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Mayor Bloomberg voiced support for the racially unbalanced admissions results at NYC's most prestigious public high school. Black and Latino students are nearly completely absent from those schools.
Admission Testing
Our city's most elite public high schools use a single 2.5 hour admission test that is similar to the SATs to select students. The score on that single test is the only input for admission to these special schools.
But, the single-test approach leads to a virtual exclusion of Black and Latino students from these schools. At the best-known school, Stuyvesant, only 19 of the nearly 1,000 students admitted recently were Black, and only 32 were Latino. These 2% and 3% population levels are unacceptable in a school system in which a majority of the students are Black or Latino.
In fact, nearly 31% of white students who take the test are accepted while only 7% of Latinos and 5% of Blacks are accepted.
Now, the NAACP Legal Defense Fund has filed a complaint against NYC because of the admissions testing approach.
Bloomberg Defense
Mayor Bloomberg reacted to the news of the NAACP Legal Defense Fund complaint by stating "Life isn't always fair."
Bloomberg made other offensive comments, including his response to concerns that affluent families are paying for tutoring: "We have tutoring for all our kids. It’s called the public school system. We do it five hours a day, roughly five days a week."
Bloomberg's support for the current regime shows his lack of character. We need to demand that he does better.
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For what it is worth, his position is not a character issue. It is his flippant response to a legitimate question regarding equitable access to the best education possible in a public school setting that is problematic. There is problem, but it is not the test itself.
ReplyDeleteThe problem is the quality of the K-7 learning environments throughout the city. Kids are taking the test in the 8th grade. If they don't have an excellent base of knowledge at that point, they won't pass the test.
The Mayor's lack of character emerges in his support for a regime that uses tax dollars to provide an elite education while essentially excluding the two largest ethnic groups in the public schools. Adding burdens to the underprivileged is a character flaw, and the Mayor has consistently chosen such a path.
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