many of whom come from poor, uneducated, immigrant families, that their hard work has been for nothing. It's a lose-lose situation.
I think that private schools should be allowed to use whatever criteria they want to create a "balanced" student body, whether that means maintaining a certain gender, racial, or income makeup, but public-funded schools should remain open to the entire public.
It's a hard fix though, because no matter how much the city invests in underperforming schools, they will be held back by the financial insecurity and family structure of the students who go there. We should keep trying to improve every public school as much as possible, but a real solution has to include things like improving low income housing, raising the minimum wage, high quality pre-K and childcare, and more social work services.
6
@Eliza Shapiro I really take issue with your consistent use of the phrase "offers of admission" to describe how students gain access to exam schools. It implies that the schools decide who gets an offer and who doesn't get an offer, and by extension, that these elite schools discriminate by "offering" seats to Asians at the expense of blacks. It implies a level of subjectivity that exists for college admissions, but is prohibited by law for these exam-entrance schools.
It would far more correct to say students "earn seats" or "earn admission." These schools cannot by law make offers; legally their acceptances are mandated by test scores.
The use of "offer" vs "earn" strikes me as not-very-subtle editorializing in what should be unbiased news stories. Yes, it's shocking and awful that almost no blacks take and pass the entrance exams. But implying that deliberate admissions discrimination is at work is an inappropriate editorial choice. Any fair analysis must consider a variety of possible factors, including the obvious — a range of familial, educational, social, and environmental circumstances that lead to poorer academic outcomes for NYC's black 8th graders.
As a longtime journalist, I decry this kind of subtle editorial bias. But I otherwise commend you for raising the issue.
23
@Jaclyn If a system consistently excludes a group of people then it is discriminatory. When I attended federally desegregated schools below the Mason Dixon, there was still discrimination against my black classmates because they did not "earn" their way into the gifted and AP classes. Test scores and other criteria kept them out, so although the black students had some access to better (read white) schools, they did not have full access, even within the same school building. The problem with systemic racism or discrimination is that leaders can easily justify a system where some "good" students "earn" their way in and the ones who can never seem to gain entrance "deserve" their fate, too. If you're really a journalist, I'm pretty shocked that you don't understand institutional racism.
3
@Jaclyn
I agree completely. Technically, yes, these are "offers" in that the student also has a non-specialized school to choose from, but much more context is needed to explain the admissions process for NYC high schools. There are two categories of public schools: SHSAT Specialized, and the rest. All the rest of the schools have a wide variety of admissions criteria, from their own test (Bard) to portfolio review and interview (Beacon) to open admission, to interest-based lottery... on and on. Each student has the opportunity to receive one match in each category. That's it. You don't end up with an array of acceptance offers to choose from. If you score well on the SHSAT, you have the choice of A or B. If not, you get whatever your B is. (Leaving LaGuardia off completely for simplicity, but if you are an artist and applied/auditioned for LaGuardia, you may also have a "C" offer in the mix).
In any case, it's far too easy to spin this to make it look like an open-and-shut case of discrimination--when that's absolutely not the case.
3
@Anon, thank you for supporting me and my fellow victims of discrimination. I spent 20 years working hard for a chance to go to the NBA but was not offered a spot despite less than 5% of the roster spots going to people of pale color. This in a nation where more than 80% of the population are the same skin color. As you argue quite well, discrimination is ANY system that consistently excludes a group of people! Time to hold NBA team owners accountable, bring down a biased system!!
5
The only argument against reparations for generations of slavery and second-class citizenship is equal opportunity in education. So much for that argument.
1
Someone needs to ask DiBlasio and Carranza point blank if they are familiar with the CUNY “Open Admissions” debacle of the late 1960’s-early 1970’s to increase racial diversity at Brooklyn College, Queens College and CCNY. The stellar reputation of those colleges fell after the admission of unqualified students, the creation of “remedial English” and “remedial math” courses, the “dumbing down” of many courses by professors and much higher drop-out rates for students. It has taken decades to restore the reputation of these schools. Why do we want to compromise the reputations of Brooklyn Tech, Bronx High School of Science and Stuyvesant High School by repeating a political disaster in the name of racial diversity?
Both DiBlasio and Carranza have stated that “Asians” have no right to believe that they are “entitled” to admission to the elite high schools and considers “Asians” as “privileged” because many students will prepare for the SHSAT by taking prep courses while they are in middle school. They lump all Asians into one group which totally ignores that this includes Chinese, Japanese, Korean, Vietnamese, Burmese, Bangladeshi, Filipinos, Indians, etc. It further ignores the fact that many students qualify for federal free/reduced lunch based on income.
If DiBlasio and Carranza are really serious about educational reform, then they will need to start with revamping the system from the ground up.
23
@klee9 Nonesense! The perceived reputation of those schools fell! The rigor of the courses wasn't lowered! There was a high attrition rate of students! They flunked out!!!
Articles like this number in the thousands and serve no purpose. Life is a competition. In my generation, Italian-Americans were discriminated against infinitely more than today's minorities. Despite a 165 IQ and being in the 99th percentile academically, Stuyvesant wasn't anywhere to be found on my radar. I didn't even know it existed. My poor, completely illiterate grandparents and barely literate parents, with whom my deaf sister and I lived in a single room, had no clue. Teachers or counselors never mentioned Stuyvesant! At the time, elite schools were almost exclusively Jewish (teachers and students) and DIVERSITY was not even a word in anyone's vocabulary. As I sit here in my daughter's 2+ million dollar DC home, enjoying the 24th year of my six figure pension from New York City, having just spoken to my other daughter living affluently in the shadow of the Eiffel Tower in Paris, I feel so sorry for myself and ponder just how much better my life would have been if I had the benefit of DIVERSITY! Or would it!!!
8
This story, if true, demonstrates without a doubt the overwhelming power and persistence of white privilege; it seems to me that the liberal de Blasio should have stepped in and demanded parity, But he didn't, which shows that all his talk about equality is just talk. Its time to walk the walk, de Blasio, put your money where your mouth is. Be a liberal if you must, but don't be a limousine liberal, like your predecessor John Lindsay. Thank you.
2
@Southern Boy Why is this about white privilege? The overwhelming majority of the kids in the most selective school are Asian.
5
@Anna
If so, then all of the non-Asian applicants and their parents should be outraged. Why does it have to be about privilege? Well, it seems that everything else is. When the liberals see a white person achieving something, they did it because of privilege. Like somehow they don't deserve it. White males are indoctrinated at the universities that they are there because of privilege. So, yes, it is all about privilege, and the liberals have made it so. Thank you.
@Southern Boy
Actually, this story demonstrates without a doubt that those who seize educational opportunity and are willing to cram for stupid standardized exams have a shot at accomplishing something great.
Please take a little time and educate yourself about the NYC public school system before you make judgments without having all the needed information.
1
Spell it: L O T T E R Y for all qualified students.
Everything de Blasio touches turns to garbage. His main issue was housing yet the housing authority is in such poor shape in his second term that it was nearly taken over completely by the feds a few minths ago. He says he believes in mass transit and yet the subway has fallen apart under his watch. He says he wants to diversify NYC’s public schools and the exact opposite happens. The man is not qualified to run a pretzel cart, let along America’s largest city. And he thinks he could be President?
17
Watering down tests and requirements is never the answer. The NYS Regents exam, say in Chemistry, has had topic after topic removed. No more orbitals and subshells. No more pH calculations. No more electrochemical cell potentials. No more thermal equilibrium of mixtures of substances at different temperatures, etc. Barely any balancing of equations. If this is not enough, the scoring on many exams has been turned into some kind of comedy show. It used to be in algebra there were 30 short answers worth 2 points each, and a choice of 4 out of seven long answers worth 10 apiece. 65 was passing. Now, there is some indecipherable conversion from raw scores to final scores. I believe a math teacher told me you can pass with what used to be in the 30s.
Whichever geniuses decided that diluting curricula and scoring was the key to success, ought to take a good look at the results these have produced. It seems like self-esteem was the goal, not education. In the end, you have no education, no self-esteem, and a generation consigned to poverty. Please don't repeat the mistakes of the past.
12
The way to address this problem is to improve the primary education of black children, not to lower academic standards of the specialized schools.
9
Don't forget the ultra-Orthodox Jewish children. I am informed that they sometimes receive almost no secular education. This irreparably harms the child, who is kept in an intellectual cage, and the larger society, which need an informed, educated electorate.
When the Hasidic "block vote" becomes powerful enough, how will this impact the public schools system?
As a lawyer and DA candidate, I am fighting for these children in Rockland County.
4
Sanctioning merit while rewarding mediocrity meaning RIP Stuyvesant.
5
Asian students are better at science. Period. That's not racist, it's years of data. Black students are not as gifted in that curriculum. That doesn't mean we need to rethink admissions. It means black (and white) students need to study harder in science. I taught for 13 years. I saw the difference in skills first hand. Much of it had to do with family support (or lack of).
12
Family values are important.
There are families who culture love, hard work and responsibility.
There are families that just want to live on the government expenses, smoke pot and eat junk food.
Who are the ones most likely to succeed?
Socialism doesn’t fix anything!
2
Just because the entering classes to the Specialized High Schools are majority Asian does not mean that there is a problem with diversity.
The category “Asian” lumps together several very different cultures and 60% of the world’s population.
9
I am told there is no more grading in France. Everybody gets a fair chance, and the majority of students fail their first year of college and get weeded out. Dumbing down doesn’t work and is a waste of precious resources. Spend it where it matters, from pre-k to the end of high school in disadvantaged schools and we will make a difference!
1
This wouldn’t be an issue if NYC wasn’t filled with horrible public schools. Fix the system so all students get high quality educations! It shouldn’t matter what high school you go to in the city - they should all be top notch.
6
@Andrew - or at the very least competent. The elephant in the room is that so much is at stake when kids take the test. One goes of a cliff educationally with NYC high schools.
1
There is a choice between high academic standards and racial diversity. Time to grow up, face reality and make an honest decision which choice is most important.
4
I'd love to see a comparison of the top 50 black students who failed to get into this school 15 years ago with the bottom 50 accepted students of any race. Let's see where they landed. My guess is there won't be much difference. Character is destiny, not pedigree.
1
Go to school every day, pay attention in class, do the homework.
5
The problem isn’t that the specialized schools conditioned entry upon intelligence and achievement, it’s that so few Black students in NYC measure up. That’s not the fault of the selective schools; it’s the fault of Black parents and the other schools.
The simple fact is that the doors to these schools ARE open and no reform of the selective schools is necessary. Reform of their feeder schools (and Black families) is another matter entirely.
Put simply, identity politics nose counting inevitably produces living, breathing victims of racial discrimination. Civil rights laws require that we treat everyone as individuals, not as representatives of their particular identity group. (Where, for instance, are the statistics about the numbers of Irish Catholic admitted? Do those numbers equal their percentage in NYC? Why aren’t we breaking down the numbers for left-handed Jews? Or boys named Brian?)
ANY consideration of “diversity” inevitably requires group-think, to the detriment of identifiable individuals, denied opportunity solely on the basis of their race.
In short, the story here is not that choosy schools are overwhelmingly Asian and white (and, likely, within that last cohort, Jewish) but that so few Black parents and other schools are preparing Black kids for an academically rigorous program.
3
NYC - where the women are strong, the men are good-looking, and all the children are above average.
6
No, No, No...stop this nonsense. I’m Chinese and took this text many years ago and I didn’t make it to any specialize High School. I got no one to blame but myself because I did not try hard enough. Everyone have the same opportunity taking this test. It’s a fair game. You got to earn it. My son just took the same test this year, him too didn’t get into any specialize high school. I’m still proud because he got the same opportunity like everyone else. He did his best so there’s nothing to be ashamed of. We both understand one thing very clear...we got to earn it! Stop making this issue into race!!!
10
How about opening more such high schools? Seems like the demand by students exceeds the supply of seats. And where are the studies that examine any connection between a student's score on this test and that student's success in one of these schools? If there is some sort of threshold effect, then all students who clear the threshold should be entered in a lottery. This is a quick fix. What needs to be addressed is the imbalance in successful test takers, and that means looking all the way back to kindergarten and the lives of all the city's children in their homes and neighborhoods. Been there, done that in the City of Milwaukee for applicants to UW-System. No easy fixes, folks, and age 16 is too late.
3
This is not a racial issue, but rather a public school education quality issue in general. And eliminating the entrance exams won’t resolve the problem. If we take a look at the demographic distribution of the top private schools in New York City, you will find that the majority are whites and then the Asians. However, the percentage of Hispanics and African Americans students are higher than those figures in top specialized public schools. The long term is to fix the elementary and middle schools in all districts, but offering a racially targeted scholarship for Hispanics and African American students (including providing tutoring service if the students lag once in the selected high school) could be a feasible short-term solution.
1
I think there are schools to prepare applicants who almost but not quite fit into service academies. Why not provide a school where kids could live and study for a year to prepare for Stuyvesant?
Boston has about 16 public high schools. Two of them are "exam schools". You need to take a test for acceptance to an "exam school". Most students want to attend these two schools. Why not have 16 exam schools where there is an attempt to match the interests and needs of students with the programs each schools offers ? The current system is not working.
