Federal judge rules that admissions changes at nation’s top public school discriminate against Asian

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I don't like C4TJ and care less if my kid gets into TJ or not. However, I do have to admit, my kid is really wants to attend TJ. Despite many folks think on this forum, very few are actually opposed to more diversity, including and providing better opportunities for under privileged students. I like the diversity in our public schools. The primary issue is how FCPS went about implementing the new process with so many holes in it and the criteria they carefully selected to undermine specific group(s) of kids.

I don't know whats the real intent is, but it sure as hell appears to undermine the kids from AAP center schools. Be it the 'attending' school based quotas, undermining the GPA against the writing skills just to name a couple. Why is it so hard to implement the quotas based on 'base' school instead (or school pyramid), all the center kids really do come from the same geographic areas as base schools anyway. The innocent victims of this process is non-AAP kids zoned to center skills. I don't mind removing Quant-Q, but why not give a more weightage to GPA and less to others (ex: 80% GPA, 10% essay and 10% portrait sheet) and why not have teacher recommendations? I am pretty sure board members are not stupid enough not have considered this. However, they might have realized if they do consider it, it will go against their goal of cutting down the very students they want to cut down from the start.

As someone said earlier in this forum, the more practical and much fairer solution could be to raise the min GPA to 3.75 until at least 3rd quarter of 8th grade, require all the core courses to be honors, slowly raise the Geo HN required by 8th (open up Algebra I HN to all), add a little bit (not too much) of weightage to portrait sheet and teacher recommendations - and finally select from the qualified kids using LOTTERY. There will not be any discrimination what so ever.

I think you make a lot of good points here, but I take issue with the idea that the point was to "undermine" kids who are attending center schools. The very point of the 1.5% allocation rule was to open up spaces and possibilities to kids who do NOT attend center schools - which, by the way, still get FAR more kids in to TJ from FCPS than do non-center schools.

It's not right that a late-bloomer who discovers their interest in STEM and their passion for an exceptional collaborative learning environment is shut out of the process just because they didn't end up qualifying for a center program.

I agree with you about the teacher recommendations and frankly think that the number should probably be at 1% instead of 1.5%, and I think most of your other ideas have merit. I would expect FCPS to slowly move in that direction once there is wide understanding that TJ is open to students from all schools.

I am genuinely curious here. Lets say hypothetically, we distribute 60% (or 80% or some other number? - and remaining % in open allocation) TJ admissions highest evaluated students to each school pyramid proportional to how many 8th graders are in each pyramid irrespective of attending schools. So my question is why do you think all these admissions will be grabbed by AAP students which warrants an attending school based quota? No where it says AAP kids will have better GPA when its unweighted and every kid in center or non-center school can easily meet the qualifying GPA and course requirements. Just wondering

I have two answers to that question:

1) I believe they will almost all be snagged by AAP students attending a center because historically, that's who has gotten seats no matter how the process has worked until seats were allocated by attending school.

2) It's important to use attending school as the criterion because a student who applies from a historically underrepresented school - say, Whitman - is guaranteed that several of the kids who they currently go to school with will also be admitted. Historically, many students from underrepresented schools who did get in turned down their offers of admission once they attended Freshmen Preview Night and realized that there were no familiar faces there with them - as other students from Carson or Longfellow had a cohort of 60-80 to commiserate with. TJ is a challenging enough environment without having zero familiar faces or zero kids who look like you when you get started.

Fair points! Though, I do feel its a little unfair in two ways 1. The process is saying AAP students that they have an unfair advantage just because they are in AAP and needs to dumb down even they came from same elementary schools to begin with. 2. It also says to non-AAP students that they still aren't good enough to compete with their peers/neighbors who were AAP, so they need special quota just to get it. Not sure how this dynamic will play after they get to TJ. Interesting though!

