Press Release
Racial Disparities Persist at City’s Elite High Schools
Yesterday, the New York City Department of Education released information about acceptance offers made to students who took the Specialized High School Admissions Test (SHSAT) for application to the city's Specialized High Schools (SHS). The city's offers present racial disparities as troubling as ever. Nearly 5,500 black students took the SHSAT—the sole admissions method for the SHS—but only seven were accepted into Stuyvesant, which requires the highest test score. That is an acceptance rate of only 0.1 percent. White students were 34 times as likely to get an offer, while Asian students were 70 times more likely than black applicants to gain acceptance to Stuyvesant.
These dismaying results occurred even though the city has continued to invest in efforts to expand preparation for, and access to, the SHSAT. But the only notable change in acceptance rates from last year is a two-percentage point increase in the share of white students receiving SHS offers. It should be clear by now that the only way to change these outcomes is for the city to adopt a new admissions structure for the eight SHS.
The ongoing debate about the SHS tends to leave out two important issues. First, it should not be the case that selection for the city's top high schools completely ignores a student's grades throughout middle school. Paying for expensive test prep should not be a backdoor that replaces the hard work in school that happens daily. Second, despite claims that certain groups, particularly the Asian community, benefit from the current system, it is important to note that more than 70 percent of Asian applicants are denied admission to the SHS. Many reform plans would increase offers to subgroups within the Asian community also currently on the outside looking in.
The Community Service Society of New York (CSS) has long called for reforms to the admissions policy at the eight SHS, and our 2015 proposal was the basis for the reform plan that the Mayor released last year. But while the Mayor has put forth a strong and evidence-based vision for change, we have yet to see the state-level strategy and activity that will be necessary to overturn the state law governing SHS admissions. Until the Mayor makes a real, good-faith effort to push for change in Albany, his statements ring hollow. We remain eager to work with him to build the support for these reforms.
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For more than 170 years, the Community Service Society of New York has been the leading voice on behalf of low-income New Yorkers and continues to advocate for the economic security of the working poor in the nation’s largest city. We respond to urgent, contemporary challenges with applied research, advocacy, litigation and innovative program models that help the working poor achieve a better quality of life and promote a more prosperous city.