In the face of growing pressure to tackle New York City’s widespread school segregation, Mayor Bill de Blasio announced on Saturday a proposal that would change how students are admitted to eight of the city’s specialized high schools, a group of highly sought-after institutions where students gain entry based on a single test.
Black and Hispanic students, who make up 67 percent of the public school population, are grossly underrepresented at the specialized high schools, which include Stuyvesant High School and the Bronx High School of Science.
Mr. de Blasio campaigned on the issue when he first ran for mayor in 2013, saying the specialized schools should “reflect the city better,” but he has yet to make a dent in the problem. This year, black and Latino students received just 10 percent of the offered seats at specialized high schools, a percentage that has held essentially flat for years.
The most significant change Mr. de Blasio proposed was replacing the test, called the SHSAT, with a new method that would admit students based on their class rank at their middle school and their scores on statewide standardized tests. That change would require approval from the State Legislature, which has shown little appetite for such a move. A bill outlining those changes was introduced in the Assembly on Friday.
Mr. de Blasio announced another, smaller change on Saturday, one the city can do on its own. Beginning in the fall of 2019, the city would set aside 20 percent of seats in each specialized school for low-income students who score just below the cutoff; those students would be able to earn their spot by attending a summer session called the Discovery program. Five percent of seats for this year’s ninth graders were awarded this way, the city said.
A spokesman for the city’s Education Department said the way students were chosen for the Discovery program would also change. Currently, poor students with certain scores from all over the city qualify, but under the new plan, the city would target students from high-poverty schools instead. Those schools tend to have a higher proportion of black or Hispanic students.
47 comments:
Dumblasio is a cancer
Translation: he does do not believe that black and Hispanic people can achieve on merit, as he controls an educational dept. with a $25 billion dollar budget and can offer no other way to help them pass the test on the same competitive standard.
Wonder how many seats will be left vacant. This is the same stupid plan he had for affordable housing and look at it, there are affordable houses that are half vacant because nobody else who applied fits the income requirements for it.
Good. As a Stuyvesant graduate I’m tired of hearing people defend the sanctimony of the SHSAT. Real life doesn’t work like standardized tests. You need to be a well rounded person to succeed and cramming all summer for a single test does not make you an intellectual. This will offer plenty of well-deserving underprivileged students a chance to experience the vastly higher standard of education that exists at these schools. Until the DOE gets its act together and improves all of our public schools, this is the best we can do for the brightest minds across the city.
The race to the bottom-- the prime directive of the left. What took him so long?
"This will offer plenty of well-deserving underprivileged students a chance to experience the vastly higher standard of education that exists at these schools."
It will also offer the students the opportunity to fail out due to their lack of cranial horsepower.
As a Bronx H.S. of Science graduate, I say fix ALL the schools. That is the only way you'll solve the problem. I only way I got into Science was that I did not go to schools in my neighborhood. I traveled far to a better school district by bus along with my siblings. We all got into specialized high schools.
Dumblassio and his minions want to make this a class war issue, typical of commie minded idiots. He links "underprivileged" with being Latino or black, claiming that the students already admitted to these "elite" schools come from higher socioeconomic levels and therefore their parents can afford tutoring to better prepare them to pass the entrance exam. THAT is blatantly racist. That denigrates parents of other ethnic groups whose top value is education and who are willing to deny themselves other things in order to afford tutoring for their kids, if it's necessary. And, there is plenty of free tutoring available in schools all over the city. No, the "elite" schools' population makeup is due to an entirely different reason, which has nothing to do with race or ethnicity.
In order to be able to do the higher academic level of work at the "elite" high schools such as Stuyvesant, Townsend Harris, and Bronx Science, it is necessary to have excellent reading and writing skills, as well as math skills. It is also essential to have the farsightedness and maturity to be willing to forego the immediate gratification of parties and other social activities in order to devote hours for study, to obtain high scores on the rigorous tests and complete assignments. A lot of the courses are equivalent to college level work. I cannot conceive of any of the students at these schools having a reading level of less than 4 (out of 4 possible reading levels) and still being able to handle this work. Perhaps there are a very few students in these "elite" schools with a reading level of 3, but they would be few and far between. The vast majority of the students Dumblassio wants admitted to these schools have a reading level of 1 or 2. Those low reading levels might have some basis simply in the innate intelligence of the student, but a lot of it also has to do with the student having skipped class, not having paid good attention to lessons, not having completed assignments and just generally not valuing education. Those things are hardly consistent with the diligent study habits necessary for students in the "elite" schools.
