TJ Commended Student Emails Released - Who is really responsible?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Uh, no, there are more commended students at TJ than semifinalists. He wanted to protect the feelings of the 20% or so of TJ students who were neither semifinalists nor commended.

THIS. And it states so in the emails

Ultimately, he did distribute them so his opinion about the "feelings" is moot.

It's not moot. He used it as a cover-up for why he didn't distribute them when the reality is he just forgot to do it. That's lying to a parent and it's not okay.

He used it as a reason for why they didn’t deliver the letters with much fanfare. Subtle but extremely important distinction there.

"Mr. Kosatka, you told me that you held these letters, in part, because you were concerned about handing them out around students who didn't receive the award."

This. Was. A. Lie.

And it was a lie to cover the fact that he forgot to do it.

We don't know what he actually said or what he meant by it.

Look, I think that the Coalition for TJ is the single worst thing to happen to the school in its existence. It's literally ripping the school apart at the seams, making it more difficult for the school to educate its students and maintain its position. I generally side with the school on most things. And I acknowledge that Yashar, like all of the major players on Asra's side in this, are Republican operatives who are hell bent on destroying public education.

But in reading this e-mail chain and digging into the facts surrounding the situation, there's only one conclusion you can come to, and that's that the DSS either lied to cover his ass or made a decision that was his and his alone to withhold these letters for whatever reason. Either of these are fireable offenses, neither of them should implicate the principal in any way because she CLEARLY wasn't on board with them, and neither of them should be inviting a damn state-level investigation.

+100. The fight between the Coalition and… the school? TJAAG? (Are there even people in TJAAG? I feel like I hear about them very little compared to the Coalition.) is going scorched-earth and everyone will be worse off for it. And if you think it isn’t disruptive, then you’ve never been in class with TJ students fighting Coalition members on Facebook, or run a TJ club with the fear that some nut job parent will get you in trouble because you didn’t pick their kid for a competitive team and that’s apparently racist. Just because it’s not obvious from the outside doesn’t mean this isn’t hurting the school.

-2022 TJ grad who has worried about all the above in the past

The TJAAG is a real group with real people. https://www.tjaag.org/

They are just as active as the Coalition, if not more so; the difference is that they can rely on publications like the Washington Post and bodies like the FCPS School Board to parrot their viewpoints, whereas the Coalition has to make more noise to get people to pay attention.

Fundamentally, the TJAAG tries to thread a needle, in that it's trying to preserve an elitist institution that serves only 3-4% of FCPS high school students and yet suggest that it's deeply committed to principles of equity. They've tied themselves up into some rhetorical knots recently, such as when a number of them have suggested that receiving a letter of commendation is a "consolation prize" and a "4th-rate award," which comes across as awfully elitist when 97% of high school students are neither semifinalists nor commended students.

Overall, many of them (you?) come across as less interested in equity, or for that matter anything having to do with schools other than TJ, so much as just making sure that TJ is sufficiently diverse, with fewer Asian kids, so that all the alumni will still feel comfortable name-dropping that they went to TJ in random conversations with acquaintances.

DP. It's unclear where the rhetorical knots are that you're mentioning. In the context of TJ, the Commended Student recognition is absolutely a consolation prize and the students view it as such. TJ students (for better or for worse) measure themselves against one another, not against the rest of America.

Folks on the right are obsessed with the anti-Asian narrative, but it falls apart in the face of this reality: if TJ's incoming classes were 70% Asian, 10% White, 10% Black, and 10% Hispanic, the pro-diversity crowd would be thrilled. They'd be shouting from the rooftops.

It's never been about fewer Asians, and it's always been about stronger representation amongst historically excluded populations, which means low income students, Black students, and Hispanic students. But folks on the right, because of their resources, connections, and media savvy, have successfully been able to frame the conversation about "anti-Asianness" when it's anything but.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Uh, no, there are more commended students at TJ than semifinalists. He wanted to protect the feelings of the 20% or so of TJ students who were neither semifinalists nor commended.

THIS. And it states so in the emails

Ultimately, he did distribute them so his opinion about the "feelings" is moot.

It's not moot. He used it as a cover-up for why he didn't distribute them when the reality is he just forgot to do it. That's lying to a parent and it's not okay.

He used it as a reason for why they didn’t deliver the letters with much fanfare. Subtle but extremely important distinction there.

"Mr. Kosatka, you told me that you held these letters, in part, because you were concerned about handing them out around students who didn't receive the award."

This. Was. A. Lie.

And it was a lie to cover the fact that he forgot to do it.

We don't know what he actually said or what he meant by it.

Look, I think that the Coalition for TJ is the single worst thing to happen to the school in its existence. It's literally ripping the school apart at the seams, making it more difficult for the school to educate its students and maintain its position. I generally side with the school on most things. And I acknowledge that Yashar, like all of the major players on Asra's side in this, are Republican operatives who are hell bent on destroying public education.