There are quite a few threads here which brag about TJ students achievements such as premier college admissions, scholarships, winning various competitions etc. I hope it still says the same after say 4 more years when the entire cohort will be replaced by new process. I have heard from two different kids currently attending TJ that there is a stigma against the freshman students. The perception is that may of the freshman students do not belong there, not up to TJ standards or not able to compete well enough etc. There could be a considerable perception bias and I can't take this statement(s) at the face value, but it does raise doubts about the efficacy of the new process. We will just have to wait and see!

It seemed like a toxic place before, it seems like a toxic place now, and eventually it will just be an above average high school that replicates the academic performance of an Oakton while drawing from a wider area.

1) it will be interesting to see how the dynamic changes when half of the school was selected by the new process rather than just a quarter.

2) it won’t mirror the performance of an Oakton. It will probably mirror the performance of the top 20 kids at Oakton but for the 500 that survive from freshmen to senior year.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I don't like C4TJ and care less if my kid gets into TJ or not. However, I do have to admit, my kid is really wants to attend TJ. Despite many folks think on this forum, very few are actually opposed to more diversity, including and providing better opportunities for under privileged students. I like the diversity in our public schools. The primary issue is how FCPS went about implementing the new process with so many holes in it and the criteria they carefully selected to undermine specific group(s) of kids.

I don't know whats the real intent is, but it sure as hell appears to undermine the kids from AAP center schools. Be it the 'attending' school based quotas, undermining the GPA against the writing skills just to name a couple. Why is it so hard to implement the quotas based on 'base' school instead (or school pyramid), all the center kids really do come from the same geographic areas as base schools anyway. The innocent victims of this process is non-AAP kids zoned to center skills. I don't mind removing Quant-Q, but why not give a more weightage to GPA and less to others (ex: 80% GPA, 10% essay and 10% portrait sheet) and why not have teacher recommendations? I am pretty sure board members are not stupid enough not have considered this. However, they might have realized if they do consider it, it will go against their goal of cutting down the very students they want to cut down from the start.

As someone said earlier in this forum, the more practical and much fairer solution could be to raise the min GPA to 3.75 until at least 3rd quarter of 8th grade, require all the core courses to be honors, slowly raise the Geo HN required by 8th (open up Algebra I HN to all), add a little bit (not too much) of weightage to portrait sheet and teacher recommendations - and finally select from the qualified kids using LOTTERY. There will not be any discrimination what so ever.

I think you make a lot of good points here, but I take issue with the idea that the point was to "undermine" kids who are attending center schools. The very point of the 1.5% allocation rule was to open up spaces and possibilities to kids who do NOT attend center schools - which, by the way, still get FAR more kids in to TJ from FCPS than do non-center schools.

It's not right that a late-bloomer who discovers their interest in STEM and their passion for an exceptional collaborative learning environment is shut out of the process just because they didn't end up qualifying for a center program.

I agree with you about the teacher recommendations and frankly think that the number should probably be at 1% instead of 1.5%, and I think most of your other ideas have merit. I would expect FCPS to slowly move in that direction once there is wide understanding that TJ is open to students from all schools.

I am genuinely curious here. Lets say hypothetically, we distribute 60% (or 80% or some other number? - and remaining % in open allocation) TJ admissions highest evaluated students to each school pyramid proportional to how many 8th graders are in each pyramid irrespective of attending schools. So my question is why do you think all these admissions will be grabbed by AAP students which warrants an attending school based quota? No where it says AAP kids will have better GPA when its unweighted and every kid in center or non-center school can easily meet the qualifying GPA and course requirements. Just wondering

I have two answers to that question:

1) I believe they will almost all be snagged by AAP students attending a center because historically, that's who has gotten seats no matter how the process has worked until seats were allocated by attending school.

2) It's important to use attending school as the criterion because a student who applies from a historically underrepresented school - say, Whitman - is guaranteed that several of the kids who they currently go to school with will also be admitted. Historically, many students from underrepresented schools who did get in turned down their offers of admission once they attended Freshmen Preview Night and realized that there were no familiar faces there with them - as other students from Carson or Longfellow had a cohort of 60-80 to commiserate with. TJ is a challenging enough environment without having zero familiar faces or zero kids who look like you when you get started.