2
"Larry Cary, president of the Brooklyn Technical High School alumni foundation, said the numbers did not highlight a flaw in the admissions system, but rather the general lack of high-quality education for black and Hispanic students."
I agree 100 %. The test is not an especially difficult one. It is essentially a watered down SAT test. If so few Black/Hispanic students are able to pass it then this means that their schools are not teaching them anything. Mr De Blasio and his esteemed chancellor should concentrate on improving schools so that more Black/Hispanic students can pass a basic Math/English test. Instead, they are attacking the test. I guess blaming the test is a lot easier. That is why, although I vote Democratic most of the time, I can't stand NYC Democrats. I have voted for Giuliani and Bloomberg...
7
I remember once, at a friend's wedding, I was introduced to a young Chinese student in high school at Stuyvesant. He had a pronounced accent and clearly wasn't from New York originally.
I asked him about his background and he told me he'd come from China as a top math student to live with his aunt and take the magnet schools entrance exam here in the city. I doubt he was the only such case of a top student who made the trip to NYC for that reason. The competition for Stuyvesant is becoming global, as global elites recognize it as a feeder for the ivy leagues.
9
@EZE Thanks for sharing this. NYC DOE is this the norm?
And that kid should get a green card and citizenship don’t force him to go back because his student visa expired. Why is American liberalism so enthralled with mediocrity. I realize meritocracy is not as fair as it used to be but mediocrity is not what made America the place everyone wanted to get into.
1
Maybe the school district should offer the special tutoring and help that rich people buy--and make it available to any demographic that is under represented in these elite schools.
3
@Terry Lowman - yes, exactly!
1
Yeah I am pretty sure that lots of those Asian kids who succeed are not rich they just choose books over Jordan’s and home cooked meals over McDonalds. They choose to make their kids successful and don’t look
3
These results are breathtakingly sad and I don't think we can assume there is some simple fix. As so many commentators have pointed out, the problem begins 12 years in the past and any remedy will only bear fruit 12 years in the future.
You can't engineer a solution by changing the standards.
8
This article focuses heavily on the results and not on the root cause of the problem: public education.
Scrapping the test would make Stuyvesant, along with all the other high schools, just another high school. I would love to see more diversity among the schools, but why not talk about the politics of public education and access to resources?
8
What isn't mentioned is the importance of the 'family' and its interest in the importance of academics. Most students who excel have families that back them all the way....perhaps there should be a coaching program to show parents how to help their kids along?
16
@Cathy - you put forward a great idea, and it would help to feature families who are also low income with unpredictable work schedules to talk about how they set high standards, delay immediate gratification - and how they handle something as simple as not understanding the homework that their child comes home with.
2
There is a conflict between progressives seeking to validate and acclaim diverse cultures whose values may differ markedly from those of mainstream America -- such as industriousness, deferred gratification and academic excellence -- while at the same time saying that the rewards offered by the system built on those very values should be shared equally among those who reject the values and those who have adhered to them and displayed merit and achievement based on them.
14
We have a similar situation in Northern Virginia at the Thomas Jefferson High School for Science and Technology – a public high school. Three times in recent years both US News and Newsweek have ranked it the #1 high school in the U.S.
The school has a supercomputer and a planetarium (donated by industry). A satellite designed by the students was placed into orbit. When it comes to language, courses are offered in Chinese, Japanese, German, French, Russian, and Latin. Until two years ago the school looked downright shabby. The 50-year buildings were substandard, with many students attending class in trailers. The taxpayers recently funded a long overdue major renovation. Most graduate stay in state and go on to the Univ of Virginia or Virginia Tech, followed by MIT, Harvard, Princeton and Stanford.
Students are admitted based on an examination, and enrollment is 74% Asian, 22% white, and 4% Hispanic or Black. These numbers do not reflect the local demographics, and since it is a public high school there are complaints. The county has launched programs to provide free tutoring, but without much success. Attempts to reduce the entrance requirements have been vigorously rejected - so far.
9
The problem is not who gets in, the problem is that the existing public school system does not produce students who can.
15
The Times covered this two years ago. Asian families spend more on tutoring to do well on the exam to gain admission than do non-Asian families. And, so, Asians out-perform on the exam. As the exam is the SOLE criterion for admissions, IF you want to diversify the student body, either you offer exam score adjustments based on socio-economic condition (likely a Constitutional worry), or you do away with the exam as other large cities have done. In the meantime, we should at least abandon the fantasy that students at these schools are smart. They are good at taking one test. Just as children at private schools are not smart. They are good at gaining admission to schools geared towards wealthy applicants.
6
@LongTimeFirstTime Cramming alone wouldn't make the difference. The students who pass the admission test have been lifelong readers and have developed good study habits throughout their lives. They have the foundation, built over many years, and whatever special tutoring or cramming they take is only the icing on the cake.
9
@Remembers History
It sounds like that makes sense. It's just not true. I passed the exam as a child with tutoring. I wasn't a lifelong reader. Read this: https://www.nytimes.com/2017/10/25/magazine/asian-test-prep-centers-offer-parents-exactly-what-they-want-results.html
This is a complex problem that probably has multiple, maybe inter-related causes (i.e. structural racial bias, class and family wealth effects, family norms and emphasis on educational goals, psychological handicapping, allocation or limits of resources in the public system as a whole, siphoning off of high testing African Amercan and Latinx to private and charter schools, and conceivably even a genetic component). Are there objective and non-agenda driven studies out there that try, in a granular and non reductionist way, to look at the reasons why racial disparities in testing results persist? (I'm also guessing that any possible solutions could be difficult to impossible to achieve).
3
The elephant in the room that this article, and the whole specialized high school discussion, fails to acknowledge is the prevalence of charter schools in communities of color. Many of these schools are K-12. Practically speaking, there is no incentive for students of color to apply to a specialized high school when they can just stay with the the school network they already attend. If the DOE is serious about enrolling students of color in the specialized high schools, charter school growth should be curtailed.
6
The incentive is that these specialized high schools are far, far more respected than any NYC charter school. What I'd like to see is the prevalence of students taking/doing well on the SHSAT out of charter schools.
1
I'm an African American female and I graduated from Brooklyn Tech in 1976. The school was pretty diverse then Asians, Whites ,Blacks , and some Hispanics. The problem isn't the test it's that NYC public schools are failing students. Where are the talented and gifted programs in elementary and middle school? Rigor has to start in the early grades not just in high school. You can't just teach to the test and expect that students who are poorly prepared will do well. Quotas aren't the answer they're just a quick and bad "solution".
NYC public schools are failing Black and Hispanic students across the board. Fix the problems in the schools, fix the public education system and you'll have more Black and Hispanic students entering the Specialized High Schools.
It will take time, money and resources but ALL NYC students will be able to compete, not just on the test, but in our global economy.
20
I was so shocked by this article that I was compelled to go back and check on my class at Stuyvesant.
I graduated in 1978 and according to the yearbook, out of a class of 700, there were 84 black kids. There was a fairly sizable "Black Students Club", which would probably be a pretty paltry gathering today.
I then counted the number of Asian kids (including myself), and there were only 111.
I can recall returning for special events a few years after I'd graduated and noticing how much more Asian-heavy the student population had become. More than that, you could tell that the Asian kids were the leaders in many of the social cliques that you always see in high schools.
I can't say how going to Stuyvesant today would be different from how it was when I was there (other than being in an entirely different building), but I can't help but wonder how much the kids are missing out on because of this stark lack of diversity as compared to the city as a whole. Fortunately for them, all they need to do is walk out the school doors and they're surrounded by it again.
In closing, I know that at least for me, one of my motivations for taking the test and wanting to go to Stuyvesant was to *escape* the fate of having to attend my local high school. For 3 out of my 4 years, I rode an hour and a half each way from Staten Island to get there. I met my dearest friends in high school and I'm happy that I had the chance to have the experience.
8
@maisany
This is fascinating. And, this is how NYC has changed in 40 years. It used to be a much more diverse and mixed place. No more.
1
It pains to see higher education and race tied together. We have to move away from this and see education with a different lens. A person skilled at running a business need not be an MBA from Stanford and neither is a creative idea requires a Ph. D.
The problem we face today is the proliferation of standardized tests and politicization of education. Somehow it has gotten into everyone's head that a college degree automatically will lead to higher pay and hence every race must race to get there to become economically equal.
Let us rethink how we educate students in middle school and high school. We need to seek the best in our students and nurture their abilities and not force everyone to take a common curriculum of science, math, etc. Students do hard work if they like what they do. A model citizen who values hard work and ethically responsible will be successful irrespective of his race or education level.
5
The very best idea is to make every school in every city absolutely top-notch.
7
You’re correct, Jeff. I’ve also been thinking that the best idea to combat poverty is to make sure that absolutely everyone is rich. For that matter, the best solution for crime is to make sure that absolutely everyone is good.
6
The city's attempt to address this were pathetic. The Specialized High School program was a joke. It went on for over a year and was preparing them for skills totally unrelated to the SHSAT exam.
Also AOC's comments are on par. There are decent alternatives to these schools, and we should focus on making more.
Also the writers all seem to misunderstand a major point. There is no defined cut off score at any of these schools. There are effective cutoff scores based on the number of applicants and how they prioritize this at time of the test. If every student suddenly chose Brooklyn Latin as their first choice -- that would have the highest cutoff.
Therefore if we got other schools that could rival these in attractiveness we would have an organic solution.
4
As a parent, you should know what is required as far as education goes, to best prepare your child. In this day and age, many parents plan their kids path through schools, which Kindergarten, through grade schools, and into Elite Prep Schools such as this one. I'm assuming it isn't free, correct? And if the black children's parents planned ahead, even a year or two or three, they would make sure they knew what was required on that entrance exam. I'm sure most of the rest of the kids did. And their parents . They don't leave anything to chance.
7
These tests are administered at age 13 years old for Stuy etc and 4 years old and 11 years old for Hunter high school, which also happen to be predominant first gen Asian from low income communities, and the demographic make up for Hunter is similar to Stuy and the other best schools. You can't really test prep a 4 year old to explain away the fact that some children have a higher IQ, even within the same family.
On a personal note, I am not the smartest person in the world, actually extremely far from it when it comes to wisdom, but I received admission into Bx Science etc, so the test is not that hard even for people who are not naturally bright like I am.
9
The heart of the problem is not the test. The test is the thermometer, the patient is the school system,the desease is inequality and the victims will be the students. The school system is and has been plagued by neighborhood political infighting and inequality - White versus Asian versus Minority, wealthy versus poor, etc. There was a time were these schools were dominated by American students, then Jewish students and now Asian students. Arguments over time, on both sides have not changed. State and city politicians point at each other. The system is the most segregated in the nation. Resources are not allocated to address the obvious needs - the framework is always a win-lose contest between PTAs, teachers, political parties, neighborhoods, ethnic, racial and religious groups. In the end the students and the society lose.
Build a school system that educates all students to the best of their abilities and the test will cease to be an issue. The test is not the problem, the education system is.
5
@W.S. I think you already have a system that educates your students to the best of their abilities. The problem is that not all students have the same abilities, and do therefore need or utilize different schools and different programmes.
If you can not pass the entry-tests to some schools, that may be seen as a clear signal that you should seek another course to steer.
6
@W.S. "There was a time were these schools were dominated by American students, then Jewish students and now Asian students." What does this mean? Is it suggesting that the Jewish students and the Asian students are not American citizens? Unlikely. Otherwise, the entrance exam for these schools is a good indicator of the job our public schools are doing in different communities. Since I don't believe any one group is inherently smarter than the others the answer must be in the circumstances of each group. Is each group composed of intact families, where the parents are educated, education is respected, and the students attend good schools? Surely not. The government cannot do very much about intact families other than encourage them. And it can also encourage a respect for education. Kind of late to affect parental education. But it can fix the schools. It's about the schools. Every kid, White, Black, Hispanic, or Asian should get a quality education K-8. Then the results would be more similar. Although intact families and parental education would always factor in. It's about the schools K-8. It's about a basic quality education for every student.
You are wrong, our public education system is a massive failure. It doesn’t teach most children anything, and certainly not the basic educational abilities required to pass a somewhat difficult test.
The worst thing that’s happened to this country is the voucher system that allows people to remove their tax dollars from public schools. Home schooling is unacceptable except for severe illness. Until we accept that there need to be national educational standards that level the playing field, we will continue our slide off the world stage.
1
For the SAT, Khan Academy set up an excellent free test prep system that works better than most paid tutoring, and in so doing democratizes the test, eliminating the advantage for those who can afford test prep.
Why doesn't NYC partner with with Khan Academy so that all students can benefit from free test prep that many students pay for today?
17
In a city of 10 million people and 1.1 million schoolchildren, is that really the best use of Khan Academy? Or the time the NY Mayor devotes to this subject?
@Simon On A Plane - it's absolutely no sacrifice at all to help other people. Our child is a straight A student and one of the top athletes in our region, in part because our family helps other students with academics and sports training, not in spite of helping other students. The bonus-that it feels good- is apparently not for everyone, but from a selfish perspective, it absolutely helps wealthier children achieve when they feel the responsibility to help others due to extra practice time, the fact that you spend more effort thinking about a subject when you're teaching it to others, and valuing what you have because you see other people don't have it- and so you work harder to be worth it.