But in reading this e-mail chain and digging into the facts surrounding the situation, there's only one conclusion you can come to, and that's that the DSS either lied to cover his ass or made a decision that was his and his alone to withhold these letters for whatever reason. Either of these are fireable offenses, neither of them should implicate the principal in any way because she CLEARLY wasn't on board with them, and neither of them should be inviting a damn state-level investigation.

+100. The fight between the Coalition and… the school? TJAAG? (Are there even people in TJAAG? I feel like I hear about them very little compared to the Coalition.) is going scorched-earth and everyone will be worse off for it. And if you think it isn’t disruptive, then you’ve never been in class with TJ students fighting Coalition members on Facebook, or run a TJ club with the fear that some nut job parent will get you in trouble because you didn’t pick their kid for a competitive team and that’s apparently racist. Just because it’s not obvious from the outside doesn’t mean this isn’t hurting the school.

-2022 TJ grad who has worried about all the above in the past

Thank you TJ Grad for describing the way in which the Coalition has negatively impacted the TJ student experience. I can understand the actions of the established Republican operatives, but I wonder if the current TJ parents who are marching alongside Nomani, Jackson, Dutta, and Miller understand the damage that they're actively doing to their own child's experience by siding with them. I would be willing to bet that they don't.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I thought the discussion can be shifted toward Langley and Westfield now, at least TJ sent out the certificate themselves, the other two schools completely missed it

+1. We now have two other schools which did the same thing. I really couldn't believe some of the posts by TJ apologists here yesterday. !) a significant property value (an award) was withheld on purpose from the students - we now know at three schools - it makes no difference wither it is Commended or not, and 2) the reason given, stated twice in the principal's emails, was for equity reason. You can try and say this was an oversight error, but the emails say twice what was said. Yes, A FCPS committee review (now underway) is in order, and apparently, the AG does have to be involved because this may be county widespread.

Calling a letter notifying someone of something that they could have easily accessed themselves "significant property value" is more than a little loony. And yeah, it's of less value because it was Commended. That's not up for debate.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Uh, no, there are more commended students at TJ than semifinalists. He wanted to protect the feelings of the 20% or so of TJ students who were neither semifinalists nor commended.

THIS. And it states so in the emails

Ultimately, he did distribute them so his opinion about the "feelings" is moot.

It's not moot. He used it as a cover-up for why he didn't distribute them when the reality is he just forgot to do it. That's lying to a parent and it's not okay.

He used it as a reason for why they didn’t deliver the letters with much fanfare. Subtle but extremely important distinction there.

"Mr. Kosatka, you told me that you held these letters, in part, because you were concerned about handing them out around students who didn't receive the award."

This. Was. A. Lie.

And it was a lie to cover the fact that he forgot to do it.

I saw that as well. I’m not defending Kosatka and I think what he did was wrong, but I would like to point out that Yashar was already mad at him by this point. She had already accused him of lying to her. It’s important to remember that pretty much anything she says from that email on is not entirely trustworthy because she thinks he’s wronged her and no longer has any incentive to work in good faith with him. (Same goes if the roles were reversed, but we don’t have any letters like that.) It’s possible she got upset with him and either misremembered in the heat of the moment or deliberately misconstrued the situation because she knew this would eventually end up with Asra. We don’t know what was running through her head at the time.

I don't think that's fair and it smacks of misogyny.

Misogyny? My literal next sentence is that I would have said the same thing if Kosatka had started accusing Yashar. Hell, I’d probably say worse since he’s the school official, not her, and knows that arguing with parents is unbecoming given his position.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Things that are true:

- The DSS at TJ failed to distribute, for whatever reason, the notices of Commended status until a month after they were placed on his desk by Dr. Bonitatibus. He should have done it and there’s really no reason for him not to.

- The DSS lied to a parent about the responsibility of the school and attempted to deflect his personal responsibility by making up some nonsense about hurt feelings and equity. (To me, this is a 100% fireable offense.)

Things that are false/unsupported by any facts or reason:

- There was a school decision to withhold these recognitions intentionally. If this were the case, the principal would not have turned them over to the DSS for distribution.

- Students were harmed in any way by this oversight. “Commended Student” status confers essentially zero realistic benefit to even a well below-average TJ student.

- This matter in any way amounts to an attack on merit. You’d have an argument here if we were talking about Semifinalists, Finalists, or Scholars - but we’re not.

- The existence of a majority-Asian population at TJ makes this matter a racially motivated attack on Asian students and families. If you believe this, you’re monumentally stupid. The people pushing the story don’t believe this - they are trying to get you to vote Republican in School Board elections so that they can defund public schools and replace them with for-profit institutions.

- The principal has anything to do with this issue. She doesn’t. Yes, the DSS is a subordinate, but a matter like this is so simple and insignificant as to not even warrant follow-up.

- TJ students care at all about this designation. They don’t, and for the most part neither do their parents. You’ll notice essentially zero TJ students or alumni who are quoted as having a problem with this.

This is the best summary of the situation that I've seen so far.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Uh, no, there are more commended students at TJ than semifinalists. He wanted to protect the feelings of the 20% or so of TJ students who were neither semifinalists nor commended.