Fair points! Though, I do feel its a little unfair in two ways 1. The process is saying AAP students that they have an unfair advantage just because they are in AAP and needs to dumb down even they came from same elementary schools to begin with. 2. It also says to non-AAP students that they still aren't good enough to compete with their peers/neighbors who were AAP, so they need special quota just to get it. Not sure how this dynamic will play after they get to TJ. Interesting though!

There are quite a few threads here which brag about TJ students achievements such as premier college admissions, scholarships, winning various competitions etc. I hope it still says the same after say 4 more years when the entire cohort will be replaced by new process. I have heard from two different kids currently attending TJ that there is a stigma against the freshman students. The perception is that may of the freshman students do not belong there, not up to TJ standards or not able to compete well enough etc. There could be a considerable perception bias and I can't take this statement(s) at the face value, but it does raise doubts about the efficacy of the new process. We will just have to wait and see!

It seemed like a toxic place before, it seems like a toxic place now, and eventually it will just be an above average high school that replicates the academic performance of an Oakton while drawing from a wider area.

1) it will be interesting to see how the dynamic changes when half of the school was selected by the new process rather than just a quarter.

2) it won’t mirror the performance of an Oakton. It will probably mirror the performance of the top 20 kids at Oakton but for the 500 that survive from freshmen to senior year.

Nope. The top 20 kids at Oakton will be kids from Carson who previously would have been attending TJ and they’ll perform at a higher level than the average TJ student in four years.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I don't like C4TJ and care less if my kid gets into TJ or not. However, I do have to admit, my kid is really wants to attend TJ. Despite many folks think on this forum, very few are actually opposed to more diversity, including and providing better opportunities for under privileged students. I like the diversity in our public schools. The primary issue is how FCPS went about implementing the new process with so many holes in it and the criteria they carefully selected to undermine specific group(s) of kids.

I don't know whats the real intent is, but it sure as hell appears to undermine the kids from AAP center schools. Be it the 'attending' school based quotas, undermining the GPA against the writing skills just to name a couple. Why is it so hard to implement the quotas based on 'base' school instead (or school pyramid), all the center kids really do come from the same geographic areas as base schools anyway. The innocent victims of this process is non-AAP kids zoned to center skills. I don't mind removing Quant-Q, but why not give a more weightage to GPA and less to others (ex: 80% GPA, 10% essay and 10% portrait sheet) and why not have teacher recommendations? I am pretty sure board members are not stupid enough not have considered this. However, they might have realized if they do consider it, it will go against their goal of cutting down the very students they want to cut down from the start.

As someone said earlier in this forum, the more practical and much fairer solution could be to raise the min GPA to 3.75 until at least 3rd quarter of 8th grade, require all the core courses to be honors, slowly raise the Geo HN required by 8th (open up Algebra I HN to all), add a little bit (not too much) of weightage to portrait sheet and teacher recommendations - and finally select from the qualified kids using LOTTERY. There will not be any discrimination what so ever.

I think you make a lot of good points here, but I take issue with the idea that the point was to "undermine" kids who are attending center schools. The very point of the 1.5% allocation rule was to open up spaces and possibilities to kids who do NOT attend center schools - which, by the way, still get FAR more kids in to TJ from FCPS than do non-center schools.

It's not right that a late-bloomer who discovers their interest in STEM and their passion for an exceptional collaborative learning environment is shut out of the process just because they didn't end up qualifying for a center program.

I agree with you about the teacher recommendations and frankly think that the number should probably be at 1% instead of 1.5%, and I think most of your other ideas have merit. I would expect FCPS to slowly move in that direction once there is wide understanding that TJ is open to students from all schools.

I am genuinely curious here. Lets say hypothetically, we distribute 60% (or 80% or some other number? - and remaining % in open allocation) TJ admissions highest evaluated students to each school pyramid proportional to how many 8th graders are in each pyramid irrespective of attending schools. So my question is why do you think all these admissions will be grabbed by AAP students which warrants an attending school based quota? No where it says AAP kids will have better GPA when its unweighted and every kid in center or non-center school can easily meet the qualifying GPA and course requirements. Just wondering

I have two answers to that question:

1) I believe they will almost all be snagged by AAP students attending a center because historically, that's who has gotten seats no matter how the process has worked until seats were allocated by attending school.

