TJ Discrimination Case

[Anonymous]

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Anonymous wrote:Anecdotally, TJ has not been selecting the top students within a school, who would make the most use of the advanced classes.
I should say FCPS is not selecting the top students, as my understanding is TJ doesn't handle the admissions.

That is incorrect only the top 1.5% of students are selected from each school.

The top according to their scoring, which unfortunately doesn't do a good job of identifying the top students.

It absolutely does identify the top students. The old system just identified those who could afford to buy the test. This is vastly better.

True but I like to come up with an alternate definition of merit that suits my preferred outcome.

A system for a regional school that assigns a minimum percentage of seats to every middle school, including schools that don't have AAP programs and have few LLIV-eligible students, and then relies on more subjective factors might be more geographically diverse but is definitely not going to identify the top students in the region and may not even identify the top students at an individual school.

This is the real challenge facing FCPS moving forward.

There isn't really a good argument to stop with the middle school allocation process, and that has created wonderful new diversity in the hallways and in each individual classroom. The culture of TJ remains alive and well in the face of individuals outside of the community who seek to destroy it.

But there is a serious question regarding whether or not the current admissions process is actually identifying the students who will contribute the most to the educational community of the school. The previous process certainly did not - it merely identified who was most likely to score well on college entrance exams - but there's not a whole lot of evidence that the new process does either.

Given that we've established that standardized exams are occlusive to the process of evaluating students, the best answer seems to be a re-imagined teacher recommendation form that asks teachers to compare students to one another within their respective classrooms and offers them the opportunity to write on behalf of or against a very small group of students.

Middle school teachers know who the students are in their building who most belong at TJ through a combination of aptitude for the material and dedication to the collaborative educational process and they should be afforded the opportunity to weigh in on the matter.

I would strongly suggest you education yourself on bias in the identification of gifted students.

Sure. Only been around them for my entire life.

But again, we’re not just talking about gifted students here - we’re talking about students who would make the strongest and most positive total impacts to the TJ community as a group, rather than as individuals.

It is has been empirically established that Asians are rated relatively lower on “group contribution” at Harvard and other places. The Supreme Court will decide whether these proxies for discrimination will pass muster.

Of course, but fortunately race isn't a factor for TJ admissions since it's a race blind process so the SCOTUS decision is irrelevant.

It was designed and implemented to reduce Asian students at TJ. We won't have to wait long for SCOTUs to tell us.

I wouldn’t hold your breath since the case isn’t even before SCOTUS.

The legality of use of 'race' for public and private school is before the SCOTUS! SCOTUS' decision will be binding on all private and public schools in the US.

It won’t necessarily be clear how these decisions apply, if at all, to an admissions policy like the new TJ admissions policy that on its face is race-neutral.

We have a US District Court's factual finding that there was a racial discrimination that was unconstitutional and no Court has reversed that ruling. Pretty clear.

No court has reversed it, but a higher court quickly invalidated its order and the activist Supreme Court declined to intervene. Pretty strong statements and part of the reason that the District Court judge hasn’t been promoted in 40 years on the bench.

Actually, The 4th Circuit Court of Appeals has NOT ruled on the appeal and they merely stayed the implementation of the District Court's Order and the SCOTUS has decided not to intervene in the case yet and we will have to see what happens at the Circuit Court of Appeals. The Harvard case will impact the eventual ruling by the Circuit Court of Appeals since they are legally bound by the SCOTUS' decisions! The US District Court's Order stands period.

If their order stood, the Admissions process for the Class of 2027, which is currently underway, wouldn’t be allowed to proceed. The stay, however temporary it is, will remain in place until the same three-judge panel that implemented the stay reverses the ruling.

Harvard and UNC will have no bearing on TJ because those schools use race directly in the admissions process. FCPS, despite a lot of rather obvious misinformation here, does not with respect to TJ.

It's misinformation for you to say the district court ruling's no longer "stands." It has simply been stayed by the Fourth Circuit pending appeal, which is typical. Given the fact that the current SCOTUS is an activist conservative court, some expected the Court to intervene and overturn the stay, but it declined to do so at this juncture (which again is typical).

It's also not accurate to say the Harvard and UNC cases will have "no bearing" on TJ. Even though those schools, unlike FCPS, use race directly in their admissions processes, there may be language in those decisions that affect how the lower courts ultimately decide to address the TJ case.

Finally, one should not lose sight of the fact that the AG investigation into potential violations of the Virginia Human Rights Act will be a distinct matter from the case alleging a violation of the U.S. Constitution. Even if FCPS is found not to have violated the Constitution in the federal case, FCPS may yet be found to have violated the VHRA, which could give rise to sanctions on FCPS.

Short version: FCPS is going to have a lot on its plate to defend when it comes to TJ for a long time.

DP. You are grasping at straws here.

So you wish. In case you haven't noticed, FCPS hasn't been doing too well in the courts on many fronts lately.

They're winning on this one.

No, they lost at the District Court level and we are waiting for the Court of Appeals to rule on the merits.

The only impact of FCPS having "lost" anything to this point in this mess is that the Class of 2026 was seated somewhat later than it should have been because of the delay caused by the initial, since-stayed ruling.

The Coalition has won literally zero in terms of action items. That's great for them that they've gotten a sympathetic state government to engage in an investigation, but the investigation is going to turn up a clerical error.

The state AG investigation is examining both (1) the change in admissions policy and (2) the delayed notification to recipients of Letters of Commendation.

Whatever it finds, it will be more than a "clerical error" relating to the latter. It doesn't help your cause to misrepresent the scope of the state investigation.

[Anonymous]

Am I the only one who noticed Youngkin/Miyares are repeating a Coalition talking point with the letters being a civil rights issue? Asra quoted a parent saying the same thing in her 12/22 City Journal article, but left it out in later writings. That's not normally a connection you'd make for this type of thing (admissions is a different story) so it caught my eye.

[Anonymous]

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Anonymous wrote:Anecdotally, TJ has not been selecting the top students within a school, who would make the most use of the advanced classes.
I should say FCPS is not selecting the top students, as my understanding is TJ doesn't handle the admissions.

That is incorrect only the top 1.5% of students are selected from each school.

The top according to their scoring, which unfortunately doesn't do a good job of identifying the top students.

It absolutely does identify the top students. The old system just identified those who could afford to buy the test. This is vastly better.

True but I like to come up with an alternate definition of merit that suits my preferred outcome.

A system for a regional school that assigns a minimum percentage of seats to every middle school, including schools that don't have AAP programs and have few LLIV-eligible students, and then relies on more subjective factors might be more geographically diverse but is definitely not going to identify the top students in the region and may not even identify the top students at an individual school.