THIS. And it states so in the emails

Ultimately, he did distribute them so his opinion about the "feelings" is moot.

It's not moot. He used it as a cover-up for why he didn't distribute them when the reality is he just forgot to do it. That's lying to a parent and it's not okay.

He used it as a reason for why they didn’t deliver the letters with much fanfare. Subtle but extremely important distinction there.

"Mr. Kosatka, you told me that you held these letters, in part, because you were concerned about handing them out around students who didn't receive the award."

This. Was. A. Lie.

And it was a lie to cover the fact that he forgot to do it.

We don't know what he actually said or what he meant by it.

Look, I think that the Coalition for TJ is the single worst thing to happen to the school in its existence. It's literally ripping the school apart at the seams, making it more difficult for the school to educate its students and maintain its position. I generally side with the school on most things. And I acknowledge that Yashar, like all of the major players on Asra's side in this, are Republican operatives who are hell bent on destroying public education.

But in reading this e-mail chain and digging into the facts surrounding the situation, there's only one conclusion you can come to, and that's that the DSS either lied to cover his ass or made a decision that was his and his alone to withhold these letters for whatever reason. Either of these are fireable offenses, neither of them should implicate the principal in any way because she CLEARLY wasn't on board with them, and neither of them should be inviting a damn state-level investigation.

+100. The fight between the Coalition and… the school? TJAAG? (Are there even people in TJAAG? I feel like I hear about them very little compared to the Coalition.) is going scorched-earth and everyone will be worse off for it. And if you think it isn’t disruptive, then you’ve never been in class with TJ students fighting Coalition members on Facebook, or run a TJ club with the fear that some nut job parent will get you in trouble because you didn’t pick their kid for a competitive team and that’s apparently racist. Just because it’s not obvious from the outside doesn’t mean this isn’t hurting the school.

-2022 TJ grad who has worried about all the above in the past

The TJAAG is a real group with real people. https://www.tjaag.org/

They are just as active as the Coalition, if not more so; the difference is that they can rely on publications like the Washington Post and bodies like the FCPS School Board to parrot their viewpoints, whereas the Coalition has to make more noise to get people to pay attention.

Fundamentally, the TJAAG tries to thread a needle, in that it's trying to preserve an elitist institution that serves only 3-4% of FCPS high school students and yet suggest that it's deeply committed to principles of equity. They've tied themselves up into some rhetorical knots recently, such as when a number of them have suggested that receiving a letter of commendation is a "consolation prize" and a "4th-rate award," which comes across as awfully elitist when 97% of high school students are neither semifinalists nor commended students.

Overall, many of them (you?) come across as less interested in equity, or for that matter anything having to do with schools other than TJ, so much as just making sure that TJ is sufficiently diverse, with fewer Asian kids, so that all the alumni will still feel comfortable name-dropping that they went to TJ in random conversations with acquaintances.

PP you responded to here. I am not and have never been affiliated with the AAG; I wasn’t even aware they had a website — thanks for sending the link! I’ll see what their stances are and how they compare to the Coalition.

Personally, I think equity has its advantages when properly balanced with the mission of the institution (in this case, to provide a first-rate STEM education at the secondary level). My middle school was one of those TS types, and it got old real fast trying to explain to kids where I was from (since none of them had even heard of the place, even though it’s in FCPS). From that perspective, I welcome changes to ensure greater representation at the school. Having different perspectives in an organization is valuable for coming up with new ideas and fostering innovation. However, I don’t think TJ should compromise its standards in the name of representation, because then you’re ending up with a watered-down experience and are now at a net loss compared to where you started. What makes TJ unique is obviously the education it provides, and diminishing that defeats the whole purpose of giving kids more access to this.

In any case, I strongly believe the best equitable solution here is a bottom-up one. FCPS should prioritize those TS schools not in TJ admissions but at the elementary and middle school levels, by providing more funding for advanced classes and enrichment programs. That’ll get kids interested in learning, increase application rates of qualified candidates from those schools, and end up with greater representation at TJ as well as a more skilled student body at its other high schools.

But hey, what do I know? I’m just a college student with too much time on his hands.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Uh, no, there are more commended students at TJ than semifinalists. He wanted to protect the feelings of the 20% or so of TJ students who were neither semifinalists nor commended.

THIS. And it states so in the emails

Ultimately, he did distribute them so his opinion about the "feelings" is moot.

It's not moot. He used it as a cover-up for why he didn't distribute them when the reality is he just forgot to do it. That's lying to a parent and it's not okay.

He used it as a reason for why they didn’t deliver the letters with much fanfare. Subtle but extremely important distinction there.

"Mr. Kosatka, you told me that you held these letters, in part, because you were concerned about handing them out around students who didn't receive the award."

This. Was. A. Lie.

And it was a lie to cover the fact that he forgot to do it.

We don't know what he actually said or what he meant by it.

