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Responding to criticisms of a program created to diversify the city’s elite high schools, school officials are highlighting a surprising fact: The program no longer gives special preference to the black and Hispanic students it was built to serve.

The city launched the Specialized High School Institute in 1995 to help get more black and Hispanic students admitted to schools such as Stuyvesant and Bronx Science. Black and Hispanic specialized high school applicants who attended the institute have been more likely to get in than those who didn’t attend.

But fewer black and Hispanic students have gotten that chance since a 2007 lawsuit forced the city to give equal access to the program to all students. Department officials drew attention to the policy change after the Daily News reported last week that fewer black and Latino students who completed the program last year scored high enough on the city’s high school exam to be admitted to elite schools.

Indeed, the new policy appears to have transformed the makeup of the institute. Between 2009, when students admitted prior to the policy change completed the program, and 2010, Hispanic enrollment dropped by more than half, from 414 to 155, while Asian enrollment more than doubled, from 156 to 481. (more…)

Today’s the day that guidance counselors distribute envelopes to eighth graders with news of whether and which of the city’s top-tier high schools opened the door for them. But for minority students, the news continues to be grim.

Combined, white and Asian students account for 70 percent of the students admitted to elite schools like Stuyvesant, the Bronx High School of Science, and Brooklyn Technical High School. Hispanic students make up 6 percent of those admitted and black students 5 percent. The remainder, 18 percent, come from private or parochial schools and racial data for them was not available.

Despite repeated statements of concern from city officials about the tiny number of minority students earning entry to top high schools, the numbers have only declined in the last three years. In 2009, 744 black and Hispanic students earned seats at specialized high schools. This year, 642 made it in.

Meanwhile, the number of minority students sitting for the exams has increased. Black and Hispanic students now make up a greater percentage of test takers than they did in 2009. (more…)

The woefully small percentages of black and Hispanic students at the city’s specialized high schools is not a new development, but that doesn’t mean we can’t do something to change it. Here’s my suggestion: The Department of Education should adopt a proportional admissions plan for the exam schools that would offer admission to the highest-scoring students from each of the neighborhoods of the city.

An idea whose time has come

In 1995, then-Chancellor Ramon Cortines lamented the declining percentages of black and Hispanic students at the city’s specialized high schools. At the time, the numbers were actually better than they are now: Bronx Science’s enrollment was 10.7% black and 9.2% Hispanic; Stuyvesant’s was 4.8% black and 4.3% Hispanic.

In 1996, ACORN (well before its recent collapse) published a report, entitled “Secret Apartheid II: Race, Regents and Resources,” that analyzed enrollment numbers at Stuyvesant and Bronx Science, the two most selective schools. (more…)

Offers of admission by borough. Data from the Department of Education

More than 6,000 eighth- and ninth-graders got good news today: offers of admission to one of the city’s nine specialized high schools.

For the 23,000 other students who took the Specialized High School Admission Test last October, the wait to find out about what school they’ll attend this fall will continue until the end of next month. They’ll find out where they’ve been accepted at the same time as the tens of thousands of eighth graders who did not try to get into one of the city’s most elite schools.

At eight city schools, including Stuyvesant and Bronx Science, admission is based on students’ scores on the ultracompetitive Specialized High Schools Admission Test, which 29,000 eighth- and ninth-graders took last October. Admission to the ninth school, LaGuardia, depends on music or art auditions and grades.

More than 100 more students were offered spots at LaGuardia this year, 1,041 compared to 936 last year. The school is graduating a larger-than-normal class this June and so extended more offers of admission than it has in the past, according to Andrew Jacob, a Department of Education spokesman. (more…)

As Elizabeth noted, it’s high school admissions season in New York City. The test that determines who gets into the city’s elite high schools happened back in October, and yesterday eighth graders submitted their lists of high school choices.

I wonder how many of today’s students know that only 40 years ago, Stuyvesant High School was boys-only? It wasn’t until 1969, when a young woman named Alice De Rivera successfully sued, that the ultra-competitive school admitted girls. I also wonder where De Rivera ended up. (Brooklyn Tech was the last of the three original exam schools to go coed, in 1972.)

Graph by Eduwonkette.

Sociologist Jennifer Jennings (who blogs as Eduwonkette) graphed a change in demographics at the city’s eight specialized high schools, providing dramatic visual evidence of a trend described in detail by the New York Times last week.

The Times article focused on persistently low numbers of black and Hispanic students in both the group of students taking the demanding high school entrance exam and scoring high enough to earn a place at one of the specialized high schools.

But Eduwonkette’s graph shows that black and Hispanic students have long been underrepresented in the elite high schools. Instead, it suggests that the real news in recent years is soaring enrollment at specialized high schools by Asian students and declining enrollment by white students.