One important purpose of the entrance exam is to weed out those applicants who lack the necessary reading comprehension skills and math skills. There would be no point in admitting such students, because they could not handle the level of work done in these schools. It has nothing to do with the color or their skin or their country of origin--only a knee jerk left wing commie-minded idiot would come up with that ludicrous crap. It is based on sheer practicality--the best use of a scarce resource. Students faced with lessons they cannot comprehend and homework assignments they cannot complete are soon frustrated. They take out that frustration by acting out--"If I can't understand or do this stuff, then NO ONE is gonna be able to have this class." Then the classes full of high-achieving serious students, a precious commodity in a school system full of charity 65 earners, will be disrupted and the chance to do very high level work will be ruined for all.
Yeah, that makes a lot of sense.
Another thing left to hand over to those looking for someone to blame.
Anyone can achieve these levels but you're looking for the city to do it for you.
If a child doesn't have a positive home life and a support system to excel it's never going to work unless that child truly pushes themselves to do better... school isn't just about what happens in the classroom. I'm tired of hearing blame the teachers, blame the tests. The tests aren't about color. Everyone has the same choices of studying to get the scores needed. If you have a classroom of kids that do not want to learn or parents who show zero interest nothing will change. There are those who invest is studying, after school / weekends / holidays. As a teenager who went to Townsend Harris - the amount of time it takes to succeed at a school like that is not easy. You give up a lot of your free time to put your heads in the book. I went there from a school in East New York. It's not about race, it's about the willingness to learn. My parents worked multiple jobs and didn't have time to help me study but they checked on me and pushed me to remember the importance of education... it all comes down to the child and families wanting to succeed and not continuously looking for freebies.
Override meritocracy and you invite disaster.
You either have the talent or you don't.
Talent over race color creed. Another quota system based on non achievement? My surgeon is a dark skinned QUALIFIED Pakistani. Hiss SKILLS are all I cared about.
"This will offer plenty of well-deserving underprivileged students a chance to experience the vastly higher standard of education that exists at these schools."
It will also offer the students the opportunity to fail out due to their lack of cranial horsepower.
You're both wrong. What will happen is that which makes the school "elite" in the first instance, namely admitting only those students with a high score on a tough test, will now be watered down so the school is no longer "elite" which is the Mayor's goal.
This has to be the most retarded policy he has come up with! Let’s dilute the standards of merit to give kids who can’t hack it l, a chance to fail. These tests are passable if kids study for them. The schools are there for above average students to excel with similar level students, and not be held back. I agree the tests aren’t perfect but until a more equitable way to measure students at different schools is devised, this is the best way to gain entry. Too much pot has diluted our mayors brain cells.
"the city would set aside 20 percent of seats in each specialized school for low-income students who score just below the cutoff"
If you are below the cutoff, you don't meet the requirements. why are we dumbing down requirements for everything now just because minorities can't achieve the same.
Equality means equal opportunity NOT equal results. enough of this "everyone gets a trophy" mentality of this dumbass.
We have the greatest specialized schools in the world. Why fix what's not broken?
Just get your kid to transfer in the last year of middle school to a poorly ranked middle school and they will be set for life.
The last of the schools to be dumbed down.
The mayor is upset because the Asians are pass most the tests and gain admittance and that's against socialism. This mayor believes everybody should be equal and entitled to the same thing regardless of how hard they are willing to work and earn it.
No problem, now The Asians will now build private schools and hire all the good teachers willing to leave the sinking ship. That is till the mayor goes after private at gunpoint too. (if given another term)
The dumbing down of America. There is no incentive to do well on anything anymore. Homeless = Free Housing (at taxpayers expense). Jobless = Free Food Stamps (at taxpayers expense). Pregnant = Free Abortions (at taxpayers expense). Parent's too lazy to cook = Free Breakfast and Lunch at schools (at taxpayers expense). Parent's too lazy to help their kids with homework = Free Homework Help (at taxpayers expense). Parent's too lazy to help their kids study = Easy admission to the best schools because of their color = At the expense of kids who's parents help keep their academic averages high. Welcome to the land of the Free. Screw the hard-working taxpayers who work hard, juggle two jobs, raise, feed and educate their kids and try to live in this unaffordable city. Hasn't anyone ever heard of Personal Responsibility?
as a stuy grad, I can tell you that stuy is not a place where people can work the bare minimum and still graduate. it is competitive and the classes are fast-paced. there are not much resources one can obtain (from the school) if he/she falls behind. without help, one can not catchup and most likely will fall into a downward spiral.