2
The problem with this type of de facto segregation in primary schooling is that it creates a "caste" system, based on race and very linear thinking (the "bubble"). I don't pretend to even remotely suggest that forced integaration is the answer to this conundrum. Contrary to liberal dogma, there is likely a natural difference in IQs at the mean for different segments of the human population, but the trick is to figure out how to stop the systemic distortions of those differences. To me, even the most radical proponents of natural selection cannot defend a system that allocates 75% of its class to a 10% minority group. Thus, regardless of whether you are a proponent of nature or nurture, the system is broken from a purely mathematical perspective.
3
Two comments. First, I disagree with the characterization of Stuyvesant as the "most selective." That distinction belongs to Bronx Science (my alma mater).
But seriously, in the 'burbs we see the same criticisms but with a slightly different perspective. Old time whites lament the fact that all the academic awards in their schools consistently go to students from the far east and the Indian subcontinent, to the exclusion of the "privileged whites." The answer is simple: some students have a significantly greater work ethic and a family support network. Is it contrary to our concept of "fairness" that some students have a good support system at home and succeed, and others do not? We have been jaded to believe that everyone should be rewarded equally, irrespective of opportunity. It is not about wealth. Asians often have very low incomes. It is about--- how important do you value an education and what are you willing to invest in the way of time and effort to achieve it?
16
@PMM yes it is contrary to the concept of fairness that students whose parents pay for test prep or push their student to take a test are set up for life and those Students who weren’t born into the right family
It shouldn’t depend on your parents whether you go to a great high school or get swept under the rug.
1
@Connor
Who should it depend on, then? If the parents are neglectful or ignorant and don't help their children succeed, who should do the work?
If our lives shouldn't depend on our parents, why don't we take all the kids and let the State raise them? That should ensure equality, no?
Public schools that deny access to any student based on a test score serve no academic purpose whatsoever. We need to stop mining our integrated schools for easiest-to-educate kids, and redouble our efforts to make sure all kids are challenged in integrated schools.
2
@Chris Moth Exactly.
Taxpayer dollars shouldn't be going to fund the specialized school if the test is the only determinate to get it. We already know there is a disparity in public schools across the city. The test is just showing you that. In a city with one of if the largest population of African Americans, only 8 admissions into Stuyvesant doesn't signal a problem, it signals a crisis.
Until we can solve it, the Elite Public Schools need criteria that make testing only one factor in admissions, community service, socialization skills, skill in the arts are just some that should be considered and could level the playing field if not make better elementary and junior high schools all around.
@Chris Moth
Ask any good teacher. Some students have higher IQs than others. Some students understand the work; some don't -- no matter how the problems are presented. Some students study hard, some study somewhat, some don't study at all.
The only way all students will do as well in school -- and life -- as all the rest is to reduce passing grades so that the least able will ace the tests.
2
@Jennifer G
So we get classes full of kids who have friendly smiles and great dance moves and are kind to animals and the poor, but can't diagram a sentence or find the area of a circle or name one bone in a human body?
Sounds like the horrible school I escaped from when I was a kid.
2
it would be very instructive to know which middle schools produced the kids who were accepted to the schools and whether they are local/zoned schools or g&t schools.
the issue is not the high schools, the issue is the disparity of the education received in elementary and middle schools.
if you fix the primary learning the high schools ultimately fix themselves.
7
Admission to Stuyvesant is based on ability. If you don’t have ability due to “systemic racism”, you still don’t have ability without remediation. That might be worth doing for most schools, but should not be a burden for an elite institution charged with developing further the most talented students. Not every school needs to be about social justice.
28
@QED It's a public school, paid for by all public tax-payers. Stuyvesant is a private school pretending to be public. It's shameful.
2
The testing of students to determine their qualifications is working. The students who achieve a high score on the test have worked hard to do so. It's a gender, race and color blind metric that insures that those admitted have the abilities that the schools' curriculum requires.
33
"The students who achieve a high score on the test have worked hard to do so". Right, so only seven black NYC students worked hard enough. @Vincent
1
Why do we think about this different from college? Why do NYC public school admissions tests represent a fair meritocracy while college standardized tests do not?
The consensus from most of the comments on this article is that we should not get rid of the admissions exam. While I think this is a valid viewpoint, I wonder why the NYT readership community - who would overwhelmingly agree that basing college admissions purely off SAT/ACT scores has integration issues - see this situation differently.
To me, they reflect the same questions: does a pure test score reflect meritocracy or do you have to "adjust" for those who had a less advantageous education background (whether that is elementary school in this case or high school in the instance of college)? Is it best to let in those that are most ready now, or let in folks who may not be as ready now but have untapped potential.
2
Either you make the cut or you do not...skin pigmentation has nothing to do with it. What does impact is intellectual ability and socialization.
23
The strong cultural academic focus of Asian Americans should be a clear reminder that there are no shortcuts. We all should be inspired by this culture of hard work and dedication and emulate it. Other communities need to take responsibility and make sure children are reaching early school years ready to learn with the tools necessary.
33
This sensationalist headline is followed by offering just enough data to convince the naïve that the SHSAT-based admission process is the problem. Integrating the elite public high schools as a policy challenge is a distraction from the real challenge, which is to provide high quality educational opportunities to children in the city’s public schools, regardless of their ethnic background or residential neighborhood. This administration has not made much progress in that regard, as witnessed by the lack of results of various programs. But it is certainly eager to spend public money studying how to increase diversity, and to commit itself to the obsessive pursuit of change in the admission criteria of three elite high schools in order to sell the impression of a great policy achievement to naïve voters.
19
@Maureen Steffek - your comment is probably the best one here. Please keep fighting the good fight and telling the truth about the state of education.
@Thadeus - I just got back from tutoring fourth-graders in multiplication in a city school this morning, which means I'll be working late tonight to make up that time. And when my child signs up for extracurricular programs, we often sponsor another child to enroll too- we do it anonymously through the coach or the program coordinator, and they pick a family in need. My child also runs a summer math and sports program at a community center, and is very passionate about doing good-but, more so, he enjoys the fact that the kids are very unspoiled and eager to learn. We've also hosted a fresh air fund guest-the same boy- every year for the past seven years. And he comes during the school year now that our families know each other, and we tutor him, buy him clothes, and send him home with lots of books.
We encourage everybody to help make up the learning gap in our country. From a democratic perspective, it feels good to do good - and from a conservative perspective, it feels good to know that we are investing in children's future gainful employment. We have done this for a long time because we feel very grateful for my (teacher) parents giving us a great head start, and my financial aid to a top school.
We're making a difference.
My question is-why don't you do the same? Why doesn't everybody who has the means to?
4
@common sense advocate
We do not have a responsibility (of any kind---legal, ethical, moral, etc) to sacrifice our family to help anyone. Period.
6
@Simon
It isn't a question of having the responsibility. People who are willing to help others get a leg up should be lauded and provide an example for others who are questioning how they can help. Nobody is forcing anyone to follow this example. Period.
1
@Zoned
I disagree. Unless all of your retirements are fully funded, your kids future schools are fully saved for, you have zero debt, etc. then your only obligation should be to your family first. Take care of your own, and when you have completed that job in its entirety then look to helping others. Charity should be saved for only those who can truly afford it (i.e., more resources that one's family could ever utilize, and for generations).
3
Intact families with parents who encourage and facilitate education, as well as a surrounding culture that honors hard work, deferred gratification, knowledge, and self-restraint (as opposed to getting high, getting laid, being cool, and glamour) have generally been the ingredients of high academic achievement. I recommend we look to these cultural factors if we want all children to achieve their highest and best potentials.
20
@Bill Smith - following up on your comment, perhaps academically successful low income families could be brought into to speak to families during early elementary school about how they urge their child's academic achievement in spite of long working hours, unpredictable work schedules, and not enough money to go around. I would repeat the ad hoc counseling process again in middle school-because middle school is where we lose a lot of kids too- when the parents have no idea how to help them with homework, and they are embarrassed.
4
Recall in the article that they mentioned that many of the Asian students were poor. The struggles of poverty do not preclude a focus on education. You have to go above and beyond showing up to class everyday to excel. You have to make it a priority in life. That’s a choice.
2
@Bill Smith
Agreed Bill. A good family upbringing, with a mom and dad in the household, an emphasis on education, and not having children until after you are married are all highly correlated with success and happiness in later life
The reason that all City high schools are not Brooklyn Tech is that Tech offers advanced curricula that kids who lack advanced skills cannot manage. Elite, selective schools are the conduit to the professions for gifted, working and middle-class NYC kids. Eliminating the admissions test would be a very dumb move.
It is highly unlikely - impossible - that only 7 kids of color in NYC are sufficiently smart to acquire the skills needed to earn the test scores required for admission. Something else is going on here.
First, are African-American kids at inner city middle schools encouraged to prepare for and take the test? At my working-class junior high, P.S. 142 - albeit years ago - we girls were not told that we could take an elite school admission test, despite the fact that we were in special progress classes, had skipped a grade, and had high enough IQs to be admitted to SP. Only boys took the test; most boys in my year went on to Tech, with one, a Hispanic kid, getting into Stuyvesant.
Second, do these numbers account for black students who are recruited for elite programs such as Prep for Prep? If an additional 7 gifted kids went to PFP, that's an potential 100% increase in Stuyvesant admissions. The numbers may be misleading.
Third, what prep are we providing for gifted students of color? The prep should start in preschool for kids in poor neighborhoods. Tracking and intensive tutoring can compensate for cultural challenges.
The test, however, should stay.
12
@RCT
You bring up a good point. I wanted to go to Hunter HS, but my parents knew nothing nor cared about how to get me there. I had the grades, but nobody at my Junior High School offered me any information on applying. I'm so glad that these specialized high schools are now open to all sexes. A male member of my family was tracked into Brooklyn Tech.
These high schools are open to all races. We need guidance counselors , teachers and courses that prepare children for these rigorous high schools so they can pass the tests and succeed once they are accepted.We should not forget that these high provide a leg up for those who don't have the money for elite private schools, but have the ability to learn at an accelerated pace. They are already equalizers.
4
@Zoned Ironically, although my JHS did not track girls into the high school
admission test, my elementary school, PS 58, had a progressive woman principal, Dr. Sloan, who nominated me and another girl – hello Marilyn, if you’re reading this- we had the highest IQs among all students in the sixth grade - to take the test for Hunter middle school. I was accepted,
but my parents, like yours, did not
recognize the opportunity, did
not want their 11 year old (I had
already skipped a grade) to travel out of the neighborhood, let alone the boro, and had no idea how to transport me to Hunter from Brooklyn, particularly since my mother and father both worked. I attended the SP in my neighborhood junior high,
and lost any opportunity I might’ve had to attend an elite high school due to the failure of the junior high to track girls into the test. My sister attended middle school in a better neighborhood – we had moved - took the test, and was admitted to Bronx Science. Once again, my parents intervened, and she instead attended a neighborhood high school. These lost opportunities really rankle both of us, and make me even more skeptical of arguments that poor kids have the same opportunities to prepare for and take the test as do middle and upper class kids. Definitely the test must say- the prep process and accessibility should change.
3
Whatever it's called, this is not fair., and before anyone says life's not fair (which it surely isn't), this is ridiculous.
Yes, life isn't fair; in fact, it's also usually unforgiving. If some people (after being repressed for centuries) need a little more help than others, then do so.
But no; it's the status quo, and who you know.
2
@Easy Goer
The help needs to be given in the earlier years of education before it is too late.
1
The city must do the hard work of fixing bad schools and parents must do the hard work of teaching their kids the value of diligence, hard work, and ambition. Racial quotas to be achieved by manipulation and dilution of the current admissions system are an easy way to produce the desired numbers and give the mayor bragging rights without removing the underlying problems of poor parenting and poor schools.
13
I admit it. I helped my kids "cheat" to get ahead academically. Every year since first grade, I've bought $40 worth of workbooks and made them do 20 minutes of extra work every day, including school breaks. They're also not allowed TV, video games durring the week. And I made them read aloud, or me to them, 15 to 20 minutes a day. Cheaters like me ought to be punished! Send my kids to the back of the bus!
86
I believe we live in a society where every single person is equal in rights and responsibilities . Giving one especific group a free pass while others have work hard it is not fair. It's not up for these schools to fix the the results of a broken socialist educational system that has been going one for years.
9
@Montesquieu
Remove the word socialist and I agree. The fact that everyone has a right to go to school is socialism.
I'm seeing a lot of posts this morning blaming black families for not "nurturing" their children enough to get into these schools, which in so many ways is adding insult to injury, and once again, blaming black people for a system that does not serve them. As the parent to a black son, I have to say upon reading this morning that Stuyvesant only accepted 7 black students, I'm rethinking whether my own child would be happy and fulfilled going to a place that demonstratably is so uninterested in him and who he represents: where he will be one of very few like himself; where he will separated from his friends, family and community members; where he will never "fit in"; where he will be vulnerable to the sort of racist incidents I have heard have been happening at Stuyvesant recently; where what he faces in life as a black man will not be supported or understood. Would going to one of these "selective" schools truly be in his best interest? Right now, I'm doubting it, and I suspect lots of the other black families who are being accused this morning as not "loving" their children enough to spend their time grooming them for schools that do not welcome them are having the same doubts.