Look, I think that the Coalition for TJ is the single worst thing to happen to the school in its existence. It's literally ripping the school apart at the seams, making it more difficult for the school to educate its students and maintain its position. I generally side with the school on most things. And I acknowledge that Yashar, like all of the major players on Asra's side in this, are Republican operatives who are hell bent on destroying public education.

But in reading this e-mail chain and digging into the facts surrounding the situation, there's only one conclusion you can come to, and that's that the DSS either lied to cover his ass or made a decision that was his and his alone to withhold these letters for whatever reason. Either of these are fireable offenses, neither of them should implicate the principal in any way because she CLEARLY wasn't on board with them, and neither of them should be inviting a damn state-level investigation.

+100. The fight between the Coalition and… the school? TJAAG? (Are there even people in TJAAG? I feel like I hear about them very little compared to the Coalition.) is going scorched-earth and everyone will be worse off for it. And if you think it isn’t disruptive, then you’ve never been in class with TJ students fighting Coalition members on Facebook, or run a TJ club with the fear that some nut job parent will get you in trouble because you didn’t pick their kid for a competitive team and that’s apparently racist. Just because it’s not obvious from the outside doesn’t mean this isn’t hurting the school.

-2022 TJ grad who has worried about all the above in the past

The TJAAG is a real group with real people. https://www.tjaag.org/

They are just as active as the Coalition, if not more so; the difference is that they can rely on publications like the Washington Post and bodies like the FCPS School Board to parrot their viewpoints, whereas the Coalition has to make more noise to get people to pay attention.

Fundamentally, the TJAAG tries to thread a needle, in that it's trying to preserve an elitist institution that serves only 3-4% of FCPS high school students and yet suggest that it's deeply committed to principles of equity. They've tied themselves up into some rhetorical knots recently, such as when a number of them have suggested that receiving a letter of commendation is a "consolation prize" and a "4th-rate award," which comes across as awfully elitist when 97% of high school students are neither semifinalists nor commended students.

Overall, many of them (you?) come across as less interested in equity, or for that matter anything having to do with schools other than TJ, so much as just making sure that TJ is sufficiently diverse, with fewer Asian kids, so that all the alumni will still feel comfortable name-dropping that they went to TJ in random conversations with acquaintances.

Citation?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Things that are true:

- The DSS at TJ failed to distribute, for whatever reason, the notices of Commended status until a month after they were placed on his desk by Dr. Bonitatibus. He should have done it and there’s really no reason for him not to.

- The DSS lied to a parent about the responsibility of the school and attempted to deflect his personal responsibility by making up some nonsense about hurt feelings and equity. (To me, this is a 100% fireable offense.)

Things that are false/unsupported by any facts or reason:

- There was a school decision to withhold these recognitions intentionally. If this were the case, the principal would not have turned them over to the DSS for distribution.

- Students were harmed in any way by this oversight. “Commended Student” status confers essentially zero realistic benefit to even a well below-average TJ student.

- This matter in any way amounts to an attack on merit. You’d have an argument here if we were talking about Semifinalists, Finalists, or Scholars - but we’re not.

- The existence of a majority-Asian population at TJ makes this matter a racially motivated attack on Asian students and families. If you believe this, you’re monumentally stupid. The people pushing the story don’t believe this - they are trying to get you to vote Republican in School Board elections so that they can defund public schools and replace them with for-profit institutions.

- The principal has anything to do with this issue. She doesn’t. Yes, the DSS is a subordinate, but a matter like this is so simple and insignificant as to not even warrant follow-up.

- TJ students care at all about this designation. They don’t, and for the most part neither do their parents. You’ll notice essentially zero TJ students or alumni who are quoted as having a problem with this.

This is the best summary of the situation that I've seen so far.

Except we don’t know if the DSS lied. That’s not a “fact”.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Uh, no, there are more commended students at TJ than semifinalists. He wanted to protect the feelings of the 20% or so of TJ students who were neither semifinalists nor commended.

THIS. And it states so in the emails

Ultimately, he did distribute them so his opinion about the "feelings" is moot.

It's not moot. He used it as a cover-up for why he didn't distribute them when the reality is he just forgot to do it. That's lying to a parent and it's not okay.

He used it as a reason for why they didn’t deliver the letters with much fanfare. Subtle but extremely important distinction there.

"Mr. Kosatka, you told me that you held these letters, in part, because you were concerned about handing them out around students who didn't receive the award."

This. Was. A. Lie.

And it was a lie to cover the fact that he forgot to do it.

We don't know what he actually said or what he meant by it.

Look, I think that the Coalition for TJ is the single worst thing to happen to the school in its existence. It's literally ripping the school apart at the seams, making it more difficult for the school to educate its students and maintain its position. I generally side with the school on most things. And I acknowledge that Yashar, like all of the major players on Asra's side in this, are Republican operatives who are hell bent on destroying public education.

But in reading this e-mail chain and digging into the facts surrounding the situation, there's only one conclusion you can come to, and that's that the DSS either lied to cover his ass or made a decision that was his and his alone to withhold these letters for whatever reason. Either of these are fireable offenses, neither of them should implicate the principal in any way because she CLEARLY wasn't on board with them, and neither of them should be inviting a damn state-level investigation.