2) It's important to use attending school as the criterion because a student who applies from a historically underrepresented school - say, Whitman - is guaranteed that several of the kids who they currently go to school with will also be admitted. Historically, many students from underrepresented schools who did get in turned down their offers of admission once they attended Freshmen Preview Night and realized that there were no familiar faces there with them - as other students from Carson or Longfellow had a cohort of 60-80 to commiserate with. TJ is a challenging enough environment without having zero familiar faces or zero kids who look like you when you get started.

Fair points! Though, I do feel its a little unfair in two ways 1. The process is saying AAP students that they have an unfair advantage just because they are in AAP and needs to dumb down even they came from same elementary schools to begin with. 2. It also says to non-AAP students that they still aren't good enough to compete with their peers/neighbors who were AAP, so they need special quota just to get it. Not sure how this dynamic will play after they get to TJ. Interesting though!

There are quite a few threads here which brag about TJ students achievements such as premier college admissions, scholarships, winning various competitions etc. I hope it still says the same after say 4 more years when the entire cohort will be replaced by new process. I have heard from two different kids currently attending TJ that there is a stigma against the freshman students. The perception is that may of the freshman students do not belong there, not up to TJ standards or not able to compete well enough etc. There could be a considerable perception bias and I can't take this statement(s) at the face value, but it does raise doubts about the efficacy of the new process. We will just have to wait and see!

It seemed like a toxic place before, it seems like a toxic place now, and eventually it will just be an above average high school that replicates the academic performance of an Oakton while drawing from a wider area.

I am pretty sure TJ will be better than Oakton, but not by much. New TJ kids will most likely in line with other oakton/Langley kids who mostly go for honors or AP courses. In other words TJ will be very much like AAP center school and not like top 20% AAP. There will be a significant overlap between TJ and other high schools. Currently, TJ kids are generally considered well above oakton/Langley etc. However, I take comfort in this - my Carson kid only has about max 20% chance at TJ as there will be at least over 200 kids with very similar GPA of 3.9+ and only thing that separates them is portrait sheet/essay. Also, kid doesn’t belong to any special categories if you think TJ will end up like oakton, my kid will be better off at oakton 😀

[Anonymous]

Was the outcome of this decision implemented at TJ? Now I hear it went through some appeal process and the case is in front of supreme court? or was it part of the recent affirmative action ban ruling?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Was the outcome of this decision implemented at TJ? Now I hear it went through some appeal process and the case is in front of supreme court? or was it part of the recent affirmative action ban ruling?

If SCOTUS hears case and doesn't consider new affirmative action ban, it's possible there's a new cause of action by parents anyway arguing the TJ process is illegal because it's affirmative action. Right now, maybe the cause of action was that the TJ process was illegal because it discriminated against Asians. But I don't have docs in front of me.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Was the outcome of this decision implemented at TJ? Now I hear it went through some appeal process and the case is in front of supreme court? or was it part of the recent affirmative action ban ruling?

If SCOTUS hears case and doesn't consider new affirmative action ban, it's possible there's a new cause of action by parents anyway arguing the TJ process is illegal because it's affirmative action. Right now, maybe the cause of action was that the TJ process was illegal because it discriminated against Asians. But I don't have docs in front of me.

One would expect the affirmative action ban to apply to not just universities but all education institutions including high schools like TJ?

is there a link to a site that shows the TJ specific case in the potential SC hearing pipeline?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:
This outlook that any education policy change that results in a higher proportion of low income Black and Hispanic in elite programs is racist simply because there is less high income Asians is terrible.

+1

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:
This outlook that any education policy change that results in a higher proportion of low income Black and Hispanic in elite programs is racist simply because there is less high income Asians is terrible.

