United Democratic Organization
65th Assembly District, Part D
I applaud the Mayor and Chancellor for trying to desegregate our Specialized High Schools. We all want more minorities and young women to be admitted to these Specialized High Schools. But the standardized test has withstood time as the one equal measure for admittance. In the past the City has maintained the standardized test when other ethnic and racial groups dominated the student bodies of these high schools. It appears discriminatory and unfair to abolish the test now that Asian-American students fill the hallways of the Specialized High Schools. The best way to be inclusive is to even the playing field for all students. Desegregated schools means providing a quality education and strengthening testing and studies in the lower grades for all students in every borough! The City must make test prep classes affordable and open for everyone to participate. The City should reduce class size, make test prep available and affordable, and make stronger efforts to encourage and welcome parental involvement in all elementary and middle schools. The City should also establish equivalent high schools of excellence in every community district. The Specialized High Schools are jewels in our City’s educational system. The Mayor and Chancellor should spend the necessary time and resources fixing the long suffering problem of providing an equal quality and assessable education for all the 1.1 million students rather than taking the much easier way out and scrapping the standardized test. We encourage a citywide conversation with various neighborhood town halls before any final decisions are made. Comments are closed.
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March 2021
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