This is the real challenge facing FCPS moving forward.

There isn't really a good argument to stop with the middle school allocation process, and that has created wonderful new diversity in the hallways and in each individual classroom. The culture of TJ remains alive and well in the face of individuals outside of the community who seek to destroy it.

But there is a serious question regarding whether or not the current admissions process is actually identifying the students who will contribute the most to the educational community of the school. The previous process certainly did not - it merely identified who was most likely to score well on college entrance exams - but there's not a whole lot of evidence that the new process does either.

Given that we've established that standardized exams are occlusive to the process of evaluating students, the best answer seems to be a re-imagined teacher recommendation form that asks teachers to compare students to one another within their respective classrooms and offers them the opportunity to write on behalf of or against a very small group of students.

Middle school teachers know who the students are in their building who most belong at TJ through a combination of aptitude for the material and dedication to the collaborative educational process and they should be afforded the opportunity to weigh in on the matter.

I would strongly suggest you education yourself on bias in the identification of gifted students.

Sure. Only been around them for my entire life.

But again, we’re not just talking about gifted students here - we’re talking about students who would make the strongest and most positive total impacts to the TJ community as a group, rather than as individuals.

It is has been empirically established that Asians are rated relatively lower on “group contribution” at Harvard and other places. The Supreme Court will decide whether these proxies for discrimination will pass muster.

Of course, but fortunately race isn't a factor for TJ admissions since it's a race blind process so the SCOTUS decision is irrelevant.

It was designed and implemented to reduce Asian students at TJ. We won't have to wait long for SCOTUs to tell us.

I wouldn’t hold your breath since the case isn’t even before SCOTUS.

The legality of use of 'race' for public and private school is before the SCOTUS! SCOTUS' decision will be binding on all private and public schools in the US.

It won’t necessarily be clear how these decisions apply, if at all, to an admissions policy like the new TJ admissions policy that on its face is race-neutral.

We have a US District Court's factual finding that there was a racial discrimination that was unconstitutional and no Court has reversed that ruling. Pretty clear.

No court has reversed it, but a higher court quickly invalidated its order and the activist Supreme Court declined to intervene. Pretty strong statements and part of the reason that the District Court judge hasn’t been promoted in 40 years on the bench.

Actually, The 4th Circuit Court of Appeals has NOT ruled on the appeal and they merely stayed the implementation of the District Court's Order and the SCOTUS has decided not to intervene in the case yet and we will have to see what happens at the Circuit Court of Appeals. The Harvard case will impact the eventual ruling by the Circuit Court of Appeals since they are legally bound by the SCOTUS' decisions! The US District Court's Order stands period.

If their order stood, the Admissions process for the Class of 2027, which is currently underway, wouldn’t be allowed to proceed. The stay, however temporary it is, will remain in place until the same three-judge panel that implemented the stay reverses the ruling.

Harvard and UNC will have no bearing on TJ because those schools use race directly in the admissions process. FCPS, despite a lot of rather obvious misinformation here, does not with respect to TJ.

It's misinformation for you to say the district court ruling's no longer "stands." It has simply been stayed by the Fourth Circuit pending appeal, which is typical. Given the fact that the current SCOTUS is an activist conservative court, some expected the Court to intervene and overturn the stay, but it declined to do so at this juncture (which again is typical).

It's also not accurate to say the Harvard and UNC cases will have "no bearing" on TJ. Even though those schools, unlike FCPS, use race directly in their admissions processes, there may be language in those decisions that affect how the lower courts ultimately decide to address the TJ case.

Finally, one should not lose sight of the fact that the AG investigation into potential violations of the Virginia Human Rights Act will be a distinct matter from the case alleging a violation of the U.S. Constitution. Even if FCPS is found not to have violated the Constitution in the federal case, FCPS may yet be found to have violated the VHRA, which could give rise to sanctions on FCPS.

Short version: FCPS is going to have a lot on its plate to defend when it comes to TJ for a long time.

DP. You are grasping at straws here.

So you wish. In case you haven't noticed, FCPS hasn't been doing too well in the courts on many fronts lately.

They're winning on this one.

No, they lost at the District Court level and we are waiting for the Court of Appeals to rule on the merits.

The only impact of FCPS having "lost" anything to this point in this mess is that the Class of 2026 was seated somewhat later than it should have been because of the delay caused by the initial, since-stayed ruling.

The Coalition has won literally zero in terms of action items. That's great for them that they've gotten a sympathetic state government to engage in an investigation, but the investigation is going to turn up a clerical error.

The state AG investigation is examining both (1) the change in admissions policy and (2) the delayed notification to recipients of Letters of Commendation.

Whatever it finds, it will be more than a "clerical error" relating to the latter. It doesn't help your cause to misrepresent the scope of the state investigation.

This is just another GOP goose chase that will yield nothing but it will help rally Youngkin's extreme far-right base.

[Anonymous]

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Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Anecdotally, TJ has not been selecting the top students within a school, who would make the most use of the advanced classes.
I should say FCPS is not selecting the top students, as my understanding is TJ doesn't handle the admissions.

That is incorrect only the top 1.5% of students are selected from each school.

The top according to their scoring, which unfortunately doesn't do a good job of identifying the top students.

It absolutely does identify the top students. The old system just identified those who could afford to buy the test. This is vastly better.

True but I like to come up with an alternate definition of merit that suits my preferred outcome.

A system for a regional school that assigns a minimum percentage of seats to every middle school, including schools that don't have AAP programs and have few LLIV-eligible students, and then relies on more subjective factors might be more geographically diverse but is definitely not going to identify the top students in the region and may not even identify the top students at an individual school.

This is the real challenge facing FCPS moving forward.

There isn't really a good argument to stop with the middle school allocation process, and that has created wonderful new diversity in the hallways and in each individual classroom. The culture of TJ remains alive and well in the face of individuals outside of the community who seek to destroy it.

But there is a serious question regarding whether or not the current admissions process is actually identifying the students who will contribute the most to the educational community of the school. The previous process certainly did not - it merely identified who was most likely to score well on college entrance exams - but there's not a whole lot of evidence that the new process does either.

Given that we've established that standardized exams are occlusive to the process of evaluating students, the best answer seems to be a re-imagined teacher recommendation form that asks teachers to compare students to one another within their respective classrooms and offers them the opportunity to write on behalf of or against a very small group of students.

Middle school teachers know who the students are in their building who most belong at TJ through a combination of aptitude for the material and dedication to the collaborative educational process and they should be afforded the opportunity to weigh in on the matter.

I would strongly suggest you education yourself on bias in the identification of gifted students.