+1

There’s a difference between a truly race-neutral process and one that is superficially race-neutral but clearly motivated by a desire to favor certain racial groups over others in order to achieve a particular racial mix.

The TJ admissions changes fall in the latter category. I would not be surprised if the new process is invalidated at some point with FCPS ordered to go back to the drawing board.

[Anonymous]

Low income asian americans in the lowest quartile make about $17k per year

https://www.cepr.net/a-brief-look-at-low-income-asian-americans-and-pacific-islanders/

Unless race-based admissions are completely eradicated, in compliance with the supreme court ban, and replaced with socio-economic merit based criteria many low income asians are denied their right to education

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:https://pacificlegal.org/press-release/federal-judge-rules-that-admissions-changes-at-nations-top-public-school-discriminate-against-asian-american-students/
Next step is to criminally charge Mr. Brabrand and FCPS SB members for their hate crimes against Asian Americans. I'll personally donate at least $10k for this cause.

Isn't TJ something like 90% Asian?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I don't like C4TJ and care less if my kid gets into TJ or not. However, I do have to admit, my kid is really wants to attend TJ. Despite many folks think on this forum, very few are actually opposed to more diversity, including and providing better opportunities for under privileged students. I like the diversity in our public schools. The primary issue is how FCPS went about implementing the new process with so many holes in it and the criteria they carefully selected to undermine specific group(s) of kids.

I don't know whats the real intent is, but it sure as hell appears to undermine the kids from AAP center schools. Be it the 'attending' school based quotas, undermining the GPA against the writing skills just to name a couple. Why is it so hard to implement the quotas based on 'base' school instead (or school pyramid), all the center kids really do come from the same geographic areas as base schools anyway. The innocent victims of this process is non-AAP kids zoned to center skills. I don't mind removing Quant-Q, but why not give a more weightage to GPA and less to others (ex: 80% GPA, 10% essay and 10% portrait sheet) and why not have teacher recommendations? I am pretty sure board members are not stupid enough not have considered this. However, they might have realized if they do consider it, it will go against their goal of cutting down the very students they want to cut down from the start.

As someone said earlier in this forum, the more practical and much fairer solution could be to raise the min GPA to 3.75 until at least 3rd quarter of 8th grade, require all the core courses to be honors, slowly raise the Geo HN required by 8th (open up Algebra I HN to all), add a little bit (not too much) of weightage to portrait sheet and teacher recommendations - and finally select from the qualified kids using LOTTERY. There will not be any discrimination what so ever.

I think you make a lot of good points here, but I take issue with the idea that the point was to "undermine" kids who are attending center schools. The very point of the 1.5% allocation rule was to open up spaces and possibilities to kids who do NOT attend center schools - which, by the way, still get FAR more kids in to TJ from FCPS than do non-center schools.

It's not right that a late-bloomer who discovers their interest in STEM and their passion for an exceptional collaborative learning environment is shut out of the process just because they didn't end up qualifying for a center program.

I agree with you about the teacher recommendations and frankly think that the number should probably be at 1% instead of 1.5%, and I think most of your other ideas have merit. I would expect FCPS to slowly move in that direction once there is wide understanding that TJ is open to students from all schools.

I am genuinely curious here. Lets say hypothetically, we distribute 60% (or 80% or some other number? - and remaining % in open allocation) TJ admissions highest evaluated students to each school pyramid proportional to how many 8th graders are in each pyramid irrespective of attending schools. So my question is why do you think all these admissions will be grabbed by AAP students which warrants an attending school based quota? No where it says AAP kids will have better GPA when its unweighted and every kid in center or non-center school can easily meet the qualifying GPA and course requirements. Just wondering

I have two answers to that question:

1) I believe they will almost all be snagged by AAP students attending a center because historically, that's who has gotten seats no matter how the process has worked until seats were allocated by attending school.

2) It's important to use attending school as the criterion because a student who applies from a historically underrepresented school - say, Whitman - is guaranteed that several of the kids who they currently go to school with will also be admitted. Historically, many students from underrepresented schools who did get in turned down their offers of admission once they attended Freshmen Preview Night and realized that there were no familiar faces there with them - as other students from Carson or Longfellow had a cohort of 60-80 to commiserate with. TJ is a challenging enough environment without having zero familiar faces or zero kids who look like you when you get started.