The specialized test ensure that any student who attends will have a certain standard to be able to achieve success. opening the flood gate will only cause many student who are not equipped for the competitive environment to fail.
what's the point of admitting 800 students every year and end with only 400 graduating?
Horsepower is an overstatement, More like mouse on a wheel power.
Most these kids of illegals are so feral they cant sit still to learn English, no self control, stab teachers no knowing right from wrong or discipline in there households to accomplish anything. -- This mayor thinks they're going to learn mathematics and science by doing this ?
HAA HAA what a LAUGH!!
Folks, this is what you get when a majority of the city treats election day like a joke. This is the city everyone voted (or didn't even bother to show up at the polls) for. So this is the nonsense that we get and rightfully deserve.
Hallelujah! The idea that a test score is the true representation of a student being trully talented, creative, uniquely gifted is ludicrous. Some of our most culturally prominent citizens were terrible in exam taking, yet they were great poets, humanists, journalists, economists, labor leaders. One can prep a donkey into scoring the maximum SAT, you just have to stop him from having any kind of social interactions with other donkeys, to study day and night, and to see other donkeys as mainly existing to be beaten academically and financially. And that's no way to raise any donkey!
800 students every year and end with only 400 graduating is a given. In NYC and southern California good 1/2 that number are "south the border" kids where most the females are pregnant by age 16 and many of the boys get into other trouble, choose gang banging.
They have zero supervision in the household and whatever you call parents were raised the same way. Nothing will fix that, things are only going to get worse, gotta get the hell out of Queens ASAP.
Its gonna be a gang ridden mess like the country's these locust people overpopulated, bled dry then fled from
I was an UNDERPRIVILGED kid who took the test to get into Art &Design High School.
It was a SPECIALIZED school from its inception.
Don't blame poor educational opportunities on race. Blame goes partially to the teachers and their mafia-like Union. Toss the deadwood and education will improve. Oops that's almost impossible, isn't it. Just like Albany politicians bad teachers stay tenured! Extracting an impacted wisdom tooth would be easier. TEACHERS need to be examined just like the students. If they don't make the cut, cut 'em loose!
Yesterday, my sister in-law was complaining about this SHSAT issue, so I asked her if she voted at last year's election (for mayor), she said "No", so I told her to "shut up". Her chance to change was at the ballot box, not now.
For Dumbasio, it is more easier to bring down the quality of 8 schools than improving the other hundreds high schools that are failing.
If 20 something public middle schools out of more than 600 provided 50% of the admitted students to those 8 HS and he dosn't see the problem, then there is no hope for education in this city with him as a mayor.
I agree with the last poster who blames the voters for staying home. De Blasio might have gotten a super majority but it was of the tiny minority that bothered to vote.
As for the "progressives" they always have the same answer, destroy those who have something. Had "progressives" shown up at the scene of the Titanic the first thing they would have done was to tip over all the life rafts.
Not all Asians are rich and if they were, they would send their kids to private school already. Specialized high school is based on merit. There are many working class Asians with immigrant parents working grueling hours so their kids can get a better life. There was a NYzt article about a Chinese kid who worked in his parents’ laundromat while studying and got into Stuyvesant. It comes down to the parents and no amount of money such as giving kids iPads etc is going to turn them into academic overachievers.
"...the soft bigotry of low expectations."
Here is a mind exercise for anyone stupid enough to support this latest bit of "social justice" pablum from Deblandio:
Picture 20 cars lined up to race at the Indy 500.
These cars qualified for the big race in time trials the day before and are ready to haul ass after whittling down the competition from an initial field of 100 vehicles.
Just before the start, an official stops the event to announce that it's unfair for all these high performance vehicles to be lined up to race without allowing for the inclusion of a last minute entry; a two cylinder vehicle that runs on cooking grease.
The two cylinder vehicle sputters up to the starting line ready to blast off on green, confident that he is ready to compete by virtue of the fact that he secured a position at the start line and the official must be right because, after all, he's wearing a suit.
Can you guess what happens when the starting gun is fired?
If you guessed that the two cylinder, cooking grease smoke bomb took off like a rocket and left everyone in the dust to win the race, congratulations, you've achieved full head-up-ass status.