Sure. Only been around them for my entire life.

But again, we’re not just talking about gifted students here - we’re talking about students who would make the strongest and most positive total impacts to the TJ community as a group, rather than as individuals.

It is has been empirically established that Asians are rated relatively lower on “group contribution” at Harvard and other places. The Supreme Court will decide whether these proxies for discrimination will pass muster.

Of course, but fortunately race isn't a factor for TJ admissions since it's a race blind process so the SCOTUS decision is irrelevant.

It was designed and implemented to reduce Asian students at TJ. We won't have to wait long for SCOTUs to tell us.

I wouldn’t hold your breath since the case isn’t even before SCOTUS.

The legality of use of 'race' for public and private school is before the SCOTUS! SCOTUS' decision will be binding on all private and public schools in the US.

It won’t necessarily be clear how these decisions apply, if at all, to an admissions policy like the new TJ admissions policy that on its face is race-neutral.

We have a US District Court's factual finding that there was a racial discrimination that was unconstitutional and no Court has reversed that ruling. Pretty clear.

No court has reversed it, but a higher court quickly invalidated its order and the activist Supreme Court declined to intervene. Pretty strong statements and part of the reason that the District Court judge hasn’t been promoted in 40 years on the bench.

Actually, The 4th Circuit Court of Appeals has NOT ruled on the appeal and they merely stayed the implementation of the District Court's Order and the SCOTUS has decided not to intervene in the case yet and we will have to see what happens at the Circuit Court of Appeals. The Harvard case will impact the eventual ruling by the Circuit Court of Appeals since they are legally bound by the SCOTUS' decisions! The US District Court's Order stands period.

If their order stood, the Admissions process for the Class of 2027, which is currently underway, wouldn’t be allowed to proceed. The stay, however temporary it is, will remain in place until the same three-judge panel that implemented the stay reverses the ruling.

Harvard and UNC will have no bearing on TJ because those schools use race directly in the admissions process. FCPS, despite a lot of rather obvious misinformation here, does not with respect to TJ.

It's misinformation for you to say the district court ruling's no longer "stands." It has simply been stayed by the Fourth Circuit pending appeal, which is typical. Given the fact that the current SCOTUS is an activist conservative court, some expected the Court to intervene and overturn the stay, but it declined to do so at this juncture (which again is typical).

It's also not accurate to say the Harvard and UNC cases will have "no bearing" on TJ. Even though those schools, unlike FCPS, use race directly in their admissions processes, there may be language in those decisions that affect how the lower courts ultimately decide to address the TJ case.

Finally, one should not lose sight of the fact that the AG investigation into potential violations of the Virginia Human Rights Act will be a distinct matter from the case alleging a violation of the U.S. Constitution. Even if FCPS is found not to have violated the Constitution in the federal case, FCPS may yet be found to have violated the VHRA, which could give rise to sanctions on FCPS.

Short version: FCPS is going to have a lot on its plate to defend when it comes to TJ for a long time.

DP. You are grasping at straws here.

So you wish. In case you haven't noticed, FCPS hasn't been doing too well in the courts on many fronts lately.

They're winning on this one.

No, they lost at the District Court level and we are waiting for the Court of Appeals to rule on the merits.

The only impact of FCPS having "lost" anything to this point in this mess is that the Class of 2026 was seated somewhat later than it should have been because of the delay caused by the initial, since-stayed ruling.

The Coalition has won literally zero in terms of action items. That's great for them that they've gotten a sympathetic state government to engage in an investigation, but the investigation is going to turn up a clerical error.

You sound desperate. We shall see how the Supreme Court rules on the Harvard case and how th AG's investigation comes out.

We already know exactly how they'll rule. These guys hate civil rights. Anyway, none of this matters for TJ anyway since it's not related to a race blind admission process.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Am I the only one who noticed Youngkin/Miyares are repeating a Coalition talking point with the letters being a civil rights issue? Asra quoted a parent saying the same thing in her 12/22 City Journal article, but left it out in later writings. That's not normally a connection you'd make for this type of thing (admissions is a different story) so it caught my eye.

Miyares’ announcement that they’re investigating the the letters under the Virginia Human Rights Act as race-based discrimination is absurd and disingenuous. There have been no allegations that the letters were distributed to non-Asian students earlier or differently than they were distributed to Asian students.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

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Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

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Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Anecdotally, TJ has not been selecting the top students within a school, who would make the most use of the advanced classes.
I should say FCPS is not selecting the top students, as my understanding is TJ doesn't handle the admissions.

That is incorrect only the top 1.5% of students are selected from each school.

The top according to their scoring, which unfortunately doesn't do a good job of identifying the top students.

It absolutely does identify the top students. The old system just identified those who could afford to buy the test. This is vastly better.

True but I like to come up with an alternate definition of merit that suits my preferred outcome.

A system for a regional school that assigns a minimum percentage of seats to every middle school, including schools that don't have AAP programs and have few LLIV-eligible students, and then relies on more subjective factors might be more geographically diverse but is definitely not going to identify the top students in the region and may not even identify the top students at an individual school.

This is the real challenge facing FCPS moving forward.

There isn't really a good argument to stop with the middle school allocation process, and that has created wonderful new diversity in the hallways and in each individual classroom. The culture of TJ remains alive and well in the face of individuals outside of the community who seek to destroy it.

But there is a serious question regarding whether or not the current admissions process is actually identifying the students who will contribute the most to the educational community of the school. The previous process certainly did not - it merely identified who was most likely to score well on college entrance exams - but there's not a whole lot of evidence that the new process does either.

Given that we've established that standardized exams are occlusive to the process of evaluating students, the best answer seems to be a re-imagined teacher recommendation form that asks teachers to compare students to one another within their respective classrooms and offers them the opportunity to write on behalf of or against a very small group of students.

Middle school teachers know who the students are in their building who most belong at TJ through a combination of aptitude for the material and dedication to the collaborative educational process and they should be afforded the opportunity to weigh in on the matter.

I would strongly suggest you education yourself on bias in the identification of gifted students.

Sure. Only been around them for my entire life.

But again, we’re not just talking about gifted students here - we’re talking about students who would make the strongest and most positive total impacts to the TJ community as a group, rather than as individuals.

It is has been empirically established that Asians are rated relatively lower on “group contribution” at Harvard and other places. The Supreme Court will decide whether these proxies for discrimination will pass muster.

Of course, but fortunately race isn't a factor for TJ admissions since it's a race blind process so the SCOTUS decision is irrelevant.

It was designed and implemented to reduce Asian students at TJ. We won't have to wait long for SCOTUs to tell us.