+100. The fight between the Coalition and… the school? TJAAG? (Are there even people in TJAAG? I feel like I hear about them very little compared to the Coalition.) is going scorched-earth and everyone will be worse off for it. And if you think it isn’t disruptive, then you’ve never been in class with TJ students fighting Coalition members on Facebook, or run a TJ club with the fear that some nut job parent will get you in trouble because you didn’t pick their kid for a competitive team and that’s apparently racist. Just because it’s not obvious from the outside doesn’t mean this isn’t hurting the school.

-2022 TJ grad who has worried about all the above in the past

Thank you TJ Grad for describing the way in which the Coalition has negatively impacted the TJ student experience. I can understand the actions of the established Republican operatives, but I wonder if the current TJ parents who are marching alongside Nomani, Jackson, Dutta, and Miller understand the damage that they're actively doing to their own child's experience by siding with them. I would be willing to bet that they don't.

More importantly, do they care?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Uh, no, there are more commended students at TJ than semifinalists. He wanted to protect the feelings of the 20% or so of TJ students who were neither semifinalists nor commended.

THIS. And it states so in the emails

Ultimately, he did distribute them so his opinion about the "feelings" is moot.

It's not moot. He used it as a cover-up for why he didn't distribute them when the reality is he just forgot to do it. That's lying to a parent and it's not okay.

He used it as a reason for why they didn’t deliver the letters with much fanfare. Subtle but extremely important distinction there.

"Mr. Kosatka, you told me that you held these letters, in part, because you were concerned about handing them out around students who didn't receive the award."

This. Was. A. Lie.

And it was a lie to cover the fact that he forgot to do it.

We don't know what he actually said or what he meant by it.

Look, I think that the Coalition for TJ is the single worst thing to happen to the school in its existence. It's literally ripping the school apart at the seams, making it more difficult for the school to educate its students and maintain its position. I generally side with the school on most things. And I acknowledge that Yashar, like all of the major players on Asra's side in this, are Republican operatives who are hell bent on destroying public education.

But in reading this e-mail chain and digging into the facts surrounding the situation, there's only one conclusion you can come to, and that's that the DSS either lied to cover his ass or made a decision that was his and his alone to withhold these letters for whatever reason. Either of these are fireable offenses, neither of them should implicate the principal in any way because she CLEARLY wasn't on board with them, and neither of them should be inviting a damn state-level investigation.

+100. The fight between the Coalition and… the school? TJAAG? (Are there even people in TJAAG? I feel like I hear about them very little compared to the Coalition.) is going scorched-earth and everyone will be worse off for it. And if you think it isn’t disruptive, then you’ve never been in class with TJ students fighting Coalition members on Facebook, or run a TJ club with the fear that some nut job parent will get you in trouble because you didn’t pick their kid for a competitive team and that’s apparently racist. Just because it’s not obvious from the outside doesn’t mean this isn’t hurting the school.

-2022 TJ grad who has worried about all the above in the past

The TJAAG is a real group with real people. https://www.tjaag.org/

They are just as active as the Coalition, if not more so; the difference is that they can rely on publications like the Washington Post and bodies like the FCPS School Board to parrot their viewpoints, whereas the Coalition has to make more noise to get people to pay attention.

Fundamentally, the TJAAG tries to thread a needle, in that it's trying to preserve an elitist institution that serves only 3-4% of FCPS high school students and yet suggest that it's deeply committed to principles of equity. They've tied themselves up into some rhetorical knots recently, such as when a number of them have suggested that receiving a letter of commendation is a "consolation prize" and a "4th-rate award," which comes across as awfully elitist when 97% of high school students are neither semifinalists nor commended students.

Overall, many of them (you?) come across as less interested in equity, or for that matter anything having to do with schools other than TJ, so much as just making sure that TJ is sufficiently diverse, with fewer Asian kids, so that all the alumni will still feel comfortable name-dropping that they went to TJ in random conversations with acquaintances.

DP. It's unclear where the rhetorical knots are that you're mentioning. In the context of TJ, the Commended Student recognition is absolutely a consolation prize and the students view it as such. TJ students (for better or for worse) measure themselves against one another, not against the rest of America.

Folks on the right are obsessed with the anti-Asian narrative, but it falls apart in the face of this reality: if TJ's incoming classes were 70% Asian, 10% White, 10% Black, and 10% Hispanic, the pro-diversity crowd would be thrilled. They'd be shouting from the rooftops.

It's never been about fewer Asians, and it's always been about stronger representation amongst historically excluded populations, which means low income students, Black students, and Hispanic students. But folks on the right, because of their resources, connections, and media savvy, have successfully been able to frame the conversation about "anti-Asianness" when it's anything but.

There was a fairly coordinated on the part of the left to portray the environment at TJ as "toxic" and to imply that most Asian students at TJ were only admitted because their allegedly wealthy parents shelled out tens of thousands of dollars for test prep materials.