Fair points! Though, I do feel its a little unfair in two ways 1. The process is saying AAP students that they have an unfair advantage just because they are in AAP and needs to dumb down even they came from same elementary schools to begin with. 2. It also says to non-AAP students that they still aren't good enough to compete with their peers/neighbors who were AAP, so they need special quota just to get it. Not sure how this dynamic will play after they get to TJ. Interesting though!

There are quite a few threads here which brag about TJ students achievements such as premier college admissions, scholarships, winning various competitions etc. I hope it still says the same after say 4 more years when the entire cohort will be replaced by new process. I have heard from two different kids currently attending TJ that there is a stigma against the freshman students. The perception is that may of the freshman students do not belong there, not up to TJ standards or not able to compete well enough etc. There could be a considerable perception bias and I can't take this statement(s) at the face value, but it does raise doubts about the efficacy of the new process. We will just have to wait and see!

It seemed like a toxic place before, it seems like a toxic place now, and eventually it will just be an above average high school that replicates the academic performance of an Oakton while drawing from a wider area.

I am pretty sure TJ will be better than Oakton, but not by much. New TJ kids will most likely in line with other oakton/Langley kids who mostly go for honors or AP courses. In other words TJ will be very much like AAP center school and not like top 20% AAP. There will be a significant overlap between TJ and other high schools. Currently, TJ kids are generally considered well above oakton/Langley etc. However, I take comfort in this - my Carson kid only has about max 20% chance at TJ as there will be at least over 200 kids with very similar GPA of 3.9+ and only thing that separates them is portrait sheet/essay. Also, kid doesn’t belong to any special categories if you think TJ will end up like oakton, my kid will be better off at oakton 😀

That's really precious. Keep telling yourself these things if it makes you feel any better.

[Anonymous]

#1 ranked high school in Washington DC,
Benjamin Banneker Academy High School has 72% black and 2% Asian.

Are a certain group overrepresented there?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:#1 ranked high school in Washington DC,
Benjamin Banneker Academy High School has 72% black and 2% Asian.

Are a certain group overrepresented there?

Washington DC is nearly 50% Black so it's not outlandish that the school is 72% Black. DC is about 5% Asian.

On the other hand, Fairfax County is about 20% Asian and 10% Black. TJ currently is 65% Asian, which is over triple the average Asian demographics of Fairfax County.

Only one of these cases could be considered as having an overrepresented group, and it's not Black kids in DC for goodness' sake.

[Anonymous]

Please stop comparing TJ with Benjamin Banneker Academy High School.

No TJ student is interested in attending Benjamin Banneker Academy High School.

I am totally fine if Benjamin Banneker Academy has 0% Asian.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:#1 ranked high school in Washington DC,
Benjamin Banneker Academy High School has 72% black and 2% Asian.

Are a certain group overrepresented there?

Washington DC is nearly 50% Black so it's not outlandish that the school is 72% Black. DC is about 5% Asian.

On the other hand, Fairfax County is about 20% Asian and 10% Black. TJ currently is 65% Asian, which is over triple the average Asian demographics of Fairfax County.

Only one of these cases could be considered as having an overrepresented group, and it's not Black kids in DC for goodness' sake.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:#1 ranked high school in Washington DC,
Benjamin Banneker Academy High School has 72% black and 2% Asian.

Are a certain group overrepresented there?

Washington DC is nearly 50% Black so it's not outlandish that the school is 72% Black. DC is about 5% Asian.

On the other hand, Fairfax County is about 20% Asian and 10% Black. TJ currently is 65% Asian, which is over triple the average Asian demographics of Fairfax County.

Only one of these cases could be considered as having an overrepresented group, and it's not Black kids in DC for goodness' sake.

72% Blacks at one school is not considered over-represented but a 65% Asian at another school is?