I wouldn’t hold your breath since the case isn’t even before SCOTUS.

The legality of use of 'race' for public and private school is before the SCOTUS! SCOTUS' decision will be binding on all private and public schools in the US.

It won’t necessarily be clear how these decisions apply, if at all, to an admissions policy like the new TJ admissions policy that on its face is race-neutral.

We have a US District Court's factual finding that there was a racial discrimination that was unconstitutional and no Court has reversed that ruling. Pretty clear.

No court has reversed it, but a higher court quickly invalidated its order and the activist Supreme Court declined to intervene. Pretty strong statements and part of the reason that the District Court judge hasn’t been promoted in 40 years on the bench.

Actually, The 4th Circuit Court of Appeals has NOT ruled on the appeal and they merely stayed the implementation of the District Court's Order and the SCOTUS has decided not to intervene in the case yet and we will have to see what happens at the Circuit Court of Appeals. The Harvard case will impact the eventual ruling by the Circuit Court of Appeals since they are legally bound by the SCOTUS' decisions! The US District Court's Order stands period.

If their order stood, the Admissions process for the Class of 2027, which is currently underway, wouldn’t be allowed to proceed. The stay, however temporary it is, will remain in place until the same three-judge panel that implemented the stay reverses the ruling.

Harvard and UNC will have no bearing on TJ because those schools use race directly in the admissions process. FCPS, despite a lot of rather obvious misinformation here, does not with respect to TJ.

It's misinformation for you to say the district court ruling's no longer "stands." It has simply been stayed by the Fourth Circuit pending appeal, which is typical. Given the fact that the current SCOTUS is an activist conservative court, some expected the Court to intervene and overturn the stay, but it declined to do so at this juncture (which again is typical).

It's also not accurate to say the Harvard and UNC cases will have "no bearing" on TJ. Even though those schools, unlike FCPS, use race directly in their admissions processes, there may be language in those decisions that affect how the lower courts ultimately decide to address the TJ case.

Finally, one should not lose sight of the fact that the AG investigation into potential violations of the Virginia Human Rights Act will be a distinct matter from the case alleging a violation of the U.S. Constitution. Even if FCPS is found not to have violated the Constitution in the federal case, FCPS may yet be found to have violated the VHRA, which could give rise to sanctions on FCPS.

Short version: FCPS is going to have a lot on its plate to defend when it comes to TJ for a long time.

DP. You are grasping at straws here.

So you wish. In case you haven't noticed, FCPS hasn't been doing too well in the courts on many fronts lately.

They're winning on this one.

No, they lost at the District Court level and we are waiting for the Court of Appeals to rule on the merits.

The only impact of FCPS having "lost" anything to this point in this mess is that the Class of 2026 was seated somewhat later than it should have been because of the delay caused by the initial, since-stayed ruling.

The Coalition has won literally zero in terms of action items. That's great for them that they've gotten a sympathetic state government to engage in an investigation, but the investigation is going to turn up a clerical error.

Despite their far-right fantasies this is going nowhere.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Am I the only one who noticed Youngkin/Miyares are repeating a Coalition talking point with the letters being a civil rights issue? Asra quoted a parent saying the same thing in her 12/22 City Journal article, but left it out in later writings. That's not normally a connection you'd make for this type of thing (admissions is a different story) so it caught my eye.

Miyares’ announcement that they’re investigating the the letters under the Virginia Human Rights Act as race-based discrimination is absurd and disingenuous. There have been no allegations that the letters were distributed to non-Asian students earlier or differently than they were distributed to Asian students.

They would not have pulled this stunt for years if the overwhelming majority of the affected recipients were not Asian students.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Am I the only one who noticed Youngkin/Miyares are repeating a Coalition talking point with the letters being a civil rights issue? Asra quoted a parent saying the same thing in her 12/22 City Journal article, but left it out in later writings. That's not normally a connection you'd make for this type of thing (admissions is a different story) so it caught my eye.

Miyares’ announcement that they’re investigating the the letters under the Virginia Human Rights Act as race-based discrimination is absurd and disingenuous. There have been no allegations that the letters were distributed to non-Asian students earlier or differently than they were distributed to Asian students.

They would not have pulled this stunt for years if the overwhelming majority of the affected recipients were not Asian students.

Proof?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Am I the only one who noticed Youngkin/Miyares are repeating a Coalition talking point with the letters being a civil rights issue? Asra quoted a parent saying the same thing in her 12/22 City Journal article, but left it out in later writings. That's not normally a connection you'd make for this type of thing (admissions is a different story) so it caught my eye.

Miyares’ announcement that they’re investigating the the letters under the Virginia Human Rights Act as race-based discrimination is absurd and disingenuous. There have been no allegations that the letters were distributed to non-Asian students earlier or differently than they were distributed to Asian students.

They would not have pulled this stunt for years if the overwhelming majority of the affected recipients were not Asian students.

Proof?

Look in the mirror.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Am I the only one who noticed Youngkin/Miyares are repeating a Coalition talking point with the letters being a civil rights issue? Asra quoted a parent saying the same thing in her 12/22 City Journal article, but left it out in later writings. That's not normally a connection you'd make for this type of thing (admissions is a different story) so it caught my eye.

Miyares’ announcement that they’re investigating the the letters under the Virginia Human Rights Act as race-based discrimination is absurd and disingenuous. There have been no allegations that the letters were distributed to non-Asian students earlier or differently than they were distributed to Asian students.

They would not have pulled this stunt for years if the overwhelming majority of the affected recipients were not Asian students.

Proof?

Look in the mirror.

I see myself... my Asian, TJ grad self. I don't see any discrimination. Maybe you're just seeing things - you should get that checked out sometime.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Anecdotally, TJ has not been selecting the top students within a school, who would make the most use of the advanced classes.
I should say FCPS is not selecting the top students, as my understanding is TJ doesn't handle the admissions.

That is incorrect only the top 1.5% of students are selected from each school.

The top according to their scoring, which unfortunately doesn't do a good job of identifying the top students.

It absolutely does identify the top students. The old system just identified those who could afford to buy the test. This is vastly better.

True but I like to come up with an alternate definition of merit that suits my preferred outcome.

A system for a regional school that assigns a minimum percentage of seats to every middle school, including schools that don't have AAP programs and have few LLIV-eligible students, and then relies on more subjective factors might be more geographically diverse but is definitely not going to identify the top students in the region and may not even identify the top students at an individual school.

This is the real challenge facing FCPS moving forward.

There isn't really a good argument to stop with the middle school allocation process, and that has created wonderful new diversity in the hallways and in each individual classroom. The culture of TJ remains alive and well in the face of individuals outside of the community who seek to destroy it.