5
@Allecram
The "system" you mention serves all...all who are willing to put in the deferred gratification to meet the standards.
2
@Allecram
You forget the many students who attend these schools who are not racist and the opportunity your son would provide to those who have not had an opportunity to interact with other races to show that we are all part of the human nation.
Sometimes there is an unintentional reverse prejudice at play. Why deny your son the opportunity to get an education commensurate with his ability.
1
There is a criteria to get into these specialized schools and it should not be watered down. The best qualified students should get in. The National Football League has 80% black athletes, and according to the U.S. census, the black population is 13.4% and the white population is 76.6%. The best get to play football and that's what it should be for high schools. It starts with getting better education in grade school and middle school to prep for high school.
19
Yeah, the test is probably biased. Against students who don’t study enough.
37
@XLER. Or, regretably, are just not that smart. Lots of times trying as hard as you can, and studying as much as you can, just isn’t enough. To think everyone, or even all ethnic groups, are equally intelligent is the height of ignorance and/or delusion. The sooner we face the truth, the quicker we can find alternative solutions.
Ah, yes, the bigotry of low expectations.
Scrapping a demanding test because black and Latino students don’t perform as well as others confirms that so-called ‘progressives’ expect those minorities to perform poorly. And it often seems ‘progressives’ do everything they can to enable such poor performance.
Imagine how much better this nation could be if ‘progressives’ demanded the same high standards of everyone.
16
De Blasio can jigger the criteria all he wants. That still won't make the black and Hispanic students who are admitted under the water-downed criteria smarter or even better academically prepared. What will happen first is that they will struggle to keep up and may suffer blows to their self-confidence and may even drop out. Then the curriculum will be watered-down because their poor performance at Stuyvesant will somehow be due to "racist" teachers and "biased" exams. Then Stuyvesant will no longer be Stuyvesant and the smart, hard-working Asian students will simply go to other schools, and you'll see several high schools in Queens eventually rise to be the best schools in Queens. When that happens, does De Blasio want to bus the black and Hispanic students there, too? You can't follow success around; you have to make it, and starts at the home, early in life.
The low admission rates of black and Hispanic students to the specialized high schools aren't the problem; they're just the symptom of the problem. The worst doctors try to fix just the symptoms while ignoring the root cause of the disease. Fix the disease, De Blasio.
23
@Alison
The low admission rates of black and Hispanic students … may be due to the fact that the higher achieving black and Hispanic parents moved to the suburbs.
As far as I can tell Diblasio is the disease you NYC voters are the doctor. stop voting him into office you will have better outcomes. Also please explain to this Chicagoan how your voting system works it appears his wife used the votes cast for him as a way into public office even though she was never on the ballot.
This is worse than a poll tax. Shame on NY.
1
Why is everything judged as "black and white?" What percentage of kids from single parent households qualified? Born to mothers under 18? How about education level of parents? There is no quick fix and you can't just treat the symptoms.
12
This article ignores the cultural disparities of the groups mentioned. Asian students are pushed from day one to work and study. By and large this is missing from the other groups. Test prep at the end of grade school can only narrow the gap between them. We don’t need better schools as much as we need better parents.
12
Test scores aren't the only. the true , or most meaningful measure of intelligence and potential. Exclusively using test scores is akin to using race, or athleticism, or some other feature to determine the academic promise of a person.
There is no one metric that should be used. Every type of measure of potential has limitations but a range of approaches, not including race since it is divisive and not particularly meaningful, should be considered.
A result that 67% of the kids in a school are Asian American means that the testing metric is out of control.
1
They mentioned in the article that the Asian students are poor. So this is not about wealth or about white privilege. It’s about culture. The Asian culture respects education. The students are self driven (influenced by culture) to work very hard and focus their time on learning to achieve success in life. They deserve every seat in the school that they have EARNED. Anyone can earn it. Put in the work required. Expose the other cultures to this concept and if they choose to embrace it, great. If not, that is their choice.
2
@Paul
Back in the 1940s & 1950s, Stuyvesant was almost 100% Jewish. I believe their alumni have done very well.
Was the testing metric out of control then?
1
@Paul. No it doesn’t, not any more than there is a greatly outsized percentage of blacks in the NBA. Wake up!
1
When I went to Brooklyn Tech in the early 90s the percentage of black students attending was near 40%. How do we explain the precipitous drop in meritorious black students?
4
@Alaricius I also went to tech in the 90s, and black students were well-represented there, though I was never privy to a breakdown of demographic data at the time. I also have not seen the data regarding New York's overall demographics, but, as I pointed out in a comment right before this, I wonder if NY's demographics are shifting overall due to gentrification, and that there are fewer black students around to take these exams.
1
It doesn't seem like the admissions process ever favored black students in NY, but I have to wonder if the decline in recent years coincides in any way, shape or form with the fact that lower-income residents are being pushed out of lower-income neighborhoods every year to make room for more affluent residents.
2
The article states most of the Asian ancestry students are from poor families in poor neighborhoods. Poor is the same, regardless of ancestry. Is there a breakdown of students by family income? The article makes it sound as if the students are middle class and low-income, racial designation aside.
2
Whether or not standardized tests predict success in a competitive educational world is open to debate as has been shown by studies of the relationship of the SAT and ACT tests for success in college education. Nevertheless, such tests are not based on race. However success on the tests depends on educational opportunities offered to students that begin before kids even get to elementary school. If you want to see more poor minority kids get into elite high schools, don't waste effort trying to manipulate entrance exams. Instead give all kids the same opportunity to succeed by improving education from pre-school learning through elementary school.
3
This is history still in the making. People of color have never been given fair opportunities. Beginning from Grade 1 these students are in NYC Public Schools that do not provide them with the resources required to succeed. Look at the new schools built in the "upper class neighborhoods" and look at the schools in Brownsville and other predominately poor neighborhoods. It's just accepted that these students will not do well; so they don't receive the education they deserve. It is not because the teachers are not teaching. This is systemic problem that must be addressed early on because by the time these children graduate Middle School a majority of them don't have the skills or test taking experience needed for entry into these priority schools. These priority schools should partner with some of these schools in the poorer neighborhoods and mentor them. Give them a chance to flourish and let them understand that if given the opportunity-they can move forward out of the neighborhoods they are in. Does anyone really care to do something? This has been an initiative that has failed over and over again. Let us look at the real issues on a macro level not just a micro level here. Real change won't happen until someone steps into these elementary and middle level schools to make real change. Would someone please come up with a real plan to break the cycle !!!!
2
Not sure why we need these elite schools, whatever the entrance criteria might be. Schools should have a mix of kids, for lots of reasons.. Proponents always complain that the schools would be "ruined" and high-achievers would be harmed if admission standards were changed. Yet, high schools in Great Neck, Scarsdale, and Greenwich admit plenty of students who wouldn't get into Stuyvesant and no one feels bad for the high-achievers there.
5
@Marty
" high schools in Great Neck, Scarsdale, and Greenwich admit plenty of students who wouldn't get into Stuyvesant and no one feels bad for the high-achievers there." that's because parents paid for their demographic group with higher taxes....
2
My point is that high achievers can be well served even when there are lesser students in the same building. I'm not sure that you responded to this point in your comment.
Many people say that the solution is to "improve elementary and middle schools." But no one knows how to do that, and even if they did, the money isn't there to level the playing field with immigrants (such as my family, from China) selected for educational attainment, and with community knowledge about how to work the system. It is as much pie in the sky as, say, the Republican argument that Obamacare should be "repealed and replaced"--OK, with what, that will work in the reasonably near future?
2
It seems like the existence of these prestigious schools implies that those in the NYC school system who don’t go to them will be less successful. This is of course false but teenagers hardly know that. Therefore I suggest that the issue is the existence of the schools, not the admissions process. Boston has the same problem with the existence of Boston Latin School among the rest of the city public high schools.
2
With regards to these 'select' schools, I have often wondered why aren't all public schools the same anyways.
If the use of public money and government stipends used anyways, why aren't monies used to make all schools on the same level?
Why are certain schools offered more in terms of resources, teachers, books and such?
And yes, withing certain school, there could be advanced classes given to students who display a certain desire for such classes.
I don't get it.
Even here in Chicago, why does such division occur?
7
Because it’s not just the school it’s the students who make up the school. They work hard and want to achieve that’s why they are successful. That’s why the schools they choose to go to are coveted. People assume it’s the school and not the students.
1
The New York City school system is broken. Every school in every school district needs to be equal. All of the specialty elementary and middle schools need to be eliminated. It is unbelievable that pre-schoolers are tested for elementary school and elementary school students admission into specialized middle schools is based on the results of standardized test. We are putting our young children under too much pressure. NYC has created a scenario similar to many prominent colleges. It is unbelievable how many children are tutored so that they score highly on the standardized tests for admission to specialized elementary schools, middle schools and high schools. NYC has created a situation very similar to the one recently in the news about college admissions. This must stop. Children should allowed to be children. Bronx High School of Science, Brooklyn Tech, High School of Music and Art, and Stuyvesant have been around for decades and I fully support their existence. But, as we have entered into a very competitive environment, perhaps it is time to reconsider the admissions process. Perhaps tutoring needs to be banned. I am certain that will even out the playing field some. If you go outside of NYC the competition to get into specialized schools does not exist the way it does in NYC. Students go to the elementary school in their district, the middle school in their district and the high school in their district. And, the students do just fine.
4
@MetroNYPhysician I have 2 PhDs so you are saying I should be banned from tutoring my own kids? How you are going to enforce this.
8
@DL Valid question but what do your PhDs have to do with it?
You just don’t get it it’s not the schools it’s the students and their parents. Build an elite high school in a black neighborhood and right down the block in an Asian neighborhood. In ten years you lefties will want the Asian school to admit more blacks because the success rate is so much higher than that same school down the block in the black neighborhood. Why can’t you let especially Asians succeed without chaining their success to under achieving blacks.
1
I attended Music and Art High School in the '70's. Entrance to the school required an application and an audition. The purpose of the school was to offer specialized instruction to those students who showed a unique talent.
I felt bad for those who didn't make the cut, but that didn't mean they were failures, simply that they didn't have the talent.
My brother went to Bronx Science, I didn't make the cut there. He is an exceptionally bright man who has built a successful career in law.
These schools are not for everyone. To try to make them that eliminates their opportunity to help the best and the brightest excel.
26
What bothers me most about progressives and activists is the tendency to view differences in outcomes in many domains as ipso facto evidence of discrimination by race, ethnicity, gender, sexual orientation etc. The purpose of government is to level the playing field to create equal opportunities, but not to guarantee equal outcomes.
41
@Jake
Yes and this attitude only seems to apply to areas where whites and Asians are more “successful”. Nobody is calling for changes to increase diversity in certain high school, college and professional sports, for instance.
7
When, oh when, will not just New York, but America, recognize that quality education can't begin in high school or even middle school if we want kids to succeed?? The problem here is clearly not the high school entrance exam. The problem is that so many children in this country are being left behind beginning in pre-school by social, economic and racial inequities that leave them completely unprepared for ANY high school, let alone an elite high school-- or college, period. Until we seriously address that problem as the national crisis that it is, there will be no good solution to the problem of black and Hispanic under-representation in elite schools, public or private. Indeed, the fact that there ARE "elite" public schools tells you everything you need to know about a system that provides the best education to only a chosen few.
7
@Mojo
Actually the public schools in NY and elsewhere spend a lot more on "special ed" than on elites. Would you want a system which does not develop the ability of gifted students? That would be a terrible waste.
The teachers' unions have lowered the quality of much of public education at every level, and students are graduated with no skills and knowledge all the time. Add to that that children are not like a can of peas: each is different and each may or may not succeed.
3
@sftaxpayer
Those are what you call "strawman arguments." I'm not talking about spending more on special ed, or about leaving gifted children behind. I'm talking about leveling the playing field so that ALL children can live up to their potential. Of course some will not succeed. That's not an excuse to offer only the best chance to the kids who appear to be the most gifted. And please spare me the tired trope about teachers being the problem. That's just an excuse used by people who don't want to support public education and it bears no relationship to actual reality.
Yes they choose to study and to excel. What would you do about it—throw them in with those who didn’t study as hard so that the numbers of minority representation look better?
1
"These numbers are even more proof that dramatic reform is necessary to open the doors of opportunity at specialized high schools,” Mr. de Blasio said. No. These numbers attest that Black and Hispanic students are not getting the elementary school education they deserve. Part of that is due to culture, not color. If parents don't value education their children won't either. How many Black and Hispanic students took the entrance exams? Don't reform the admissions tests; reform the education the kids are receiving. The degradation of educational standards and curriculum is scandalous. This has been ongoing for two generations, so few now realize what standards used to be. Kids are graduating High School with what would have been fifth grade reading ability, or less, in 1960. And, then with Open Admissions they attend CUNY colleges where the criteria for passing a course is once again lowered. It is a tragedy. What happens to all these under-educated young people who can't compete for the most interesting jobs. They work for less, some harbor resentment and blame others for their circumstances, and distract themselves with games and cell phones.