Statistically, one can see that the increases in Black and Hispanic enrollment have come largely at the expense of Asian enrollment, as the White enrollment has remained relatively steady.

And, to this day, the TJAAG folks and their allies continue to assert that Asian students are "over-represented" at TJ, as if Asian applicants should be looked at, in the first instance, not as individuals but instead primarily as members of a group.

So, good luck with your efforts to suggest conservatives have some unique "media savvy," but the most recent controversies over TJ stem from the left having made a calculated political decision that changing the admissions process to promote the admission of more Black and Hispanic kids would provide more electoral benefits than antagonizing the Asian community (or at least certain segments of the Asian community). The verdict is still out on whether those efforts were politically astute or, for that matter, even legal.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I thought the discussion can be shifted toward Langley and Westfield now, at least TJ sent out the certificate themselves, the other two schools completely missed it

+1. We now have two other schools which did the same thing. I really couldn't believe some of the posts by TJ apologists here yesterday. !) a significant property value (an award) was withheld on purpose from the students - we now know at three schools - it makes no difference wither it is Commended or not, and 2) the reason given, stated twice in the principal's emails, was for equity reason. You can try and say this was an oversight error, but the emails say twice what was said. Yes, A FCPS committee review (now underway) is in order, and apparently, the AG does have to be involved because this may be county widespread.

So many lies.

The certificates were NOT withheld at TJ. They were distributed, but a few weeks late.

The reason is moot because they weren’t withheld.

The email messages weren’t from the principal.

We only have allegations from a politically-motivated parent. We don’t know what was actually said.

[Anonymous]

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Anonymous wrote:Uh, no, there are more commended students at TJ than semifinalists. He wanted to protect the feelings of the 20% or so of TJ students who were neither semifinalists nor commended.

THIS. And it states so in the emails

Ultimately, he did distribute them so his opinion about the "feelings" is moot.

It's not moot. He used it as a cover-up for why he didn't distribute them when the reality is he just forgot to do it. That's lying to a parent and it's not okay.

He used it as a reason for why they didn’t deliver the letters with much fanfare. Subtle but extremely important distinction there.

"Mr. Kosatka, you told me that you held these letters, in part, because you were concerned about handing them out around students who didn't receive the award."

This. Was. A. Lie.

And it was a lie to cover the fact that he forgot to do it.

We don't know what he actually said or what he meant by it.

Look, I think that the Coalition for TJ is the single worst thing to happen to the school in its existence. It's literally ripping the school apart at the seams, making it more difficult for the school to educate its students and maintain its position. I generally side with the school on most things. And I acknowledge that Yashar, like all of the major players on Asra's side in this, are Republican operatives who are hell bent on destroying public education.

But in reading this e-mail chain and digging into the facts surrounding the situation, there's only one conclusion you can come to, and that's that the DSS either lied to cover his ass or made a decision that was his and his alone to withhold these letters for whatever reason. Either of these are fireable offenses, neither of them should implicate the principal in any way because she CLEARLY wasn't on board with them, and neither of them should be inviting a damn state-level investigation.

+100. The fight between the Coalition and… the school? TJAAG? (Are there even people in TJAAG? I feel like I hear about them very little compared to the Coalition.) is going scorched-earth and everyone will be worse off for it. And if you think it isn’t disruptive, then you’ve never been in class with TJ students fighting Coalition members on Facebook, or run a TJ club with the fear that some nut job parent will get you in trouble because you didn’t pick their kid for a competitive team and that’s apparently racist. Just because it’s not obvious from the outside doesn’t mean this isn’t hurting the school.

-2022 TJ grad who has worried about all the above in the past

Thank you TJ Grad for describing the way in which the Coalition has negatively impacted the TJ student experience. I can understand the actions of the established Republican operatives, but I wonder if the current TJ parents who are marching alongside Nomani, Jackson, Dutta, and Miller understand the damage that they're actively doing to their own child's experience by siding with them. I would be willing to bet that they don't.

More importantly, do they care?

They will when any college admissions department that cares enough to look at applicants past the application decides not to touch the family with a 10 foot pole.

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Anonymous wrote:The thing is, the issue is not whether the school administrators think there is value to being a NM Commended Student. That is not their role. The students earned that distinction the day they took their PSATs and the scores and cutoffs were established. The school’s only role is to distribute the letters to the students and let the student decide whether there is value in adding that award to their college and scholarship applications.

You may believe that it is a waste of resources for the state to investigate the handling of these commendations because you feel they are trivial. But what happens when the school withholds awards or information about your student because it is deemed trivial before the student (or you) have the opportunity to even see it? What happens if the administrator making the call doesn’t happen to share your worldview and values?

TJ did distribute the certificates. They just did it a little too slowly for any possible ED applications (for the rare kids who didn't already know their status).

Won't the kid be able to see their commended status on collegeboard and thus include that in their ED application regardless of whether or not someone told them they were commended? Based on my kid's recent PSAT score (he's in 11th grade), we already know he is/will be commended and intend to include that in the common app. At a school like TJ, everyone is hyper aware of these things and I'd be surprised if some kid is waiting for a certificate to confirm his status..

