Comments on: Complaint targets elite HS admissions process, not just outcome

By: Djharkavy

Djharkavy — Mon, 01 Oct 2012 19:30:00 +0000

If the students are not academically prepared to enter the specialized high schools, then we are not doing them any favors by accepting them.

The work is rigorous and difficult, and even among those who have the skills to get accepted, some of them are unable to keep up.

By: sosps

sosps — Mon, 01 Oct 2012 01:10:00 +0000

I agree that muddled thinking
underlies the complaint. The complaint focuses much animus on Stuyvesant,
but of course, Stuyvesant is one of the three schools that must use the test,
as mandated by State law. So what is
this really about? Is the point to
increase black and Hispanic enrollment at Stuyvesant and Bronx Science and Brooklyn Tech (scarcely mentioned), or the
Specialized High Schools that are not mandated by the State to use the test, or
all the Specialized High Schools? If it
is about Stuyvesant, Bronx Science and Brooklyn Tech, the first stop should be
the State legislature. If it is about the other Specialized High Schools — the
ones that are not mandated under State law to rely on the test – then it is
worth pointing out that some have significantly higher percentages of black and Hispanic students: HSMSE (which has a higher cutoff score than Brooklyn
Tech), and Brooklyn Latin (which has a lower cutoff score). Is the complaint complaining about those schools too? Should they be interviewing thousands of applicants about their life experiences rather than relying on the SHSAT?

If
the point is that some groups do not have an equal ability to prepare for the
test, then it must be noted that Stuyvesant has Title I status because of
the high number of students who qualify for free or reduced lunch. (Tech too, I think.) In other words, there are plenty of kids who
come from poor families. They do,
however, prepare for the test, whether by taking a prep class, or by buying a
book and doing a bunch of practice tests. Yes, not every student spends years prepping. This is because a student
with a sound basic education can do pretty well on the test without a lot of
prep. Maybe to get into Stuyvesant, it
is necessary to have taken Algebra, but the reading and logic part of the test
is simply not that difficult for children who read a decent amount. You do not have to spend thousands of dollars
on test prep.

If
the point is that black and Hispanic kids are not encouraged to take the test
and apply to the Specialized High Schools, or given basic information about how
to do prepare for and take the test, that is bad – but it is not a problem with the test. It is a problem with outreach.

If
the point is that in some areas of the City, the combination of living in
poverty and being black or Hispanic means that students are not getting the good
basic education that is needed as a starting point, even before the student
begins to prepare for the test, that is also bad. But criticizing the test, and attacking
Stuyvesant and Bronx Science, seems to be starting at the wrong end.

By: Mr. Flerporillo

Mr. Flerporillo — Sun, 30 Sep 2012 21:24:00 +0000

Do you ask your students to call you “Doctor”?

By: DM

DM — Sun, 30 Sep 2012 19:03:00 +0000

Here is my take on it: http://drmandler.wordpress.com/2012/09/28/new-yorks-specialized-high-schools-in-danger-of-elimination/

By: Anonymous

Anonymous — Fri, 28 Sep 2012 16:39:00 +0000

Or, we could use some basic math here. These tests likely have a 2-3% margin or error for measuring how capable students are of meeting the rigorous academic standards of these elite schools. That likely means that students who score within a given range are statistically the same. If that’s true, the city should set a cut off for specialized high schools and assign seats based on a lottery, not how students rank on the test (since within a bandwidth, students are statisically the same). I wonder how that would re-shuffle the mix…

By: Tim

Tim — Fri, 28 Sep 2012 14:26:00 +0000

Why stop there? Hey, Cal Tech, Haverford, Rice? From now on, one half of your entering classes must be kids who scored less than the national average on the SAT.

Harvard, Stanford, Chicago? 1/2 of your admits must have high-school GPAs lower than 3.0.