If you guessed correctly that the other vehicles left the smoke bomb in the dust, you've achieved a passing score on today's qualifying test for the non-stupid.
...now, what will happen to students without the skills to achieve on standardized tests when you place them into schools where calculus and physics are considered the shallow end of the pool? (answer key located on page 9)
Harry Haller
The Post had an article yesterday which gave statistics on ethnicity and income at all of the "specialized" high schools. The amount of students said to be living below the "poverty level" at Stuyvesant was on the order of 60%.
Aut disce aut discede.
"For Dumbasio, it is more easier to bring down the quality of 8 schools than improving the other hundreds high schools that are failing."
Bingo. Close the thread
It's like this. Me and Dumblasio are sitting in the gutter and a guy drives by in a Rolls Royce. I say "boy I'd like a car like that one day." Dumblasio says "I can't wait till the day that guys in the gutter with me"
It's a mental illness
For those of you who say that the sole criteria for admission shouldn't just be a test score you have a valid point, BUT the mayor's plane doesn't address that issue. The simply says bring in students who don't make the cut.
I have news. Big Bill is running in 2020 and is getting his talking points in line with the Party's wishes.
For those of you who say that the sole criteria for admission shouldn't just be a test score you have a valid point
What exactly? The main 3 schools have incredible results from their student body in terms of attendance, graduation rate, and acceptance to top colleges nationwide, not to mention notable alumni.
Just another form of Affirmative Action. A rose by any other name will still have thorns. Make the students rely on their color, not their brains. The whole policy of the Dumbocratic Party. If DeBlasio really cared, he'd target their subculture of teenage births, rap music and lack of family values as the reasons holding them down.
We had no money also, spent mornings hunting for curbside radios and TV to bring home, fix and sell with my grandfather. I went to JHS 93 then took the test for Brooklyn Tech.
I thought its was an easy pass but what was placed in front of me had nothing to do with science or electronics. I knew Ohms law, how to solder, use an oscilloscop and VTVMs by age 12, but shit that test was hard. And a real a nightmare for a dyslexic person but I-- did pass (likely DUE to having dyslexia and the ability to see things without having to use complex mathematics. The teachers in 93 never detected it, however teachers in Brooklyn Tech (many former military avionics engineers) did through my handwriting and schematic drawings.
I remember the shitty gym teacher Mr.Matron reading the names & results in the 93 cafeteria and laughing, near every name was followed by fail, fail, fail, fail, fail,
At Brooklyn Tech It was near impossible to keep up with the Asians, these guys were in the books at the back of the 6AM DeKalb ave bus studying the who ride too, then all during lunch and the whole ride home. Never seen them eat, drink, talk or socialize, no interest in girls --only study. I think they may have all had special reading glasses too.
These Asian guys were like robots.
NO WAY are students who don't make the cut (screening) getting through these schools without dumbing everything down so low it would make those schools useless.
Perhaps that is the actual reason.
"Anonymous Anonymous said...
Hallelujah! The idea that a test score is the true representation of a student being trully talented, creative, uniquely gifted is ludicrous. Some of our most culturally prominent citizens were terrible in exam taking, yet they were great poets, humanists, journalists, economists, labor leaders. One can prep a donkey into scoring the maximum SAT, you just have to stop him from having any kind of social interactions with other donkeys, to study day and night, and to see other donkeys as mainly existing to be beaten academically and financially. And that's no way to raise any donkey!"
Yes, a test is not a perfect criterion. Yet, you tell me how you will OBJECTIVELY evaluate the intelligence, drive, poetic ability, talent and overall ability of the thousands of people applying. Make sure no possible BIAS slips in.
I'll take the imperfect test.
Some of NYC's agencies could stand for more diversity. Look at DOT and DOC for example.
So by doing this, DeBlasio is actually insulting and being very racist. He is saying those black and hispanice studens are too dumb to get into specialized high school by themselves so they need assistance from their own local school. So I guess he is also insulting his own wife and kids race. If you are good enough, no need to reserve 20% of the seats. It's like the nba where they have to reserve 20% of them to indians and chinese. smh. dumbut.
Dummies are dummies. AND they've ruined a one good school system!
Then we have incompetent teachers!
14 Nobel Prize winners between
Bronx Science, Brooklyn Tech and Stuyvesant.
....and this genius wants to change that formula.