But there is a serious question regarding whether or not the current admissions process is actually identifying the students who will contribute the most to the educational community of the school. The previous process certainly did not - it merely identified who was most likely to score well on college entrance exams - but there's not a whole lot of evidence that the new process does either.

Given that we've established that standardized exams are occlusive to the process of evaluating students, the best answer seems to be a re-imagined teacher recommendation form that asks teachers to compare students to one another within their respective classrooms and offers them the opportunity to write on behalf of or against a very small group of students.

Middle school teachers know who the students are in their building who most belong at TJ through a combination of aptitude for the material and dedication to the collaborative educational process and they should be afforded the opportunity to weigh in on the matter.

I would strongly suggest you education yourself on bias in the identification of gifted students.

Sure. Only been around them for my entire life.

But again, we’re not just talking about gifted students here - we’re talking about students who would make the strongest and most positive total impacts to the TJ community as a group, rather than as individuals.

It is has been empirically established that Asians are rated relatively lower on “group contribution” at Harvard and other places. The Supreme Court will decide whether these proxies for discrimination will pass muster.

Of course, but fortunately race isn't a factor for TJ admissions since it's a race blind process so the SCOTUS decision is irrelevant.

It was designed and implemented to reduce Asian students at TJ. We won't have to wait long for SCOTUs to tell us.

I wouldn’t hold your breath since the case isn’t even before SCOTUS.

The legality of use of 'race' for public and private school is before the SCOTUS! SCOTUS' decision will be binding on all private and public schools in the US.

It won’t necessarily be clear how these decisions apply, if at all, to an admissions policy like the new TJ admissions policy that on its face is race-neutral.

We have a US District Court's factual finding that there was a racial discrimination that was unconstitutional and no Court has reversed that ruling. Pretty clear.

No court has reversed it, but a higher court quickly invalidated its order and the activist Supreme Court declined to intervene. Pretty strong statements and part of the reason that the District Court judge hasn’t been promoted in 40 years on the bench.

Actually, The 4th Circuit Court of Appeals has NOT ruled on the appeal and they merely stayed the implementation of the District Court's Order and the SCOTUS has decided not to intervene in the case yet and we will have to see what happens at the Circuit Court of Appeals. The Harvard case will impact the eventual ruling by the Circuit Court of Appeals since they are legally bound by the SCOTUS' decisions! The US District Court's Order stands period.

If their order stood, the Admissions process for the Class of 2027, which is currently underway, wouldn’t be allowed to proceed. The stay, however temporary it is, will remain in place until the same three-judge panel that implemented the stay reverses the ruling.

Harvard and UNC will have no bearing on TJ because those schools use race directly in the admissions process. FCPS, despite a lot of rather obvious misinformation here, does not with respect to TJ.

It's misinformation for you to say the district court ruling's no longer "stands." It has simply been stayed by the Fourth Circuit pending appeal, which is typical. Given the fact that the current SCOTUS is an activist conservative court, some expected the Court to intervene and overturn the stay, but it declined to do so at this juncture (which again is typical).

It's also not accurate to say the Harvard and UNC cases will have "no bearing" on TJ. Even though those schools, unlike FCPS, use race directly in their admissions processes, there may be language in those decisions that affect how the lower courts ultimately decide to address the TJ case.

Finally, one should not lose sight of the fact that the AG investigation into potential violations of the Virginia Human Rights Act will be a distinct matter from the case alleging a violation of the U.S. Constitution. Even if FCPS is found not to have violated the Constitution in the federal case, FCPS may yet be found to have violated the VHRA, which could give rise to sanctions on FCPS.

Short version: FCPS is going to have a lot on its plate to defend when it comes to TJ for a long time.

DP. You are grasping at straws here.

So you wish. In case you haven't noticed, FCPS hasn't been doing too well in the courts on many fronts lately.

They're winning on this one.

No, they lost at the District Court level and we are waiting for the Court of Appeals to rule on the merits.

The only impact of FCPS having "lost" anything to this point in this mess is that the Class of 2026 was seated somewhat later than it should have been because of the delay caused by the initial, since-stayed ruling.

The Coalition has won literally zero in terms of action items. That's great for them that they've gotten a sympathetic state government to engage in an investigation, but the investigation is going to turn up a clerical error.

The state AG investigation is examining both (1) the change in admissions policy and (2) the delayed notification to recipients of Letters of Commendation.

Whatever it finds, it will be more than a "clerical error" relating to the latter. It doesn't help your cause to misrepresent the scope of the state investigation.

This is just another GOP goose chase that will yield nothing but it will help rally Youngkin's extreme far-right base.

The issue with the change in admissions policy is that the policy is race-neutral on its face, but animated by animosity towards Asian kids and White politicians thinking they can curry favor with Blacks and Hispanic voters by treating Asian kids not as individuals but as members of an “over-represented” group and throwing them under the bus.

That’s a tough issue to address legally. If you think the current admissions policy would have been acceptable if crafted on a blank slate, without the factual record indicating the racial hostility towards Asians, then what is the path forward? It feels like judicial overreach to lock FCPS into its prior admissions policy, but a bit of a farce to tell FCPS to go back to the drawing board, in which case FCPS could re-adopt its current policy with the School Board members presumably under strict instructions not to admit the anti-Asian bias, call TJ with an Asian super-majority “toxic,” or the like.

So at some level it does all feel more political than legal, but it’s not just the “extreme far-right base” that will look at this and be appalled by the behavior of the School Board and past administrators like Brabrand. It seems the real goal is to effect change in the governance of FCPS and, on that score, the conservatives may yet lose a battle but win a war.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Am I the only one who noticed Youngkin/Miyares are repeating a Coalition talking point with the letters being a civil rights issue? Asra quoted a parent saying the same thing in her 12/22 City Journal article, but left it out in later writings. That's not normally a connection you'd make for this type of thing (admissions is a different story) so it caught my eye.

Miyares’ announcement that they’re investigating the the letters under the Virginia Human Rights Act as race-based discrimination is absurd and disingenuous. There have been no allegations that the letters were distributed to non-Asian students earlier or differently than they were distributed to Asian students.

They would not have pulled this stunt for years if the overwhelming majority of the affected recipients were not Asian students.

Proof?

Look in the mirror.

I'm sure argument that will work great in court

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

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Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

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Anonymous wrote:

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Anonymous wrote:

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Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Anecdotally, TJ has not been selecting the top students within a school, who would make the most use of the advanced classes.
I should say FCPS is not selecting the top students, as my understanding is TJ doesn't handle the admissions.

That is incorrect only the top 1.5% of students are selected from each school.

