Describe your school: Is it public or private? How do students get to attend your school? Is it based on geographic area? A test, an audition or high grades? What is the makeup of the student body in terms of race, class, gender, sexuality or religion?
Do you consider your school to be diverse? Why or why not? Do you think the way students are admitted to your school affects how diverse it is?
In New York City, policymakers, teachers, parents and students are talking about diversity in highly selective public high schools that require grades or tests for entrance. Because of low enrollment of Black and Latino students, these schools, like other selective high schools across the country, have often been criticized as “functionally racist and segregated.” But not all students agree.
In “How It Feels to Be an Asian Student in an Elite Public School,” Michael Powell writes:
Tausifa Haque, a 17-year-old daughter of Bangladeshi immigrants, walks in the early morning from her family’s apartment in the Bronx to the elevated subway and rides south to Brooklyn, a journey of one and a half hours.
There she joins a river of teenagers who pour into Brooklyn Technical High School — Bengali and Tibetan, Egyptian and Chinese, Sinhalese and Russian, Dominican and Puerto Rican, West Indian and African American. The cavernous eight-story building holds about 5,850 students, one of the largest and most academically rigorous high schools in the United States.
Her father drives a cab; her mother is a lunchroom attendant. This school is a repository of her dreams and theirs. “This is my great chance,” Tausifa said. “It’s my way out.”
Brooklyn Tech is also subject to persistent criticism and demands for far-reaching reform, along with other test-screened public high schools across the nation.
Liberal politicians, school leaders and organizers argue such schools are bastions of elitism and, because of low enrollment of Black and Latino students, functionally racist and segregated. Sixty-three percent of the city’s public school students are Black and Latino yet they account for just 15 percent of Brooklyn Tech’s population.
For Asian students, the percentages are flipped: They make up 61 percent of Brooklyn Tech, although they account for 18 percent of the public school population.
Some critics imply that the presence of so many South and East Asian students, along with the white students, accentuates this injustice. Such charges reached a heated pitch a few years ago when a prominent white liberal council member said such schools were overdue for “a racial reckoning.”
Richard Carranza, who served as New York’s schools chancellor until last year, was more caustic. “I just don’t buy into the narrative,” he said, “that any one ethnic group owns admission to these schools.”
But several dozen in-depth interviews with Asian and Black students at Brooklyn Tech paint a more complicated portrait and often defy the political characterizations put forth in New York and across the country. These students speak of personal journeys and struggles at a far remove from the assumptions that dominate the raging battles over the future of their schools.
Their critiques often proved searching; most Asian students spoke of wanting more Black and Latino classmates.
Fully 63 percent of Brooklyn Tech’s students are classified as economically disadvantaged. Census data shows that Asians have the lowest median income in the city and that a majority speak a language other than English at home.
Hasiba Haq, a former student at Brooklyn Tech whose parents grew up on an island in the Bay of Bengal, shared her experience:
By the time she turned 11, her family and neighbors talked of the high school examination. Her parents enrolled her in a tutoring center, a rigorous boot camp with teenage Asian teachers drawn from the specialized high schools. The sticker price was $4,000. Her parents bargained hard, but still paid a small fortune.
“It was every weekend and classes over the summer,” Ms. Haq said. “Everyone in the community knew it was your turn to take the test.”
She got in and the local Bengali newspaper ran her photograph and those of other Bengali teenagers who gained admittance to specialized high schools. “Family honor is tied to it,” she said. “It’s kind of embarrassing.”
When she walked into Brooklyn Tech, she felt her shoulders drop. “I could finally breathe,” she said. “I was around kids like me.”
The article also included the story of Ricardo, a current student at the school:
Diane Nunez, who is Black, and her son, Ricardo, 15, share a goal: to maximize his education and get him into a top college. His road was uncertain. He applied to the highly competitive Mark Twain Middle School and scored in the 97th percentile. The test cutoff was the 98th percentile.
When Ricardo was in seventh grade, Ms. Nunez received a guidance counselor’s email intended for another family. It mentioned a city-run tutoring course for the high school test. “I thought, ‘Wait a minute, Ricardo is smart enough for this,’” she said. “Why isn’t he getting offered this?”
Ms. Nunez dug into her savings and enrolled Ricardo in a private tutoring agency favored by Asian parents. Ricardo understood the lost weekends of study it would entail. “That was the most challenging academics I’d ever done,” Ricardo said. “But I knew where I wanted to end up.”
Once at Brooklyn Tech, he joined the Black student union. “I don’t feel like a minority,” he said. “We resist being pitted against each other at this school.”
Students, read the entire article and then tell us:
What is your reaction to the article? Does Brooklyn Tech resemble your school in any way? Do any of the perspectives of the students resonate with you?
After reading the article, do you feel the same about your assessment of diversity at your school? Is your school racially and socioeconomically diverse compared to other schools in your community? Do you wish your school were more diverse in some ways?
How easy is it to talk about diversity and inclusion at your school? Is it something that regularly comes up in classes or with your classmates? Do you wish you had more opportunities to talk about things like race and class in school? Why or why not?
How important is it to you that you attend a racially and socioeconomically diverse school? In what ways can diversity enhance or deepen learning experiences? What are the barriers of achieving a diverse and integrated school where you live?
What do you think about specialized public high schools? Do they exist where you live? Do you think they offer an important opportunity for students of all backgrounds to learn at an accelerated pace and attend college? Or do you think they create or reinforce “an uneven playing field,” one that especially excludes minority and low-income students?
Want more writing prompts? You can find all of our questions in our Student Opinion column. Teachers, check out this guide to learn how you can incorporate them into your classroom.
Students 13 and older in the United States and Britain, and 16 and older elsewhere, are invited to comment. All comments are moderated by the Learning Network staff, but please keep in mind that once your comment is accepted, it will be made public.
