Affirmative action was killed and yet, we still need to hear issues about your kids not getting into school because some Black kid took their spot or whatever
In 2020, the Fairfax County School Board adopted a new, “holistic” admissions policy that the board said was intended to increase socioeconomic diversity at the school. Under the new policy, the school filled part of the incoming class with the top students at each public middle school in the area. To fill the remaining 100 seats, school officials considered a variety of factors, including academic performance, whether the applicant comes from a low-income family, and whether English is the applicant’s second language. In reviewing an application, school officials did not know an applicant’s name, ethnicity, race, or sex.
The number of Asian American students offered admission at TJ, as the school is known, fell by 19 percentage points under the new policy: Instead of receiving 73% of the offers in the new class, Asian American students received 54% of all offers made for the class of 2025. The number of offers made to Black and Hispanic students, on the other hand, roughly quadrupled.
And the conclusion parents got from this is that the new admission policy is trying to target Asians and not that top students from public schools with lower socioeconomic status’(who are disproportionately Black and Hispanic- another issue that should be targetted) were historically ignored from going to this school in favor of rich kids who had studied for the school since 3rd grade.
At least the linked article said what the real concern is
In the second round, a certain number of seats would be set aside for kids from each of the county’s neighborhoods. The move wouldn’t guarantee diversity, but it would give poorer kids a better shot.The pushback came loud and fast. Parents from McLean and other wealthy neighborhoods booed Domenech at a school-board meeting and e-mailed by the hundreds to protest. They feared their kids would be “cheated out of a seat at Jefferson,” says Domenech, and the school board killed his plan.
They don’t want fair schooling admissions, they want an elite K-12 school program that keeps out the poors and undesirables. I would be lying if I said I didn’t feel schadenfreude for kids still not getting in but I digress.
AA is predicated on imaginary children who have no academic ability being given golden ticket admission at the detriment of hard working smart kids. Then it causes unnecessary division between the Asian and Black community because the “lazy uneducated poor” Black kids are taking spots from the “hard working” Asian kids(subtext White kids)(yes it’s just racism). When in reality, it’s education was gutted so much that public schools have to “compete” with private schools on who gives a better education-which ends up being the private school that received enough funds to run in the first place (another fallout of racist policy where white kids didn’t want to go to integrated schools).
I wish the energy was put towards better public education funding and not adding unnecessary legitimization to private education framed as undeserving children getting ahead.
Anyone have thoughts? I rarely get to see opinions on Affirmative Action from the left, since we have way more to worry about.