Michigan, Berkeley, Virginia? Your admissions offices must now view suspensions and disciplinary infractions as a positive, not a negative!
The problem here isn’t the test, or that some proportion of the city’s highest performing students are isolated in pressure cookers. The problem is that segregation, poverty, NCLB, and good old-fashioned ineptitude have rendered a large number of districts virtually incapable of identifying and educating academically advanced K-8 children.

By: sosps

sosps — Fri, 28 Sep 2012 12:34:00 +0000

I don’t think any of the specialized schools are under-subscribed, so it is not clear how that would help. The high scoring kids who accept the seats would still outscore other kids – it would just be a smaller pool. Brooklyn Tech has actually had too many students accepting seats in the last few years, and ended up with more students than expected. If it is true that students take the test without intending to enroll – which is annoying and a waste of the City’s money if it is still happening (I thought that changing the admissions schedule so the SHSAT takers would not get advance notice of placement would fix that) – requiring students to accept a seat if offered one is not going to fix this problem.
and a waste of the City’s money

By: Mary Conway-Spiegel

Mary Conway-Spiegel — Fri, 28 Sep 2012 12:22:00 +0000

How about mandatory enrollment of a cross-section of level 1-4 students City-Wide? Not popular, but maybe better than warehousing the Level 1′s and isolating the best/brightest in pressure cookers…?

By: Cantheydomath

Cantheydomath — Fri, 28 Sep 2012 11:27:00 +0000

Require that any kid who takes the test and is offered a seat must take it. That would reduce by 20,000 the egomaniac parents who insist their kids take the test to prove what good parents they are. It would also curb the growing industry of prep centers for these tests,

By: sosps

sosps — Fri, 28 Sep 2012 10:43:00 +0000

It’s worth noting the high percentage of students in Stuyvesant and Tech qualifying for free or reduced lunch. We’re not talking about millionaire’s kids. Plenty of families at Tech have non-English speaking parents (from many different countries) whose kids are at a specialized high school because they studied for the test. I think this complaint is really off the mark – the NAACP Legal Defense Fund seems not to have a clue.

By: Guest

Guest — Fri, 28 Sep 2012 05:44:00 +0000

I was a hispanic who was accepted into one of these schools. I hadn’t known about these schools until 7th grade, and the majority of the material on the test was not taught in my school. I passed by having to intuitively figure out the math and logic on the spot. After I was accepted I had noticed that my peers nearly all had huge head starts that were not available to me, such as test preps for the SHSAT and being able to take high school courses and regents in middle school. I was a year behind in math compared to most of the students. Don’t force a bunch of minority students into the schools, if they aren’t even being taught to par. They aren’t getting in not because they aren’t smart, not because they are being discriminated against, but because the schools are not preparing them enough or supplying them the knowledge needed to pass the exam.

By: Guest

Guest — Fri, 28 Sep 2012 03:16:00 +0000

How about improving middle schools and grade schools. How about home life, libraries, food.

By: Esther

Esther — Fri, 28 Sep 2012 00:38:00 +0000

This lawsuit is absolute nonsense. It is common knowledge that the specialized high schools are not easy to get into and that the test requires preparation and motivation. If a child is motivated enough to want to go to an elite high school, he or she will go to the library, check out a specialized high school exam preparation book, and study. This lawsuit is likely the byproduct of the NAACP having not enough work to keep its attorneys busy. Using NAACP’s theory, since Stuyvesant High School is 71% Asian, that means that the specialized high school entrance exam discriminates against all non-Asian students. Therefore, by design of the exam the NYC Board of Education is discriminating against all White, Black, Hispanic, Middle Eastern, Native American, Eskimo, Aleutian, Inuit, etc, individuals. Rather than lowering the bar for admission by way of a frivolous lawsuit, perhaps the NAACP should engage in activities (e.g. providing funding for extra tutoring) that will help the “affected” individuals gain admission to these elite high schools.

By: Bonniepbl

Bonniepbl — Fri, 28 Sep 2012 00:04:00 +0000

Here is when I agree with the mayor. The tests are colorblind.i don’t want to see quotas. If the minorities could be lifted out of poverty there would be some more,most likely in these schools.