The top according to their scoring, which unfortunately doesn't do a good job of identifying the top students.

It absolutely does identify the top students. The old system just identified those who could afford to buy the test. This is vastly better.

True but I like to come up with an alternate definition of merit that suits my preferred outcome.

A system for a regional school that assigns a minimum percentage of seats to every middle school, including schools that don't have AAP programs and have few LLIV-eligible students, and then relies on more subjective factors might be more geographically diverse but is definitely not going to identify the top students in the region and may not even identify the top students at an individual school.

This is the real challenge facing FCPS moving forward.

There isn't really a good argument to stop with the middle school allocation process, and that has created wonderful new diversity in the hallways and in each individual classroom. The culture of TJ remains alive and well in the face of individuals outside of the community who seek to destroy it.

But there is a serious question regarding whether or not the current admissions process is actually identifying the students who will contribute the most to the educational community of the school. The previous process certainly did not - it merely identified who was most likely to score well on college entrance exams - but there's not a whole lot of evidence that the new process does either.

Given that we've established that standardized exams are occlusive to the process of evaluating students, the best answer seems to be a re-imagined teacher recommendation form that asks teachers to compare students to one another within their respective classrooms and offers them the opportunity to write on behalf of or against a very small group of students.

Middle school teachers know who the students are in their building who most belong at TJ through a combination of aptitude for the material and dedication to the collaborative educational process and they should be afforded the opportunity to weigh in on the matter.

I would strongly suggest you education yourself on bias in the identification of gifted students.

Sure. Only been around them for my entire life.

But again, we’re not just talking about gifted students here - we’re talking about students who would make the strongest and most positive total impacts to the TJ community as a group, rather than as individuals.

It is has been empirically established that Asians are rated relatively lower on “group contribution” at Harvard and other places. The Supreme Court will decide whether these proxies for discrimination will pass muster.

Of course, but fortunately race isn't a factor for TJ admissions since it's a race blind process so the SCOTUS decision is irrelevant.

It was designed and implemented to reduce Asian students at TJ. We won't have to wait long for SCOTUs to tell us.

I wouldn’t hold your breath since the case isn’t even before SCOTUS.

The legality of use of 'race' for public and private school is before the SCOTUS! SCOTUS' decision will be binding on all private and public schools in the US.

It won’t necessarily be clear how these decisions apply, if at all, to an admissions policy like the new TJ admissions policy that on its face is race-neutral.

We have a US District Court's factual finding that there was a racial discrimination that was unconstitutional and no Court has reversed that ruling. Pretty clear.

No court has reversed it, but a higher court quickly invalidated its order and the activist Supreme Court declined to intervene. Pretty strong statements and part of the reason that the District Court judge hasn’t been promoted in 40 years on the bench.

Actually, The 4th Circuit Court of Appeals has NOT ruled on the appeal and they merely stayed the implementation of the District Court's Order and the SCOTUS has decided not to intervene in the case yet and we will have to see what happens at the Circuit Court of Appeals. The Harvard case will impact the eventual ruling by the Circuit Court of Appeals since they are legally bound by the SCOTUS' decisions! The US District Court's Order stands period.

If their order stood, the Admissions process for the Class of 2027, which is currently underway, wouldn’t be allowed to proceed. The stay, however temporary it is, will remain in place until the same three-judge panel that implemented the stay reverses the ruling.

Harvard and UNC will have no bearing on TJ because those schools use race directly in the admissions process. FCPS, despite a lot of rather obvious misinformation here, does not with respect to TJ.

It's misinformation for you to say the district court ruling's no longer "stands." It has simply been stayed by the Fourth Circuit pending appeal, which is typical. Given the fact that the current SCOTUS is an activist conservative court, some expected the Court to intervene and overturn the stay, but it declined to do so at this juncture (which again is typical).

It's also not accurate to say the Harvard and UNC cases will have "no bearing" on TJ. Even though those schools, unlike FCPS, use race directly in their admissions processes, there may be language in those decisions that affect how the lower courts ultimately decide to address the TJ case.

Finally, one should not lose sight of the fact that the AG investigation into potential violations of the Virginia Human Rights Act will be a distinct matter from the case alleging a violation of the U.S. Constitution. Even if FCPS is found not to have violated the Constitution in the federal case, FCPS may yet be found to have violated the VHRA, which could give rise to sanctions on FCPS.

Short version: FCPS is going to have a lot on its plate to defend when it comes to TJ for a long time.

DP. You are grasping at straws here.

So you wish. In case you haven't noticed, FCPS hasn't been doing too well in the courts on many fronts lately.

They're winning on this one.

No, they lost at the District Court level and we are waiting for the Court of Appeals to rule on the merits.

The only impact of FCPS having "lost" anything to this point in this mess is that the Class of 2026 was seated somewhat later than it should have been because of the delay caused by the initial, since-stayed ruling.

The Coalition has won literally zero in terms of action items. That's great for them that they've gotten a sympathetic state government to engage in an investigation, but the investigation is going to turn up a clerical error.

The state AG investigation is examining both (1) the change in admissions policy and (2) the delayed notification to recipients of Letters of Commendation.

Whatever it finds, it will be more than a "clerical error" relating to the latter. It doesn't help your cause to misrepresent the scope of the state investigation.

This is just another GOP goose chase that will yield nothing but it will help rally Youngkin's extreme far-right base.

The issue with the change in admissions policy is that the policy is race-neutral on its face, but animated by animosity towards Asian kids and White politicians thinking they can curry favor with Blacks and Hispanic voters by treating Asian kids not as individuals but as members of an “over-represented” group and throwing them under the bus.

That’s a tough issue to address legally. If you think the current admissions policy would have been acceptable if crafted on a blank slate, without the factual record indicating the racial hostility towards Asians, then what is the path forward? It feels like judicial overreach to lock FCPS into its prior admissions policy, but a bit of a farce to tell FCPS to go back to the drawing board, in which case FCPS could re-adopt its current policy with the School Board members presumably under strict instructions not to admit the anti-Asian bias, call TJ with an Asian super-majority “toxic,” or the like.

So at some level it does all feel more political than legal, but it’s not just the “extreme far-right base” that will look at this and be appalled by the behavior of the School Board and past administrators like Brabrand. It seems the real goal is to effect change in the governance of FCPS and, on that score, the conservatives may yet lose a battle but win a war.

+1, this is a good analysis of the situations. Seeing the conservative takeover of school boards across the country, it wouldn't be a shock if there were factions trying to use TJ as a way to do the same here as well.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Anecdotally, TJ has not been selecting the top students within a school, who would make the most use of the advanced classes.
I should say FCPS is not selecting the top students, as my understanding is TJ doesn't handle the admissions.