16
@an observer
Bravo to you for telling the truth, but even with better education in lower grades there will be many differences in educational success. Children are not a can of peas as
dummy DiBlasio seems to imagine.
1
Yep blacks and liberals complain not enough black winners at the oscars so what happens the next year you get Black Panther up for best picture. Watering down any criteria that is based on excellence to make more people included and you end up with mediocrity.
1
How many of the overall student body went to tutoring to tackle the entrance exam. How many of black student went through tutoring. That is the question, my local pharmacist, explained that her son was going through tutoring for an entrance exam. How many student can make it to the specialize High School without tutoring? Can all the students can afford tutoring? equally , of not maybe the remedy is to set up mandatory tutoring for everyone who is contemplating applying.
3
If admission is based on the scores on a single test, and no other factors, it seems most logical to first examine the preparation of the students taking the exam for ways in which it can be improved. Second, surely, there are many students who get the same high score, and more students with qualifying scores than positions, so how are these choices made? Maybe adding an additional criterion for admission, not changing the minimum score, would have an impact. And, after the recent admissions scandal, a regular and thorough check for any corruption in the secure handling of the exam questions, test-administering, test-taking, scoring, and recording of grades would also be a wise move; people do game the system. If the Mayor's plan is as described in this article, it seems overly simple and a bit off target.
1
This is where the rubber meets the road:
Activists can argue the fairness of subjective decisions in society (i.e. Grammy nominations, Oscar nominations, leadership positions, etc), but when it comes to objective decisions, such as standardized test based admissions, the social justice argument falls apart - it's as silly as requiring racial parity in the NFL. No one wants to see some schlub "make" it purely because of representation requirements. Candidates have two choices: improve credentials, or get out of the way!
24
Those numbers are the nails in the coffin of the current system of admissions.
2
@Pete in Downtown If a canary falls dead in a coal mine, the problem is not with the canary
8
@B. True, but a dead canary in a coal mine means it's time to get out, and quick. Also, the canary doesn't decide who stays and who doesn't. This test does, and is used as the sole determinant of who is admitted to these schools and who is not.
1
Wouldn’t deblasios plan simply result in rapid gentrification/demographic changes to NYC neighborhoods?
Is that the long term goal? Because I find it hard to believe he didn’t think of that.
1
If anything, this should be the epitome of Mayor de Blasio's failure to improve the public school system. If he is so intent on diversifying the elite high schools, he needs to diversify the success of students passing the SHSAT. This mayor knows nothing about meritocracy and how to achieve it.
What do expect from a lazy and pandering politician? Hopefully de Blasio's term runs out before he does damage to these fine institutions.
13
What good does admitting more black students do if they are not equipped to succeed in a rigorous academic bootcamp due to the deficits in their educational experiences? Focus on providing a primary & middle school education that can actually prepare these kids to be successful, understanding that it appears that there is not the same degree of necessary family support at home for poor black kids as there is for poor Asian & white kids. That's a huge gap, with the divide beginning very early on in their lives. The cycle of perpetuated poverty due to inadequate early education is heartbreaking.
19
For low-income black families who push their kids to excel, provide funds so that their kids can take the test prep classes. As the article points out, there are many low-income Asian kids who do well. And the test is not the problem. Success on the test requires years of getting your kids to do the right thing and learn the material. Whites and blacks alike are under-represented at Stuyvesant. I suspect kids from both groups are not getting enough parental involvement to excel. Too much TV and too many cell phone videos. Take a lesson from the Asians.
16
Wow, this comments section shows the mailed fist in the pseudo-liberal glove. Paraphrasing: we need to adequately fund schools in poor minority districts but don’t raise my taxes. We need to allow blacks to escape the cycle of poverty but I don’t want them in my neighborhood. Racism and stunted opportunity was a thing most of the last 2 centuries but it all got solved in the 60s. I beat the odds myself ergo no excuses for anyone else.
I wonder what side of the excellence argument these commenters would be if Harvard and Yale abolished legacies and admitted 95% Asians on test scores alone?
Perhaps we should drop the self delusion over meritocracy and accept both a permanent overclass with vast resources and political connections able to cement their status AND a permanent underclass unable to escape the poverty/crime trap due to lack of educational resources and a host of structural issues. Kind of like the Indian caste system.
3
My friend’s child, who is black, has a 97 GPA. He is in a charter high school. Someone like him is not counted in these specialized schools and in DeBlasio’s stats. This is only partial information!!! The success of black children is partially counted only? Why is that?
Why didn’t he apply to one of these specialized schools? After school, he has a 20 minute commute now. If he went to Stuyvesant, it would be an hour and a half commute. Out of about three hours to study and do homework, he would spend about half of time commuting.
29
This astoundingly insufficient article fails to ask and answer some crucial, basic questions. Most important, how many high-achieving black and Latino students were admitted to private and charter schools and thus had no need to take the socialized public HS test?
17
Or: we could acknowledge and celebrate the tremendous success of Asian young people in our city. Hard work, self-denial, discipline, and a family invested in one's success. You know, the bourgeois values that are so oft-ridiculed and attacked by the "woke" left.
Congratulations to my Asian brothers and sisters out there gettin' it done. WTG!
37
The burning of "Black Wall Street" in Tulsa shows the long term effort to economically suppress African Americans. Redlining prevented the growth of wealth in property, etc. You can't hit someone in the knee with a baseball bat and expect them to win a marathon.
There is so much in these comments that makes me ashamed to be a New Yorker, including but not limited to:
1) Racist stereotypes (deserving, hard working Asian manicurists and restaurant owners vs lazy, undeserving black single moms)
2) Belief that because someone has gained certain status they inherently deserve it, while someone who has not is undeserving, and refusal to assess underlying systemic factors causing success or failure
3) Just plain meanness targeted at children.
5
Your "liberal" mayor demands racial discrimination in school admissions.
If some people cannot pass the cutoff on the exam, perhaps they should study harder, starting in first grade.
23
This is lazy journalism and in the era of heightened sensitivity to social matters, the NY Times should do better. What if these 7 students are from extremely affluent households? What if they aren't from the US? What if some students who might qualify chose not to apply? It's concerning that a portion of the population isn't represented in the results but that's not the story here and to default to race is irresponsible. African students from countries with less resources than the worst neighborhoods in US excel academically. Why is that? It is easier and cheaper to become educated that ever before in this country. Book are cheaper, the internet has vast resources that are free. This isn't an issue that can be solved by Government.
19
Instead of focusing exclusively on the admissions exam (which the Mayor needs Albany support to change), he should also focus on improving access to the middle school educations students need to do well on the test. Currently, the City's allows its "administrative" school districts to provide admissions preference to in-district kids. With the way the lines are drawn (for example, look how the poorer, less white & public housing heavy Manhattan Dist. 1 is gerrymandered away from Dist. 2), students of color & lower income are effectively denied admission into the city's best middle schools & that more than anything impacts their ability to get into the best high schools. The Mayor has the power to eliminate in-district middle school preferences immediately & unilaterally, although doing so would bother some of his whitest & wealthiest donors who don't want to share their schools. Want proof of the Mayor's power? When the parents within the northern border of Manhattan Dist 1 (who live in the very white & wealthy Stuyvesant Town) wanted their kids to get preference in Dist. 2's better middle schools, they went to the city & got their district changed so their kids were zoned in Dist. 1 for elementary school but Dist 2 for middle & high school. If those wealthy parents were allowed to buy access to the best middle schools for their kids, why shouldn't the same opportunity be provided to all kids? End geographical preference for NYC's middle schools. That will help a lot.
1
It also seems important to consider the other side - that is, how does this disparity enforce stereotypes about and biases against people of color among the students who do attend? How long do those attitudes linger and how do they inform future interactions?
2
The color of a student's skin should never be taken into account when administration decides who to admit. It discriminates against other races of students, and the practice needs to be discontinued. Equal opportunity means just that: EQUAL. It should not include a person's race, creed, religious affiliation. The only group who could be granted special considered are indigent children.
14
So many details left out of an article with an inflammatory headline. How many kids opted out of the tests? From which schools? Who is holding those schools accountable? What about schools like La Guardia and Beacon? Highly sought after and very diverse? How many of the bright kids from under performing schools received offers at private’s? I’m starting to feel disappointed with some of the articles the Times has been printing lately. Offer more insight and more solutions - people look to this information when making decisions about how to get involved, vote, and make change. And I’d like to hear a lot more from the faculty at both the schools that turn out the high performing schools and those that don’t. They see it all - the families, the values, the communities. They should be heard in droves.
8
As you can see, the majority of students admitted to these schools are not white. They are Asian, mostly Indian and Chinese. I think the solution is to set up equally good schools for those who come from economically weak back ground and give them preference in them. Leave the few selective schools alone.
4
DeBlasio has failed miserably in improving the overall public schools in NYC and now to cover up the city’s failure wants to change the admission criteria of SHS by making it about race. If the DOE really cared about racial equality perhaps they can answer why there are no decent HS in Bronx where there is a big population of Blacks/Hispanics. At least students in Manhattan and Queens have other options and many choose those over SHS because they don’t want the intense curriculum. (I am not sure about Brooklyn). The mayor should stay in the city and serve the residents that he is supposed to be working, instead of traveling to Iowa!
Please stop looking at students in terms of race. It is immoral. If DOE schools are racially biased, then fix it. But don't penalize poor Asian students who have earned their place in these programs (and who benefit far more from them than would students who are currently not getting into _any_ SHS).
4
The amazing part is that comments show people still believe the bribes and cheating start at the college level. It starts at an early age and the proof is in the amount of money that was involved.
Photoshop, ringers,bribes,cheating and false documentation was routine for these people.
1
If you cannot pass the admissions test you do not deserve a place at any of these selective high schools. Dumbing down the admissions requirements to make the schools accept undeserving minority students will only turn them into the failing mess that is the rest of the New York City public school system.
12
Why is pressure being applied to public officials to integrate the elite public schools?
Isn't that part of the problem?
Where is the emphasis on students to take responsibility for their own learning when free test-prep is being offered in public and charter schools?
When are students from these under-represented groups going to be held accountable for their own results?
Keep blaming the mayor, the chancellor, the Department of Ed, the teachers, the principals, the school bus driver and anyone else you can think of and we will continue to see a decline in these numbers guaranteed.
Interesting that the only two groups who are absolved from taking responsibility for the results are the parents and their children.
That's where the pressure should be applied.
15
@PeterW
That truly sounds tide detergent white.
1
@PeterW
Your post reminds of the comments that use to be made about drug addicts when people pretended only black people were drug addicts.
1
I am a '67 Stuyvesant graduate and came from a lower income family. One of the brightest people I ever met (including later on in college and medical school) was a black kid from a poor community in Queens. That was the beauty of Stuyvesant. It was 100% based on merit. And his abilities and smarts were so high level, he enforced a view I still hold to this day; individual intelligence and ability are color and ethnicity blind.
As many others have said, changing admission will destroy the system. Change the culture in early education and family support is a much better approach.
19
The magic formula for any students academic success is = Student + parental money + parental involvement.
My son is intelligent, hard working. Good kid. Now would he have gotten national merit scholarship through top grades in PSAT exam, if I had not insisted and invested into 2 years of coaching for it ?
Then he went on to College, with national merit scholarship. In College, after just 2 years , he took MCAT and scored in top 1 pct of MCAT. He again had taken preperatory courses for MCAT at end of 1st year itself.
Remember, all the intelligence and hard-work was his and his alone. But finances and parental guidance, does provide an extra edge to put these students over to the top.
That's why, I think a parents economic back-ground must be taken into consideration for admission processes. Its a tough, complex consideration.
3
In case you missed it in the article, it points out that a majority of the students at these specialized schools are Asian, and a vast majority of them are poor. Yes, overall, there is a collective family goal to support their children in academic achievements, but these low income students managed to ace the test *despite* their financial situations.
6
No it shouldn’t. Elite schools are for elite students not C students. I bet dollars to donuts lots of parents spent more than you and their kids did not get in. It’s your child who excelled he or she earned it. Give them some credit will you please.
5
The problem here is certainly not the high schools, but the pre-K, elementary and junior high schools. And of course, the PARENTS. Failure to prepare students, regardless of color, is the fault of all preceding grades, but mostly that of the parents.
Tilting the scales to favor a race is not a lot different than tilting the scales to favor the wealthy. It is still a tilt!
6
I suppose one could look at the NBA and draw similar conclusions. I don't know if there are any recent statistics but I did find that in 2015 that 74% of the players in the NBA were Black. I know why and it is simply because to be admitted or hired by the NBA you have to be an excellent basketball player. That is the test. If they hired people based on racial quotas their teams would very likely not be as good. The team owners in the NBA or any other sport for that matter just want the best so they can win. What would be the point of allowing students who could not qualify by passing an entry test designed to determine success in the school just because of kin color which has zero affect on success.
14
@NYChap
The difference is bias to access and preparedness, perpetuated by unintentionally biased school staff and teachers . My sister is 6 feet tall and high school basketball ball coaches kept luring her to play basketball. She excelled academically and in the arts and our new Jersey suburban high school counselors kept urging her from applying to top notch schools when it was time to apply to college. Long story short she is a graduate from an ivy league school and never played a sport. We are brown skinned minorities who like all other minorities constantly live through the racism and bias of access and presumptuous expectations. Give all kids high academic expectations and exposure as well as access to sports and music education and you will see a more just, balanced and fully realized American for our youth.