LOLOLOLOLOLOLOLOLOLOLOL
I applaud you New Yorkers for wanting to rid NYC of this canker sore. Problem is, you just keep voting in Democrats. Remember John V. Lindsay. Remember David Dinkins. Need I go on. Didn't Einstein make a comment once about repeating the same mistake over and over and over as being a sure sign of insanity. It's hard to feel sorry for you when you just can's stop doing it. But anyway, the best of luck to you. I love NYC. My former home.
Yes, because one group has a culture of diligence and hard-work, let's make everything easier so no one's left behind, LOL. Every school should be brought up to the specialized HS' standards, if that were taken care of you wouldn't hear so much whining about Asians dominating the few HS that aren't complete crap. ass backwards policy as usual
Funny question. While I have to assume that Dante (Major's son) was a dedicated and smart student to get into Brooklyn Tech and graduated from it, but I doubt how he was able to get into Yale, was it because his Mom is African-American or because his father is the Major of NYC or because his great achievement from Brooklyn Tech? Was it because "who you know" or because "what you know"...Makes me wonder since Mr Mayor doesn't recognize hard work, only "colors".
"So by doing this, DeBlasio is actually insulting and being very racist"
No, because anything he does apparently does not apply to his family or himself.
Lets see: He does drugs, uses a caravan of SUVs, personal armed guards, patrol cars to go to a gym, and I have yet to see him take in one homeless at Gracie mansion or his Park Slope home.
All 100% the opposite of what he dishes out.
I remember Bloomberg always took the subway with 2 cops already on duty. Would even buy his own hotdogs. Not this piece of shit !!
And "They" ruined CUNY after the liberals forced it to lower it's standards to let "Them" in.
Average GPA in middle school and State Tests scores are all RIGGED. Teachers help these kids cheat like crazy. Took a class in education once, and one prospective teacher said the teacher put the answers to the Regents State Test next to the pencil sharpener. If a student ever asks a question about a particular test question, the teacher just says - go sharpen your pencil. There is SO MUCH CHEATING going on by the teachers. This is because teachers have to have a certain amount of kids pass- No child left behind. There's no way that is happening with the amount of ESL students, lazy parents, and homeless kids in the system. So what's a teacher to do? CHEAT. The State Regents states are also designed to make it almost impossible to fail. The rubrics/grading is so skewed, you have to be a complete DUMBO to fail. I've seen the grading and rubrics. High school teachers grading the state regents math tests, all basically laughed when grading it together, because they all knew, the rubric is DESIGNED so very little kids fail. It's just a formality they do, it's all fake. You should give your kid a real test online - Seton, Stanford - if you want to know your child's real potential. Then there's the grades teachers give out. ALL inflated. I've seen high school kids in this city, 9th grade, who cannot do fractions, percentages, or decimals. They got to HS because their past teachers are not only inflating grades, but passing kids that shouldn't. Like kicking the bucket down the line. No teacher wants to fail a kid, even if it's deserved because it reflects poorly upon the teacher. No Child Left Behind - if you fail a kid, the principal points the finger at the teacher and say you didn't do enough. It's just a system now, shuffle the kids along. So if Deblasio wants to use GPA and State test Scores, it's COMPLETE UNOBECTIVE - because it is subject to lying, cheating teachers - inflating kids grades and helping them cheat.
There was recent news about a father in Maryland who sued the school system. His son graduated from high school, but read at a 5th grade level. Father couldn't believe it. Wake up people, this is what No Child Left Behind does to our schools. You politize education, it will no longer will educate. Get politics out of education and let teachers teach, and give them the right to FAIL kids. Parents especially need to be held accountable for their kids. They shouldn't be allowed to send a child to school, if they haven't even trained their kid to sit still and be respectable in class. That's just common sense.
to the Anonymous poster who stated look at NYC agencies, they are not diversified. Well yeah... look at HRA, Board of Elections, DHS, NYCHA, HPD, DOB. It's all Caribbean black all the time. When are those agencies going to be diversified?
How about having White Americans who were born in NYC work at City Jobs?
AND. for the poster who stated free breakfast and lunch for parents too lazy to make food for their children - this is an extension of the plantation where all the slaves were fed.
This is the worst idea DBD has come up with.
The majority of black and latino high school students can not sit still and don't want to learn anything. They want to deal drugs, blast music and get a job with the City so they don't have to work.
Post a Comment