That is incorrect only the top 1.5% of students are selected from each school.

The top according to their scoring, which unfortunately doesn't do a good job of identifying the top students.

It absolutely does identify the top students. The old system just identified those who could afford to buy the test. This is vastly better.

True but I like to come up with an alternate definition of merit that suits my preferred outcome.

A system for a regional school that assigns a minimum percentage of seats to every middle school, including schools that don't have AAP programs and have few LLIV-eligible students, and then relies on more subjective factors might be more geographically diverse but is definitely not going to identify the top students in the region and may not even identify the top students at an individual school.

This is the real challenge facing FCPS moving forward.

There isn't really a good argument to stop with the middle school allocation process, and that has created wonderful new diversity in the hallways and in each individual classroom. The culture of TJ remains alive and well in the face of individuals outside of the community who seek to destroy it.

But there is a serious question regarding whether or not the current admissions process is actually identifying the students who will contribute the most to the educational community of the school. The previous process certainly did not - it merely identified who was most likely to score well on college entrance exams - but there's not a whole lot of evidence that the new process does either.

Given that we've established that standardized exams are occlusive to the process of evaluating students, the best answer seems to be a re-imagined teacher recommendation form that asks teachers to compare students to one another within their respective classrooms and offers them the opportunity to write on behalf of or against a very small group of students.

Middle school teachers know who the students are in their building who most belong at TJ through a combination of aptitude for the material and dedication to the collaborative educational process and they should be afforded the opportunity to weigh in on the matter.

I would strongly suggest you education yourself on bias in the identification of gifted students.

Sure. Only been around them for my entire life.

But again, we’re not just talking about gifted students here - we’re talking about students who would make the strongest and most positive total impacts to the TJ community as a group, rather than as individuals.

It is has been empirically established that Asians are rated relatively lower on “group contribution” at Harvard and other places. The Supreme Court will decide whether these proxies for discrimination will pass muster.

Of course, but fortunately race isn't a factor for TJ admissions since it's a race blind process so the SCOTUS decision is irrelevant.

It was designed and implemented to reduce Asian students at TJ. We won't have to wait long for SCOTUs to tell us.

I wouldn’t hold your breath since the case isn’t even before SCOTUS.

The legality of use of 'race' for public and private school is before the SCOTUS! SCOTUS' decision will be binding on all private and public schools in the US.

It won’t necessarily be clear how these decisions apply, if at all, to an admissions policy like the new TJ admissions policy that on its face is race-neutral.

We have a US District Court's factual finding that there was a racial discrimination that was unconstitutional and no Court has reversed that ruling. Pretty clear.

No court has reversed it, but a higher court quickly invalidated its order and the activist Supreme Court declined to intervene. Pretty strong statements and part of the reason that the District Court judge hasn’t been promoted in 40 years on the bench.

Actually, The 4th Circuit Court of Appeals has NOT ruled on the appeal and they merely stayed the implementation of the District Court's Order and the SCOTUS has decided not to intervene in the case yet and we will have to see what happens at the Circuit Court of Appeals. The Harvard case will impact the eventual ruling by the Circuit Court of Appeals since they are legally bound by the SCOTUS' decisions! The US District Court's Order stands period.

If their order stood, the Admissions process for the Class of 2027, which is currently underway, wouldn’t be allowed to proceed. The stay, however temporary it is, will remain in place until the same three-judge panel that implemented the stay reverses the ruling.

Harvard and UNC will have no bearing on TJ because those schools use race directly in the admissions process. FCPS, despite a lot of rather obvious misinformation here, does not with respect to TJ.

It's misinformation for you to say the district court ruling's no longer "stands." It has simply been stayed by the Fourth Circuit pending appeal, which is typical. Given the fact that the current SCOTUS is an activist conservative court, some expected the Court to intervene and overturn the stay, but it declined to do so at this juncture (which again is typical).

It's also not accurate to say the Harvard and UNC cases will have "no bearing" on TJ. Even though those schools, unlike FCPS, use race directly in their admissions processes, there may be language in those decisions that affect how the lower courts ultimately decide to address the TJ case.

Finally, one should not lose sight of the fact that the AG investigation into potential violations of the Virginia Human Rights Act will be a distinct matter from the case alleging a violation of the U.S. Constitution. Even if FCPS is found not to have violated the Constitution in the federal case, FCPS may yet be found to have violated the VHRA, which could give rise to sanctions on FCPS.

Short version: FCPS is going to have a lot on its plate to defend when it comes to TJ for a long time.

DP. You are grasping at straws here.

So you wish. In case you haven't noticed, FCPS hasn't been doing too well in the courts on many fronts lately.

They're winning on this one.

No, they lost at the District Court level and we are waiting for the Court of Appeals to rule on the merits.

The only impact of FCPS having "lost" anything to this point in this mess is that the Class of 2026 was seated somewhat later than it should have been because of the delay caused by the initial, since-stayed ruling.

The Coalition has won literally zero in terms of action items. That's great for them that they've gotten a sympathetic state government to engage in an investigation, but the investigation is going to turn up a clerical error.

The state AG investigation is examining both (1) the change in admissions policy and (2) the delayed notification to recipients of Letters of Commendation.

Whatever it finds, it will be more than a "clerical error" relating to the latter. It doesn't help your cause to misrepresent the scope of the state investigation.

This is just another GOP goose chase that will yield nothing but it will help rally Youngkin's extreme far-right base.

The issue with the change in admissions policy is that the policy is race-neutral on its face, but animated by animosity towards Asian kids and White politicians thinking they can curry favor with Blacks and Hispanic voters by treating Asian kids not as individuals but as members of an “over-represented” group and throwing them under the bus.

That’s a tough issue to address legally. If you think the current admissions policy would have been acceptable if crafted on a blank slate, without the factual record indicating the racial hostility towards Asians, then what is the path forward? It feels like judicial overreach to lock FCPS into its prior admissions policy, but a bit of a farce to tell FCPS to go back to the drawing board, in which case FCPS could re-adopt its current policy with the School Board members presumably under strict instructions not to admit the anti-Asian bias, call TJ with an Asian super-majority “toxic,” or the like.

So at some level it does all feel more political than legal, but it’s not just the “extreme far-right base” that will look at this and be appalled by the behavior of the School Board and past administrators like Brabrand. It seems the real goal is to effect change in the governance of FCPS and, on that score, the conservatives may yet lose a battle but win a war.