2
@Cambridgedoc The key is that your sister "excelled academically" and that is how and why she got into an Ivy league school. That reason should apply to anyone regardless of skin color. You seem however to be biased because you don't think that could happen to anyone but your sister.
In the UK, working-class white boys are at the bottom of the ladder in terms of academic achievement. So underachievement is not a question of race, it’s a question of economics, parental support, aspirations, money, culture.
I’ve also worked in a low ranking university, where the module leader described the students as “thick”. Tutors had low aspirations for the students and one memorably told me that a dyslexic teenager “doesn’t do grammar”. I insisted that he made an effort and taught him basic grammar rules. His written work improved. These students weren’t stupid and many were way more talented than they realised.
221
@LShayne
I completely agree. Raise standards for all and we all benefit
25
@LShayne Raise standards and get better teaching across all public schools, absolutely. If kids do well enough let them place into more challenging academic environments. If not, challenge them to their best potential where they are.
Keep in place schools that require the best effort, a higher level of performance ability and knowledge for gifted children.
All kids need true peers-- and true challenge; gifted and high performing students should not have to be held back.
14
@LShayne
No. White, Asian working class testing higher/outperforming middle class black students.
5
I graduated from MIDWOOD HIGH SCHOOL a large neighborhood public high school located in Brooklyn in 1960.I never even thought about taking the exam for an ELITE HIGH SCHOOL.Nevertheless I attended an excellent College and graduated from MEDICAL SCHOOL I had a very meaningful and successful medical career.In short what is needed in New York City is not obsessing about minority students being admitted to an ELITE HIGH SCHOOL,but rather improving the neighborhood High schools to allow far larger number of minority students to obtain a high quality education that enables them gain admission to college.
15
@DAVID, I applied to the elite schools in 1958, but failed. So off to DeWitt Clinton and City College. Made a career for myself and now comfortably retired. Instead of raising the standards in elementary schools, we’re keen on lowering the standards to meet the demands of quotas, or what is politically correct. Another medal for showing up?
6
@DAVID Don't you wish New York City guys like us could share those wonderful, irretrievable days with today's misguided, apathetic, ignorant generations! The New York City public schools were, by far, the best on the planet back then. City College was widely regarded as the "PUBLIC IVY". I actually got paid to go there since the college, based on merit, was tuition free and I had a Regents College scholarship of $250 a year. How many times did you hear the word "diversity"? As a dirt poor Italian living with my mom, dad, and deaf sister in one room in my grandparents house, I NEVER did. This mindless, quixotic, hysterical crusade for DIVERSITY is precisely what has caused the demise of the American system of education and way of life!
1
@Dudley Cobb, looking back I realize the fine education I received. Throughout my career I met people of so many different disciplines, and, was able to converse intelligently, whether with an astrophysicist, carpenter or celebrity. Geography, chemistry, physics, languages, or writing. Each skill fit nicely into my goals.
Then we had trade schools. High schools with specific trades in mind. Aviation and automotive schools. Merchant marines. It was all there for the taking. Yes, those were days of more analog skills, and today the digital world is prevelant. But that doesn’t mean trades are defunct. I think they will be more in demand when there are less plumbers, mechanics and electricians.
More money, that dirty word, is going to have to be put into education: schools, supplies, and staff. Otherwise, like trump, people will have to go through life conning others as to their qualifications. Print a business card and whatever it says, that’s who you are.
A sad state of affairs. That’s our leadership. A sad state, and affairs.
2
Let's not loose sight here, the exam is not the problem. Black and brown students are just a capable as any other group of students in their cohorts. The mayor should focus on ensuring that public schools are adequately funded - quality education for all should be the norm. These specialized high schools should be the extra cream so to speak, not the scapegoat for the neglect in the public school system. There are historical systematic issues intertwined here and this is where the hard work is. Our black and brown students deserve better, they are ready to work for it, and can meet these standards given a supported opportunity to do so.
8
@Jonathan
Sorry Jonathan, I disagree. It will take a long time to improve the other schools and a generation will be lost. This should be the last year of the test being the sole determinant and eventually phased out all together. Are they waiting for the eventual test cheating scandal to go public? Investigation of the test prep schools should be started based on some of their extraordinary success getting students into the program. If nothing is done this will be the eventual next step.
Reading through this article makes me wonder why none of the elite arts high schools, specifically LaGuardia HS of Music , Arts and Performing Arts are not mentioned or counted in piece. I'm certain that they would impact your premise of few blacks being admitted. Students take tests for these schools which are geared to the mission of the school, they do not discriminate by color, they are aimed to get the most qualified students for each school, to do anything less would shift the value that these schools have had for 80 years. LaGuardia's tests are very rigorous in each discipline, to water that down or eliminate those hurdles would change the climate of the schools that are considered elite. Not every child is prepared to meet the criteria for every discipline. Not everyone gets a trophy when participating in sports events, otherwise there would be no Olympics which showcases the best in their field.
14
@Marlene Dodes-Callahan Same here, in Austin Texas, constant complaints about the highly esteemed academic magnets but none about the arts magnet. The rubric was changed a couple years ago , and a portion of admission is now geared to admit the best in feeder schools, mirroring the top 10% program at the university of Texas. Nothing happened. The numbers of African American kids did not increase significantly. education is not well funded here. the magnets us far less resources than the neighborhood schools, by the way. it wouldn't work here to offer the advanced courses in neighborhood schools due to budget.
1
My cousin lives in a county that could not narrow the achievement gap - no matter what they did, the difference in scores between the races remained.
The County's answer - eliminate final exams and change the grading so many more people received As.
As a result, it is nearly impossible to differentiate b/t the strong students and the above average students (and the weaker students are less apparent), colleges must rely more on standardized testing, and the students are far less prepared for college b/c it takes less effort for an A and they have not experienced final exams.
I am not sure if the achievement gap on paper has narrowed, but I am certain the students are the biggest losers in this attempt to reach "equity" and "progress."
15
I am a now middle aged black woman who went to an elite high school and I wouldn't have missed it for the world. I began to realize then and understand better now that I was one of the few in my "community" who had what it takes to make it.
As long as the students who are truly qualified are not held back for reasons of bias, that's all anyone is owed. I think Stuyvesant selected the black students who met their admission requirements and the fact that they were fewer in number that in previous years speaks to lack of preparation at the earliest stages of education and not necessarily from institutional racism, as this story implies.
Mayor de Blasio can make any promises he wants to. He's a politician and convincing the voters to re-elect him is his stock in trade. We need to strengthen our schools for all students in a way that lasts beyond any individual's time in office. Otherwise, our great-grandchildren will be treading the same stale waters with the same lack of progress that we are now.
99
I bet your great grand father said the same thing. Unfortunately for blacks liberals run the education system and making other liberals and black and brown kids feel good is more important than actually educating them. Congrats on your hard work.
5
It's not just blacks who are unfortunate. For every black person cast into a school, job, life that they are ill prepared for, you have a white person who questions, doubts, resents the entitlement given. This is turning into a societal boomerang that will cut us all down.
2
@AngiePS so well said. All about pandering and not dealing with root cause and problem. Unfortunately, certain segments of our society are ignoring the real problems and denigrating institutions like Stuyvesant for political gain. In the end, the children will not be any better off by getting rid of high standards.
1
Being unable to pass entrance exams is not a problem with school funding, teacher qualifications, books, pencils and paper that the public believes are the underlying causes for poor academic performance among black students. These kids come to these exams from the neighborhoods they live in. Those neighborhoods engender little respect for education and no respect for teachers or other adults. This is a problem far too complex for forced racial integration to solve. Until political leaders like Di Blasio listen to teachers who've worked in failing schools, and recognize the social causes of the problem, no progress will be made.
15
In the interest of full disclosure, I graduated Science in '74. It strikes me that the exams are truly meritocrat. This isn't to say that some students don't have significant advantages over others. Whether it's a two parent household that provides an intellectually stimulating environment or attending a better middle school etc. Lets not pretend that it's possible or even desirable to have a system that is 100% equal. That said, I think a special effort should be made to help promising students from less advantaged backgrounds to have the best shot at passing the test. This will also enable them to succeed in the rigorous curriculum these schools offer. However, negating the test and claiming the quality of the students attending will not be affected is disingenuous at best.
14
Stuyvesant '88. This is really the last straw. Really hard to justify how the city is better off concentrating a small group of talented white and asian kids in a handful of schools. Marginally good for those high-ability and motivated students, but they would do just fine in any school and probably get into better colleges. The vast bulk of the country does just fine in schools that mix abilities. The top 5-10% of the class go to good colleges, etc.
The best school in the history of NYC was James Madison, a Brooklyn neighborhood school, in the 1940s and 1950s (multiple Nobel prize winners, senators, mobsters, etc.). The specialized school approach is a product of the white-flight of the 1960s and has lost its relevance in modern NYC (where the median apartment sells for $1 million).
4
These numbers are outrageous. The single test must be eliminated. Test prep skews the scores. I don't believe that providing test prep to everyone solves the problem. Real life is not a multiple choice exam. Some of these children begin prep at a very early age and others do not have this opportunity due to family circumstances. All tests can be gamed through test prep. Students of prestigious prep classes will report back to the school with better question samples and thereby guide the tutoring despite the illegality of this. NYC should immediately replace the test by choosing the top performers in each middle school. The specialized schools are a public resources that must be spread evenly. The Asian community parents who are against eliminating the test can disperse themselves across the city and become the top performers in some of the weaker schools and thereby ensure their children get into the specialized schools as well as enhance everyone's education in the weak school. This is the only fair choice.
4
@Ruby Tuesday Jewish students used to dominate the elite high schools decades ago. No one complained then. And they have gone on to very productive careers, just check out the alumni lists.
2
.All A,s are not created equal I guarantee you the top 5 percent in all black schools are not as sharp as the top 5 percent of predominantly Asian or white schools. It’s cultural and until blacks value education forcing Asians and whites out and putting blacks in is not going to help black success rates. But it can definitely hurt the qualified kids they force out. They are kids they worked hard why do they have to suffer so less hard working kids get in.
1
Test prep! Test prep! So...no more than 7 black families in NYC can afford test prep? Let’s get hold ourselves and think this through.
1
Did the students earn a spot and were deprived or are they disappointed that more spots weren't taken from higher achievers?
How might the higher achievers benefit from the diversity of interaction with classmates that haven't earned their spot?
How will the students with better grades and scores, that were replaced benefit from unearned diversity?
"Endeavor insures equality" Janis Ian
4
Well, I guess in one sense, this test does discriminate against students: it discriminates against those who don't possess a certain command of math and English. That is it.
I love how instead of trying to make sure that all students have access to a good education across the city, the Mayor, who is apparently void if any plan to give families the resources they need to do well on the test, would prefer to alter the admissions criterion of ONE school in the city, whose ONLY requirement is high proficiency in math and English questions.
22
Is this a DOE failure and therefore of mayoral control of the schools, or is it a lack of initiative on the part of the parents who don't know what's going on with their options? Or, are parents choosing to protect their children from the feeling of having failed to qualify by not telling them about the tests? There is clearly a collective self-esteem issue in the domain of race and ethnicity, but there is also a passive attitude some members of the public takes regarding these tests and the rigorousness of the schools. Many parents know they can't afford the tutors that students depend on for academic success. It doesn't mean poorer kids are any less bright. It means you need both brains and money to make a serious go of it.
1
Almost half of the students at these sélectives are poor students. They are not wealthy.
5
As usual, the left is confusing right with privilege. Just like they tell you at the DMV that a license to drive is a privilege not a right, admission to an elite high school/college is a privilege not a right. Such a privilege is given to those who met the criteria for admission. Those who did not meet the criteria are not extended the privilege, pure and simple, they do not have the right to claim their spots.
Sure you could fudge with the criteria for admission to get the student body you seek, like elite colleges, but this is high school we are talking about, every kid still has to take the core classes including lots of math and science. There is no room for those who can't keep up with the math and science to coast through with a diploma in ethnic or gender studies like in elite colleges. Instead, either these kids will flunk the classes or the school would have to lower their standards, once again benefitting the few at the expense of the many.
Maybe it's time we make everyone wear a Darth Vader mask when they leave the house, then there would be no complaints of any racial discrimination. But then you have to ask, why do we need to wear a mask to accomplish that? Liberals make *everything* about race, then complain that everyone else is racist. These people don't know irony if it hits them in the face.
16
This is not a "left" vs. "right" issue at all. Jumaane Williams (NYC's new public advocate) and AOC are not supporters of the plan to eliminate SHSAT, for example. Perhaps those who presume such binaries here (and then complain that liberals just do not understand), don't know irony when it hits them in the face.
These results only mean that Mayor de Blasio is failing to provide black/LatinX students with quality education in earlier grades-- NOT that the admissions standards need changing.
I wish the NYTimes would put more attention on that, than focus all this attention on a group of schools that make up a tiny portion of the overall high schools in NYC.
