ATLANTA — Thomas Jefferson High School for Science and Technology is a public magnet school located in Alexandria, Virginia. As the name indicates, its curriculum focuses on STEM (science, technology, engineering, and math). The school also happens to be ranked by U.S. News & World Report as the #1 high school in America.
As you can imagine, admission into the top-ranked high school in America is highly sought after.
The school had an extensive and arduous admissions process. Multiple teacher recommendations were required along with a $100 application fee. The entire process had four stages, including a three-and-a-half-hour-long test, a “problem solving essay,” and prerequisites such as having taken Algebra 1 in 8th grade.
In June 2020, admissions statistics for the school revealed a startling lack of diversity at the school. The school had accepted 486 students out of 2,539 applicants, representing an acceptance rate of 19%. One hundred sixty Black students had applied; the number accepted was “too small for reporting” (meaning 10 or fewer). Only 16 Hispanic students were accepted.
This data sparked a movement among alumni, parents, and students calling for change.
The movement resulted in the Fairfax County School Board changing the high school’s admissions process. The application fee and test were eliminated. In addition, the school allocated a specific percentage of seats in an incoming class to each of the middle schools in the area, rather than selecting the top students from any school.
In adopting the new policy, the board resolved that “the admission process must use only race-neutral methods that do not seek to achieve any specific racial or ethnic mix, balance or targets.”
The race-neutral changes were effective in altering the demographic composition of the incoming class. The percentage of Black students receiving offers grew to 7% from 1% of the class. More low-income students, English-language learners, and girls were admitted than in prior incoming classes. For the first time in more than a decade, all 28 middle schools in the county sent students to Thomas Jefferson.
Not everyone was happy with the new statistics. The percentage of Asian American students receiving offers dropped to 54%, down from 73%. A group of parents, many of them Asian American, objected to the changes and formed the “Coalition for TJ.” The Pacific Legal Foundation, a nonprofit legal organization, filed a lawsuit in March 2021 on the coalition’s behalf in federal court, arguing that the school’s admissions policy was racially discriminatory in violation of the 14th Amendment’s Equal Protection Clause. The coalition claimed that, despite the policy containing no reference to race, school officials “specifically intended to reduce the percentage of Asian-American students who enroll in TJ,” and “intended for the policy to act as a proxy in order to racially balance TJ.”
The coalition won their case in the trial court. In February 2022, the lower court concluded that — as shown by the data — the policy had a disparate impact on Asian American applicants, and therefore barred any further use of the admissions policy. Further, the trial court concluded that school officials sought to achieve a “racial balance” by increasing the school’s representation of Black and Hispanic students at the expense of Asian American students, revealing an “invidious discriminatory intent.”
School officials appealed that decision. In May 2023, they won their appeal. In a 2-1 opinion, the 4th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals noted that Asian American applicants suffered no real detriment under the new policy. Even though fewer of them received offers than in years past, they were more likely than applicants from any other racial group (including whites) to receive an offer.
This week, the coalition asked the United States Supreme Court to hear their case. We will see if the Court accepts the case, but it would be no surprise if it did. Having recently eliminated any consideration of race from the college admissions process, the next step might be to eliminate race-neutral policies that may accomplish the same goals of race-conscious policies.
This is a troubling path we are hurtling down. Consider the impact of a decision from the U.S. Supreme Court in the coalition’s favor. The result would be the end of any attempts whatsoever by public institutions (or private entities that accept public dollars) to address racial disparities. In other words, the current racial disparities that exist in everything from education to employment to medical care to housing would all be crystallized. Or more likely, they would worsen.
You may think that I’m being dramatic, but that is only because you don’t know American history. The progress that African Americans have achieved thus far was not the result of a natural progression of the order of things. Us going from slaves to citizens was not something that was simply “going to happen anyways.” It was the result of an intentional act. A struggle that spanned generations. A struggle which continues to this day as states pass race-neutral laws and gerrymander districts to restrict our voting power, and pass other laws which prevent the teaching of our history in schools before the course is even offered.
In a weird sense, it would be the most American thing to extinguish African Americans’ hopes of racial equality and equity using the constitutional amendment that was created to help them after their release from slavery. The Founding Fathers formed a nation upon the concept of freedom, while at the same time denying freedom to others in their midst. The idea that African Americans exist outside of the full scope of America’s ideals is nothing new. It has been with us since the beginning.
To be clear, this is not me calling the members of the coalition racist. As a parent myself, I understand wanting the best for your children. That is what these parents want. The best for their children. And per U.S. News, Thomas Jefferson High School of Science and Technology is just that: the best.
However, the understandable desire for the best for your children becomes less understandable when that desire compels you to disregard the plights of others and hoard resources. It’s akin to those people who hoarded items like toilet paper and sanitizer and K95 face masks during the pandemic, at the expense of essential workers. Now that I think about it, disregarding the plight of others to achieve or maintain a “leg up” is a concept that has been with us since the beginning, as well.
Racist might not be the word. Selfish is certainly one that applies. And in my book, that word is just as bad.
Eric Foster, a community member of the editorial board, is a columnist for The Plain Dealer and cleveland.com. Foster is a lawyer in private practice. The views expressed are his own.