+1 Black and brown kids have no business attending TJ

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Anecdotally, TJ has not been selecting the top students within a school, who would make the most use of the advanced classes.
I should say FCPS is not selecting the top students, as my understanding is TJ doesn't handle the admissions.

That is incorrect only the top 1.5% of students are selected from each school.

The top according to their scoring, which unfortunately doesn't do a good job of identifying the top students.

It absolutely does identify the top students. The old system just identified those who could afford to buy the test. This is vastly better.

True but I like to come up with an alternate definition of merit that suits my preferred outcome.

A system for a regional school that assigns a minimum percentage of seats to every middle school, including schools that don't have AAP programs and have few LLIV-eligible students, and then relies on more subjective factors might be more geographically diverse but is definitely not going to identify the top students in the region and may not even identify the top students at an individual school.

This is the real challenge facing FCPS moving forward.

There isn't really a good argument to stop with the middle school allocation process, and that has created wonderful new diversity in the hallways and in each individual classroom. The culture of TJ remains alive and well in the face of individuals outside of the community who seek to destroy it.

But there is a serious question regarding whether or not the current admissions process is actually identifying the students who will contribute the most to the educational community of the school. The previous process certainly did not - it merely identified who was most likely to score well on college entrance exams - but there's not a whole lot of evidence that the new process does either.

Given that we've established that standardized exams are occlusive to the process of evaluating students, the best answer seems to be a re-imagined teacher recommendation form that asks teachers to compare students to one another within their respective classrooms and offers them the opportunity to write on behalf of or against a very small group of students.

Middle school teachers know who the students are in their building who most belong at TJ through a combination of aptitude for the material and dedication to the collaborative educational process and they should be afforded the opportunity to weigh in on the matter.

I would strongly suggest you education yourself on bias in the identification of gifted students.

Sure. Only been around them for my entire life.

But again, we’re not just talking about gifted students here - we’re talking about students who would make the strongest and most positive total impacts to the TJ community as a group, rather than as individuals.

It is has been empirically established that Asians are rated relatively lower on “group contribution” at Harvard and other places. The Supreme Court will decide whether these proxies for discrimination will pass muster.

Of course, but fortunately race isn't a factor for TJ admissions since it's a race blind process so the SCOTUS decision is irrelevant.

It was designed and implemented to reduce Asian students at TJ. We won't have to wait long for SCOTUs to tell us.

I wouldn’t hold your breath since the case isn’t even before SCOTUS.

The legality of use of 'race' for public and private school is before the SCOTUS! SCOTUS' decision will be binding on all private and public schools in the US.

It won’t necessarily be clear how these decisions apply, if at all, to an admissions policy like the new TJ admissions policy that on its face is race-neutral.

We have a US District Court's factual finding that there was a racial discrimination that was unconstitutional and no Court has reversed that ruling. Pretty clear.

No court has reversed it, but a higher court quickly invalidated its order and the activist Supreme Court declined to intervene. Pretty strong statements and part of the reason that the District Court judge hasn’t been promoted in 40 years on the bench.

Actually, The 4th Circuit Court of Appeals has NOT ruled on the appeal and they merely stayed the implementation of the District Court's Order and the SCOTUS has decided not to intervene in the case yet and we will have to see what happens at the Circuit Court of Appeals. The Harvard case will impact the eventual ruling by the Circuit Court of Appeals since they are legally bound by the SCOTUS' decisions! The US District Court's Order stands period.

If their order stood, the Admissions process for the Class of 2027, which is currently underway, wouldn’t be allowed to proceed. The stay, however temporary it is, will remain in place until the same three-judge panel that implemented the stay reverses the ruling.

Harvard and UNC will have no bearing on TJ because those schools use race directly in the admissions process. FCPS, despite a lot of rather obvious misinformation here, does not with respect to TJ.

It's misinformation for you to say the district court ruling's no longer "stands." It has simply been stayed by the Fourth Circuit pending appeal, which is typical. Given the fact that the current SCOTUS is an activist conservative court, some expected the Court to intervene and overturn the stay, but it declined to do so at this juncture (which again is typical).

It's also not accurate to say the Harvard and UNC cases will have "no bearing" on TJ. Even though those schools, unlike FCPS, use race directly in their admissions processes, there may be language in those decisions that affect how the lower courts ultimately decide to address the TJ case.

Finally, one should not lose sight of the fact that the AG investigation into potential violations of the Virginia Human Rights Act will be a distinct matter from the case alleging a violation of the U.S. Constitution. Even if FCPS is found not to have violated the Constitution in the federal case, FCPS may yet be found to have violated the VHRA, which could give rise to sanctions on FCPS.

Short version: FCPS is going to have a lot on its plate to defend when it comes to TJ for a long time.

DP. You are grasping at straws here.

So you wish. In case you haven't noticed, FCPS hasn't been doing too well in the courts on many fronts lately.

They're winning on this one.

No, they lost at the District Court level and we are waiting for the Court of Appeals to rule on the merits.

The only impact of FCPS having "lost" anything to this point in this mess is that the Class of 2026 was seated somewhat later than it should have been because of the delay caused by the initial, since-stayed ruling.

The Coalition has won literally zero in terms of action items. That's great for them that they've gotten a sympathetic state government to engage in an investigation, but the investigation is going to turn up a clerical error.

The state AG investigation is examining both (1) the change in admissions policy and (2) the delayed notification to recipients of Letters of Commendation.

Whatever it finds, it will be more than a "clerical error" relating to the latter. It doesn't help your cause to misrepresent the scope of the state investigation.

This is just another GOP goose chase that will yield nothing but it will help rally Youngkin's extreme far-right base.

The issue with the change in admissions policy is that the policy is race-neutral on its face, but animated by animosity towards Asian kids and White politicians thinking they can curry favor with Blacks and Hispanic voters by treating Asian kids not as individuals but as members of an “over-represented” group and throwing them under the bus.

That’s a tough issue to address legally. If you think the current admissions policy would have been acceptable if crafted on a blank slate, without the factual record indicating the racial hostility towards Asians, then what is the path forward? It feels like judicial overreach to lock FCPS into its prior admissions policy, but a bit of a farce to tell FCPS to go back to the drawing board, in which case FCPS could re-adopt its current policy with the School Board members presumably under strict instructions not to admit the anti-Asian bias, call TJ with an Asian super-majority “toxic,” or the like.

So at some level it does all feel more political than legal, but it’s not just the “extreme far-right base” that will look at this and be appalled by the behavior of the School Board and past administrators like Brabrand. It seems the real goal is to effect change in the governance of FCPS and, on that score, the conservatives may yet lose a battle but win a war.

+1 Black and brown kids have no business attending TJ

Pack it up, guys, the racists have come out to play.