24
@Ray - it's also up the the black/LatinX students and families of to take advantage of the current educational opportunities. Quit blaming the system.
6
There is no law that says that any and all parents cannot work with their children every night from the time they are 5 years old to improve their reading and other necessary skills.
And guess what? It's free. All you have to do is put in the time and impose discipline: no television; no video games; no smart phone. Hit the books and hit them hard.
This has worked since the dawn of time.
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@DickeyFuller
Sorry, you must begin before the child is 5 years old. They child must be read to at bedtime from infancy old.
2
One issue, which admittedly doesn't affect a large number of students, but is certainly in play, and that I have not seen the mayor address, is how would students from independent schools be factored in to his plan? As it stands now, any student in the five borough can take the SHSAT and if they score well enough, they are in. So what would happen to kids who are in an independent school through 8th grade, and then want to attend one of the specialized high schools?
I also find it interesting that the push for racial integration (as if Asian students aren't a minority) falls on the shoulders of these specialized high schools, but not a peep from the mayor or the school chancellor when it comes to the countless schools in the city that are 100% black and Hispanic.
4
@Realist According to the DOE proposal presented at various CEC meetings, all of the students from private schools and those who opt out of state tests will be placed in one lottery for 10% of the seats. No further details were available.
Can the media please STOP focusing on this??? As a parent of children in non-specialized schools I would love to hear what the city is doing to strengthen the non-specialized schools where the overwhelming majority of NYC students go to high school. If the city did more to support the other schools, perhaps we wouldn't have this insane fight over a few seats.
9
Some right-wing organizations and Asian students are in court demanding that Harvard us this test-controls-all system. I do not know when that case will be decided, but there is a middle ground between this system and the high-school-by-high-school system the mayor has proposed. Let the exam continue, but let half the slots go to the top grades (or the top test results) school-by-school, while the other half continues to be granted under the current system. To qualify for a school-by-school slot, the student must have attended that school for 3 of the last 4 years of elementary school, including the final year. No switching to that school in the last half of 8th grade.
2
@Barbara Reader
I think this is an interesting solution. However disadvantaged, one should prove their worth - in this case by either excelling in class or in the test - to get admitted.
Hopefully some compromise which rewards talent, capacity for hard work and ambition is created to replace the current system that seems to unduly favor those who can afford going to the rote mills to get equipped for the test.
Additionally, as an other comment pointed out, too much attention is given to a few schools. More should be done to improve the others where a majority of the students go.
1
@Barbara Reader The problem with that, and I speak as an inner city school teacher, is that we are effectively not allowed to give grades lower than C. When students who only get 20% of the work right get C’s, then the students who get 80%+ right end up with A’s because they are doing so much better than their classmates. This doesn’t mean they have the skills to succeed at a selective high school.
2
"Asian-American students received 587 offers, and white students were offered 194 seats. Asian-American and white students make up about 15 percent each of the total public school system. "
So, though Asian-American and white students represent the same percentage of the population, there were three times more Asian-Americans than white students accepted. Does this mean that the process is biased against whites?
Di Blasio should focus on the the factors that contribute to a higher success rate among Asian-Americans. Why do they score even better than their white counter-parts? They don't have a bigger brain. An interesting fact that is omitted from the debate: 70% of African-American children are born to single mothers, 49% of Hispanic children are born to single mothers, 29% of white children are born to single mothers. On the other hand, only 17% of Asian children are born to single mothers. This is the real discrepancy that is never addressed for fear of being branded as a racist. The detrimental impact of single parenting is the most significant culprit, not the test or the admission process. What happens in the home is almost more important than what happens in school. If children don't attend school every day, pay attention, do their homework, study for the test, no amount of integration plans will help. And by the way, there aren't many Asian teachers in the system. So, it doesn't matter if the teachers don't look like them.
34
@dba Asians do not have a bigger brain, but the mean IQ score for East Asians is 5% higher than the Caucasian mean. And European Jews score a mean of 17% higher. In highly competitive situations, like elite high school or college entry exams, these percentages, combined with a family culture that places high value on education, produce the discrepancies we see at Stuyvesant and MIT.
1
The USA team won the first place at the International Mathematical Olympiad in 2018 (IMO 2018). There were 107 participating countries. All six members of the winning team are Asian-American. The Canadian team was ranked 16th. All its members are Asian-Canadian.
21
you can't force people to be talented and gifted and smart. It starts with culture. Asians value a strong household and education. Simple as that.
22
I never read any complaints about every race other than black being underrepresented in the NBA and NFL. No one ever took seriously any proposal to alter the draft process to automatically being the "top 10% in your locality."
14
I assume someone is asking the black and Hispanic kids who were accepted about their upbringing and comparing their answers to a sample of kids who were not accepted.
6
I can add little but to echo the overwhelming balance of sentiments here except to remind readers that there used to be way more black students at these schools 'back in the day'. What changed? One thing that changed is that they got rid of tracking. I came up through the tracking system. As a new immigrant to this country back in the early 80s, instead of ESL, by ignorance, xenophobia, racism, or all three I was placed in "bottom" for grades 1 and 2. There I got the extra help that I needed to make it to "top" the rest of my elementary school years. It also helped silence the haters when I was in the 99th percentile on the "citywides" ( do they still have that? ). What I am saying is, by bringing back tracking, you help both the most struggling students as well as the most flourishing.
2
Last I checked, a lot of the top college football and basketball teams have little or no Asians on them, or Caucasians for that matter. Maybe we need to change the rules so that at least one white kid and one Asian kid are on the field at all times.
19
The misplaced correlation of a single high-stakes test with "merit" makes me angry and sad at the same time. We all know people who excelled in school who turned out to be less competent in their chosen professions than some of their classmates who did not do as well academically - in addition to lacking the kind of social/emotional intelligence that is as important to the development of physicians, lawyers, and other professionals as their academic achievements. Anyone who truly believes that only those 7 African-American students had the "merit" to be admitted to Stuyvesant or that it would "harm" Asian-American students to reevaluate and perhaps modify the exam - or consider other qualifications for admittance - truly has no understanding of the consequences these kinds of policies. What they do is to perpetuate the circular logic that only those who can pass this exam have "merit," and thus those who cannot, don't. It's ridiculous and maddening. I was a fabulous test-taker in high school and university; which is probably why I was the only black student in my veterinary school class of over 100 at Michigan State University in 1988, and one of 25 out of 175 or so at The Law School in The University of Chicago in 1995. But, guess what? Today I am neither a veterinarian nor a lawyer, although I gained those degrees and passed the necessary board and bar exams to become licensed in both professions. Instead, I am an educator! (Do you wonder why?)
8
My grandson was just accepted by Stuyvesant. As our family celebrates, I am incredibly proud of him--and even more proud of my son and daughter-in-law. From the earliest age, these parents read to their children, stocked the home with books, discussed current events around the dinner table, and helped--every single school night--with homework. This constant devotion and dedication to my grandson's education is the reason that my grandson was prepared to ace the exam. The reason that many black children do not make the elite high schools has infinitely more to do with the home environment than with the failure of our educational system. Tragically, as long as many black families buy into the assertion that racism alone is to blame for their problems, they cannot see that the responsibility is theirs.
25
@Lone Voice
Congratulations to your son, daughter-in-law and grandson.
Your "lone voice" speaks volumes of truth if only people would take the time to internalize the message. That message is that families and individuals have some things which they can control among the many they cannot. Among those things they can control are their family values.
6
The 7 are an inspiration, and proof that others can succeed on the merits despite the obstacles. Instituting race-based quotas would take the inspiration away: we wouldn’t be sure _any_ one beneficiary of it would have gotten in on merit alone, even if s/he totally would have.
5
I wonder why La Guardia school is not included in this report. As an alumni I know the academic standards are high, and colleges highly respect the school.
Would be interesting to see what schools are sending students to the specialized schools. I suspect many are coming from private schools, whose population is probably much less integrated.
3
The highly-regarded Brooklyn privates are all at or above 30% minority students in the upper schools. Most of these students are black. Many high-achieving students of color prefer the more progressive, diverse populations of privates vs. being just one of the 7 out of 895.
4
^That said, there definitely should be more than 7 black students per year gaining entrance to Stuy, and NYC needs to focus more resources on lower through middle school education. This is not a problem to superficially solve in 9th grade.
2
Instead of implying that the admissions system is somehow unfair to black students, put your efforts into helping these students improve their skills so they can perform on the tests just like everyone else. You do them no service by lowering standards so they can get in. Ask yourself why other groups such as Asians do well on these tests - because their families ingrain a sense of duty and commitment to education and constantly encourage academic performance. That's why they do well. Black families? The sad fact is that the parents don't even show up for parents' night and parent-teacher conferences - they just don''t care about what it takes to get their kids the education they need. Nobody prevented them from taking these steps. It's a sad but simple fact.
28
I agree with your first point that Asian kids are ingrained with a sense of duty to strive and achieve in school. However, as a parent at a very socioeconomically and racially diverse Brooklyn public, a lot of lower-income parents cannot make conferences or curriculum night because they do not have as much flexibility with their schedules to do so.
11
@RB I used to just read comments like yours and stew silently, but now I want to speak up. Please be careful as to what you state as a "fact". Do not hear or read anecdotes regarding African Americans and assume it is applicable to all.
I am African American and as a student my mother and stepfather showed up at scheduled Parent/Teacher conference, and they were not the only African-American parents who showed up. My sisters and I attended both parochial and public schools and we have done well personally and professionally. Granted we are not doctors and lawyers but we have attained the the often mentioned "American Dream." This success is no different than other members of my extended family (ie. cousins, aunts etc.).
I suspect that it may be more of socioeconomic issues rather than racial issues that NYC is struggling with. It is the NYC Board of Education's responsibility to make sure their education house in order.
I'm tired of it! Everyone should be careful about making broad-brush statements as to what is "fact".
4
Alison: I sincerely apologize if I offended you. Not my intention at all. But I think you also made clear that your parents cared and supported you efforts in school, and that had a lot to do with your success in life. That's what I mean. Of course, I don't mean to paint everyone with the same brush, but I think not enough parents in the Black-American community are doing what your parents did. If they can't get to a meeting because of a job, then let's fix that. I truly believe the prospects for long-term success are far greater if communities help themselves than if they wait for outsiders, like the school system, to fix those issues.
1
When I first took the MCAT to apply to medical school my scores were lackluster. I didn’t study as much as I should have and assumed I’d do well because I was smart and had always done well. The mediocre scores were a wake up call. At the time I was at UCLA and surrounded by very studious Asian American students, many of whom were also applying to med school. I asked one of these students her study habits- not only did she take a prep course, but she regularly stayed up until 2 am studying, and studied at least 4-6 hours daily for the test (in addition to her regular class work). I got the message and stopped playing around. Next year I re-took it, did much better and got in. I wonder just how much and what kind of prep work students are doing to prepare for this test (the article didn’t mention). While I believe intelligence is equal across the board, we know there are cultural differences between groups in regard to their attitudes towards education and I suspect this influences outcomes.
41
"While I believe intelligence is equal across the board "
Would you care to cite evidence for this statement.
1
@Wayne E. There are mountains of data showing that mean intelligence varies widely among ethnic groups, but anyone daring to acknowledge the science is pilloried as a racist. If one allows oneself to even consider that possibility, all sorts of social discrepancies, e.g. in education/employment achievement, or in crime/incarceration, no longer require tortuous explanations involving injustices suffered by long dead generations, or current systemic discrimination for which there is little evidence.
2
Really? You believe that intelligence is "equal across the board"?
Not at all saying intelligence caries by ethnicity or race; but some families are smarter than others. And it's not just nurturing.
Vow to diversity all you want, but these are selective schools for those best qualified to graduate from an advanced course of study. This process of education must begin at lower grade levels and again, for those proven to be accomplished,
Anything else loses both the intent a cachet of these schools.
9
Reading w interest, but as I don't live in NYC I'm curious & hope someone will answer my question. Are all public school 8th graders required to take the exam or do students choose to take it? If it's a choice, can the Times tell us how many students of color choose to participate?
6
@Jen It is a choice. Students must proactively choose to register for the test and prepare for it.
5
@Jen There is an entrance examination that anyone can take. By the way there, are seven specialized schools in the NYC system from science to arts in academic scope.
Regarding the demographics, I suggest you contact the NYC Board of Education (the internet is a wonderful thing). I suspect that somehow there is data on this available even thought the question is not supposed to , I think, be asked (think of a job application).
1
@Jen Reading is fundamental. "About 5,500 black students took the admissions exam this year out of a total of about 27,500 applicants."
If a kid from Stuyvesant went to a local high school, he would likely get into a better college, with a larger scholarship. Kids go there because they want to study, basically all the time. They want the hardest work and to learn as much as possible. There is nothing magical about these schools.
Do you want your son or daughter to have a grueling academic load and the hardest classes? Are they willing to study until they go to sleep? Do you want them to look up to and be attentive to their teachers?
Your son or daughter may have a 95 average at their local middle school. If they carried those same habits to Stuyvesant they would fail most if not all their classes.