Exactly. These are bright, engaged kids. How many kids did this actually impact - any?

It's all faux outrage to push politics at the expense of TJ kids. Disgusting Republicans.

Agree. My kid went to TJ (graduated a couple of years ago). A large chunk of kids end up becoming NMF's and it didn't really affect college outcomes. In retrospect, he'd have been better off going to base HS. Other factors (race, etc.) in play that impact admissions way more than NMF status. I don't think TJ kids are targeting colleges where a 'commended' status will influence the outcome.

This is exactly correct. And here's the thing - getting to be a Commended Student is certainly... commendable, shall we say. It's a significant accomplishment, and the kids should have been notified in a timely manner.

But to assert that these kids' college prospects or futures were in any way damaged by the delay... if you're pushing that, you're proving that you have no idea how college admissions work, especially at a place like TJ. Period.

So by all means, continue to push that nonsense, and expose yourself as clueless.

And desperate. Sure seems like Republicans are freaking out after the November disappointments.

The more they push ridiculous hysteria the more they just look crazy and irrelevant.

You can expect a steady drip of stories like this from now until the November School Board elections. That's what all of this is about.

Good. The School Board sucks and pays next to no attention to our pyramid. If controversy around TJ helps unseat some of them, that's fine with me.

At the expense of TJ students? Really?

You do know TJHSST is a creation of a Republican Board of Supervisors in the mid-80s, right? It's the other party that keeps trying to "reform" it rather than allow it to concentrate on its original mission.

Back when the Republicans actually used to do something? Now they just want to tear it all down.

Republicans DGAF about these kids - they are fully willing to hurt them just to possibly scrounge up a few votes.

[Anonymous]

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Anonymous wrote:Uh, no, there are more commended students at TJ than semifinalists. He wanted to protect the feelings of the 20% or so of TJ students who were neither semifinalists nor commended.

THIS. And it states so in the emails

Ultimately, he did distribute them so his opinion about the "feelings" is moot.

It's not moot. He used it as a cover-up for why he didn't distribute them when the reality is he just forgot to do it. That's lying to a parent and it's not okay.

He used it as a reason for why they didn’t deliver the letters with much fanfare. Subtle but extremely important distinction there.

"Mr. Kosatka, you told me that you held these letters, in part, because you were concerned about handing them out around students who didn't receive the award."

This. Was. A. Lie.

And it was a lie to cover the fact that he forgot to do it.

We don't know what he actually said or what he meant by it.

Look, I think that the Coalition for TJ is the single worst thing to happen to the school in its existence. It's literally ripping the school apart at the seams, making it more difficult for the school to educate its students and maintain its position. I generally side with the school on most things. And I acknowledge that Yashar, like all of the major players on Asra's side in this, are Republican operatives who are hell bent on destroying public education.

But in reading this e-mail chain and digging into the facts surrounding the situation, there's only one conclusion you can come to, and that's that the DSS either lied to cover his ass or made a decision that was his and his alone to withhold these letters for whatever reason. Either of these are fireable offenses, neither of them should implicate the principal in any way because she CLEARLY wasn't on board with them, and neither of them should be inviting a damn state-level investigation.

+100. The fight between the Coalition and… the school? TJAAG? (Are there even people in TJAAG? I feel like I hear about them very little compared to the Coalition.) is going scorched-earth and everyone will be worse off for it. And if you think it isn’t disruptive, then you’ve never been in class with TJ students fighting Coalition members on Facebook, or run a TJ club with the fear that some nut job parent will get you in trouble because you didn’t pick their kid for a competitive team and that’s apparently racist. Just because it’s not obvious from the outside doesn’t mean this isn’t hurting the school.

-2022 TJ grad who has worried about all the above in the past

The TJAAG is a real group with real people. https://www.tjaag.org/

They are just as active as the Coalition, if not more so; the difference is that they can rely on publications like the Washington Post and bodies like the FCPS School Board to parrot their viewpoints, whereas the Coalition has to make more noise to get people to pay attention.

Fundamentally, the TJAAG tries to thread a needle, in that it's trying to preserve an elitist institution that serves only 3-4% of FCPS high school students and yet suggest that it's deeply committed to principles of equity. They've tied themselves up into some rhetorical knots recently, such as when a number of them have suggested that receiving a letter of commendation is a "consolation prize" and a "4th-rate award," which comes across as awfully elitist when 97% of high school students are neither semifinalists nor commended students.

Overall, many of them (you?) come across as less interested in equity, or for that matter anything having to do with schools other than TJ, so much as just making sure that TJ is sufficiently diverse, with fewer Asian kids, so that all the alumni will still feel comfortable name-dropping that they went to TJ in random conversations with acquaintances.

PP you responded to here. I am not and have never been affiliated with the AAG; I wasn’t even aware they had a website — thanks for sending the link! I’ll see what their stances are and how they compare to the Coalition.

Personally, I think equity has its advantages when properly balanced with the mission of the institution (in this case, to provide a first-rate STEM education at the secondary level). My middle school was one of those TS types, and it got old real fast trying to explain to kids where I was from (since none of them had even heard of the place, even though it’s in FCPS). From that perspective, I welcome changes to ensure greater representation at the school. Having different perspectives in an organization is valuable for coming up with new ideas and fostering innovation. However, I don’t think TJ should compromise its standards in the name of representation, because then you’re ending up with a watered-down experience and are now at a net loss compared to where you started. What makes TJ unique is obviously the education it provides, and diminishing that defeats the whole purpose of giving kids more access to this.

In any case, I strongly believe the best equitable solution here is a bottom-up one. FCPS should prioritize those TS schools not in TJ admissions but at the elementary and middle school levels, by providing more funding for advanced classes and enrichment programs. That’ll get kids interested in learning, increase application rates of qualified candidates from those schools, and end up with greater representation at TJ as well as a more skilled student body at its other high schools.

But hey, what do I know? I’m just a college student with too much time on his hands.

DP. This is a really thoughtful response and it is appreciated.

A bottom-up approach is wonderful and should be instituted, but it cannot be the totality of the solution because inherently, whenever it is established, it will miss the students who at that point in time are not at the bottom - i.e. in early elementary school. All parties agree that more time, treasure, and energy should be expended on improving the caliber of STEM education, especially in less-resourced schools and communities.

Where there is disagreement is whether or not this strategy is ALL we should use. What becomes of the kids who, today, are in 5th, 6th, 7th, and 8th grade? Are they out of luck because they were born at the wrong time? Should TJ students miss out on the inherent value of their contributions to the diversity of the school simply because the "real" solution hasn't bubbled up to the surface yet?

[Anonymous]

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Anonymous wrote:Uh, no, there are more commended students at TJ than semifinalists. He wanted to protect the feelings of the 20% or so of TJ students who were neither semifinalists nor commended.

THIS. And it states so in the emails

Ultimately, he did distribute them so his opinion about the "feelings" is moot.

It's not moot. He used it as a cover-up for why he didn't distribute them when the reality is he just forgot to do it. That's lying to a parent and it's not okay.

He used it as a reason for why they didn’t deliver the letters with much fanfare. Subtle but extremely important distinction there.

"Mr. Kosatka, you told me that you held these letters, in part, because you were concerned about handing them out around students who didn't receive the award."

This. Was. A. Lie.

And it was a lie to cover the fact that he forgot to do it.

We don't know what he actually said or what he meant by it.

Look, I think that the Coalition for TJ is the single worst thing to happen to the school in its existence. It's literally ripping the school apart at the seams, making it more difficult for the school to educate its students and maintain its position. I generally side with the school on most things. And I acknowledge that Yashar, like all of the major players on Asra's side in this, are Republican operatives who are hell bent on destroying public education.

But in reading this e-mail chain and digging into the facts surrounding the situation, there's only one conclusion you can come to, and that's that the DSS either lied to cover his ass or made a decision that was his and his alone to withhold these letters for whatever reason. Either of these are fireable offenses, neither of them should implicate the principal in any way because she CLEARLY wasn't on board with them, and neither of them should be inviting a damn state-level investigation.

+100. The fight between the Coalition and… the school? TJAAG? (Are there even people in TJAAG? I feel like I hear about them very little compared to the Coalition.) is going scorched-earth and everyone will be worse off for it. And if you think it isn’t disruptive, then you’ve never been in class with TJ students fighting Coalition members on Facebook, or run a TJ club with the fear that some nut job parent will get you in trouble because you didn’t pick their kid for a competitive team and that’s apparently racist. Just because it’s not obvious from the outside doesn’t mean this isn’t hurting the school.

-2022 TJ grad who has worried about all the above in the past

The TJAAG is a real group with real people. https://www.tjaag.org/

They are just as active as the Coalition, if not more so; the difference is that they can rely on publications like the Washington Post and bodies like the FCPS School Board to parrot their viewpoints, whereas the Coalition has to make more noise to get people to pay attention.

Fundamentally, the TJAAG tries to thread a needle, in that it's trying to preserve an elitist institution that serves only 3-4% of FCPS high school students and yet suggest that it's deeply committed to principles of equity. They've tied themselves up into some rhetorical knots recently, such as when a number of them have suggested that receiving a letter of commendation is a "consolation prize" and a "4th-rate award," which comes across as awfully elitist when 97% of high school students are neither semifinalists nor commended students.

Overall, many of them (you?) come across as less interested in equity, or for that matter anything having to do with schools other than TJ, so much as just making sure that TJ is sufficiently diverse, with fewer Asian kids, so that all the alumni will still feel comfortable name-dropping that they went to TJ in random conversations with acquaintances.

Citation?

I think it is a lower tier prize at a school like TJ. And further, I think the real issue is that there were likely very few kids who didn’t even get a commended scholar award. And they didn’t want to make those kids who didn’t get commended feel bad. For top 20 colleges, they get lots of NMSF and finalists. The commended honor isn’t a big deal, although it means their scores weren’t horrible.