Education is not something that someone pays for, gift wraps, and hands to you. That applies to Stuyvesant and also to your local middle school. Unlike universities, public schools all get the same funding
15
“Unlike universities, public schools all get the same funding.” No, they don’t. Not from the City; not from the State; not from the Feds. It is a lot more complicated than simply assuming that we’ve made equivalent investments in schools and students from which we then expect equal outcomes or compare, at least in the press, on supposedly equal terms. No simple answers here to a complex educational, financial, social and political problem that needs solutions.
4
@Gregg Betheil
Agreed. A good friend of mine is treasurer of her middle school PTA and they raise hundreds of thousands of dollars to benefit their school and students. I guarantee that the PTAs in less well-off schools are not funded so generously by their already strapped parents. And these are just the resources that are funneled through formal, institutional channels.
4
@James: If the local high school is one where the other kids are constantly having behavior problems and there is such disorder that it's hard for any real instruction to take place, or where other kids can't grasp the concept of a derivative so that it would be counterproductive or pointless to try to teach it to the whole class--then maybe said kid wouldn't learn as much and wouldn't do as well.
5
As a complete outsider I cannot see the morality of telling Asian parents and their children that because you have an intact family, work very hard, sacrifice to have money for your child's tutor, encourage your children to study and then have them do well enough on the exam to get into the best high schools that your child's spot was given to a Black or Hispanic child simply because of their color.
In WI, Milwaukee schools have more money per pupil than other school districts but terrible results simply because the burden is totally placed on the schools. Every knows but some refuse to accept that the child's home environment is the most important determinant of academic success.
121
My bi-racial daughter, a top student at a Brooklyn D15 middle school student, got her first choice for at a top, non-specialized, highly diverse high school where she will continue to be a great student. She did not get an offer at any one of the specialized high schools. Her response: "Mom, for the purposes of the DOE, I am Black - I was never going to get a seat at one of those schools."
5
@JDHS 1991 that might make sense if there were holistic admissions to SHSAT schools. How does her race connect to her achievement on the test, where race is not identified on the test paper?
23
@JDHS 1991 That attitude isn't going to serve her well in life.
11
@JDHS 1991, I hope you corrected your daughter and informed her that, simply, her scores were not high enough to get into the specialized schools. Tell her to try harder next time.
14
In the 80s I was the "coordinator" (the director) of a SEEK tutoring lab. The SEEK program for those who don't know is/was a program that admitted students who were "educationally and economically disadvantaged" into a CUNY college. Contrary to popular opinion CUNY's open admissions policy didn't just allow anyone into their schools. As I understood it, the cutoff average of 80 of high school scores was required for admission to CUNY. For open admissions it was 75.
As coordinator my job was to get SEEK students tutors for any subject they requested. Usually within their first year in attendance, I could tell who would last and who wouldn't. Those who truly were "educationally" disadvantaged but determined to do something about as an adult were in my office the first week of school requesting (a) tutor(s). They were the type who persisted and graduated.
NYC should adopt a method for selection of students that's adopted by many state college systems. Set aside and reserve a small amount of admissions for the top 5% graduates from the City's high schools - particularly the low performing ones. The fact that these students were at the top of their class (especially in the really low performing ones), says something about their persistence and determination. Get these admissions support (like tutors), and I believe they shine.
Disclosure: I was a terrible HS student. But was admitted to CUNY. I graduated w/ honors, and went on to become a NYC public school teacher.
3
I wonder what percentage, if any, of kids had parents who were willing to cheat to get them in. Of course it isn't "cheating" to have special tutors who specially prep particular students for these particular tests. However, that kind of resource is unavailable to the majority of lower income students no matter what their merits might be.
4
@DaveG- FREE tutoring is offered to ALL NYC students!
3
Most of the students at these schools are minority (Asian), and most are poor. There is no money for cheating. Enough with these stereotypes!
6
There is no demonstrated need to have those schools in the first place. Students from all high schools should have a chance to do well at their local school. By removing competitive students from the other high schools, the program everywhere else is weakened by the implication that the good students are only at the two schools. the lack of black students shows a racist bias in the recruiting and testing process. The best remedy is to eliminate the schools from the public sector.
5
@Harpo This is such an important point. Some of the DC-area schools have stopped admitting as many students to the magnets who are in zoned schools with a large cohort who all qualify. The thinking is that their current school already has enough students to justify advanced programs, and those magnet school slots are needed for students at schools where there are only a few students in each grade or subject area who need the advanced programs.
2
@Harpo, so, in other words, eliminate institutions of excellence so that the mediocre can feel better about themselves. Okay, duly noted.
4
@Ed It's not about feeling better. You can read Malcolm Gladwell ("Getting In" and other reports). Students do better in a broader context than in an intense competitive environment. There is no mention in the article of any evidence that isolating students by testing leads to a better education, unless we are dealing with self-fulfilling prophesies. That is the same conclusion about the current scandal about getting in to selective universities being based on missing the point that those schools select students who would succeed anyway.
Me: Stuy ‘65. How hard should good change be? I call on other alums to demand an admissions system that allows missing diversity in the student body. Use methods colleges use to open it up. What are we, Dixie in ‘60? This is embarrassing, and not a victimless “broken system”. Give all a chance, and admit there are those who “juke the stats” by focusing on the exam with laser concentration. Kids from other demographics have talents and ability that Peglegs can’t imagine. Do we want to look like South Africa before Mandela?
6
Social privileges do matter whether of a race, power, language, wealth, secrets and or training natures are all predicated on the giving of chances via accessed granted by others. Individual meritocracy on the other hand is innate human characteristic or talent. This distinction is obvious in arts and sports venues. Other public pursuits such as crime, business and education opportunities require first the acceptance and then nurturing of others.
Since attitudinally ‘race’ breeding is a primitive view stemming from old world pastoral animal practices and has shown itself worthless scientifically, religiously and socially in the context of humanity. Fuller social racial opportunities will rise. Tribalism is long dead, commercialism or social equity is now.
Having the highest test score is no better than the lowest score. If the lowest score shows the a minimum capacity to do the future work required successfully. Learning is not a contest but a process. Having subject matter expertise (assessed knowledge) does not mean special ability or imagination. So NYT schools can admit more Black students. To be fair, consider it a form of reparations. Do NY leaders have learning difficulties and need remedial help perhaps?
1
I think the real question is what were the African American's scores? If there is racial discrimination then there's a story here. But if it's just diversity for diversity's sake, then I don't see one.
20
@David The issue is that kids from underperforming schools, mostly from underprivileged backgrounds, perhaps with low parental involvement as well are not likely to do well on the entrance exam. Acing the entrance exam requires YEARS of expensive test prep. Many black students in NYC fit into at least one of the above categories, which is why they are under-represented in these high schools. So the issue is not to expand diversity for diversity's sake, but to make sure the best and brightest across the city are not excluded from these schools because the lack the resources to prepare for and ace the test.
2
@Mary Anne Key words: low parental involvement.
Stop blaming everyone else.
It's the parents. If the parents don't have the time or the income to support the kids, they never should have had them.
5
@DickeyFuller Yikes. To that I'll just say: let's do our societal duty to provide high-quality education to ALL kids, so that their success doesn't depend on the parents they have. Failing public schools is a huge part of the problem here.
2
DeBlasio wants a form of racial spoils, and to do so, Asian-Americans must be forced out. It's not very complicated.
13
@Chris, It is easy to throw Asian American voters under the bus because there are relatively fewer of them compared to blacks and Latinos.
1
Race, race, race, race...nope, culture, culture, culture. Many Asians are in the program. The entrance tests are there for a reason. The best and the brightest do not include the dumb, unmotivated and poorly educated. 3rd grade math skill do not belong in a calculus class, unfamiliarity with written language can't cope with Shakespeare. The reason why black student are so few started way before the entrance exams.
19
@Joe Race, poverty and cultural factors are all interrelated. Kids who were unfortunate enough to attend failing schools all their life are very unlikely to do well on this exam, especially if they are from poor families. That's the argument for changing admissions criteria. To bring more equality of opportunity to it. And yes, this absolutely starts with much greater investment in public schools.
2
Is it that far fetched, that beyond a high work ethic and parent involvement, that Asians, on average, are just smarter than the rest of us?
9
@Ryan Hermanson No, it’s the messaging they get at home. They are told it is assumed they will do well and go to college.
1
@Ryan Hermanson Yup, very far-fetched! You've already named the key factor at play here: high parental involvement.
1
@Mary Anne My parents were extremely involved in the education for my sister and me. My sister might have been eligible for one of these specialized schools but I would not have made the cut! People who are gifted possess something I don't have no matter how hard I study.
1
One can go on blaming white society for the problems of the black community, but in truth the white community as a whole would like nothing more than to see blacks succeed. That includes people from both the left and the right of the political spectrum.
The left likes to blame all the problems faced by the black community on white racism or legacies of slavery, which is now almost 200 years ago. That argument has worn thin.
The elites on the right also like to say there are no differences on average in ability to justify their winner take all morality.
Science however now tells us that a lot of things are determined by genes including interests, intelligence, beauty and ugliness.
We can’t expect our most talented to lower their standards as a way to raise others.
Computers will one day make the differences in individual abilities seem small by comparison to their powers; advances in genetic engineering will make it possible to raise the IQ’s for all.
Heck we could do that today simply by having sperm/egg banks.
If someone is smarter than me I appreciate it when they solve things I can’t. If I can be of help to someone else, great.
What we do need is to foster empathy and a reverence for all of life. We all smart or stupid can help by appreciating what a miracle every day holds.
7
Why are Asian-American out-performing? Is anyone looking at that?
13
@SAL Likely because many of these students come from families where the parents put heavy importance on academic success and are willing to devote time, energy and money to investing in their kids success. Many of these students are from low-income families, yet parents have sacrificed financially so that their kids are prepared to ace the test. Not all kids are lucky enough to have this kind of parental involvement.
9
@SAL
String family bonding and commitment.
5
The editors should adapt the advice of another NYT columnist and give the context for the low acceptance rate of African Americans.
What was the test score mean and median of all students who applied to these elite schools?
What was the test score mean and median of all applicants by race, ethnicity and gender? The data is there.
What part of "low income Asians" indicates an acceptance bias against African Americans?
Until the editors adapt a more intellectually honest approach to matters such as these, their credibility on the subject of race is questionable at best.
Sorry, but you guys are your own worst enemies.
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These comments make my stomach hurt.
Folks blithely writing that there's no problem here, this is not about race, the kids who got in are there from merit.
New flash. It's always about race. And clearly, CLEARLY there is a racial issue at play with this admissions process.
I'm not saying to scrap the test. But what are the other criteria by which kids are considered for admission? I'd like to know. Because kids, and intelligence, and what they have to offer as human beings, are reflected in far more than math and science scores.
Anytime someone talks about merit, I have to laugh. Let's talk about merit. How does one measure merit when one set of kids comes from a history of slavery, discrimination, torture, terror and segregation, and the other does not? How well does merit work then?
Merit is the word that white people use to convince themselves that racism is not in play in everyday life. When it is, and has been for centuries.
Merit. What a lie. Keep telling yourselves that.
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@Diva It is not just one set of kids that comes from "a history of slavery, discrimination, torture, terror and segregation." What do you think the 20th century looked like for countries like China, Vietnam, and Cambodia? I'm white, but my family saw their country partitioned, wiped off the map, destroyed in WWII, and themselves landed in refugee camps in Britain. The history of black people in America is horrific but it doesn't serve your purpose or anyone else's to blithely glide over the suffering others have endured.
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@Diva, so, in other words, Asians are free from discrimination and did not have to overcome hardships to advance in American society. Okay.
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@Rob G
African Americans were sold out from each other -- dividing families, parents from their children, husbands from wives, siblings from their brothers. They were also not allowed to practice their languages, their religions or their ethnic traditions, forced to adopt their white masters' beliefs, religions, practices, and, interestingly enough, their hatred. Throughout the years, any unity, any financial gain, any solidarity, was systematically and repeatedly destroyed by the white establishment. Case in point, Tulsa. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tulsa_race_riot
They are just starting to talk about this history!
The proof is definitely in the historical record. Why don't you go review it?
One thing missing from this story is to what degree the admitted students lives are shaped by learning. As one commentator noted about a performing arts school that he daughter was admitted to, she had been practicing for years. It's not realistic for someone to think a few months of prep can prepare them for a test that is based on years of cumulative study. Finally, we should not for one second think that Black admittance is low because of lack of ability. If I don't learn how to swim, I'll drown if the ship goes down because I can't swim, not because I can't learn how to swim.
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REAL AFFIRMATIVE ACTION; It is my understanding and actual first hand experience, and on my own, that the Entrance Exams to these 'Elite' Public Schools ARE COMPLETELY COLOR BLIND. I agree completely with Ms. Ocasio-Cortez that more Public Schools citywide should be given sufficient funding and support to enable them to begin to provide this kind of excellent teaching and opportunities across the board to all children, from every background. Without this, many students will continue to be advanced to higher grades, without the skills needed, even by wonderful teachers, with true "vocation", who are simply overwhelmed by the lack of funding and support to these schools. This kind of genuine "Affirmative Action" with support and funding can enable many "non-white-non Asian" students to show they are every bit as capable of excellent abilities to learn and create as anyone who may have more privileges than they.
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