SHSAT Sunset

Category: 2014

  • Close Stuyvesant High School

    This 2014 Slate.com article makes the unusual argument that Specialized High Schools should be closed.

    My alma mater, Stuyvesant High School, has been a lightning rod in New York City politics for as long as I can remember. Whenever critics have griped about the way Stuyvesant does business, my inclination has long been to say, essentially, “Screw you.” Going to Stuyvesant is one of the best things to have ever happened to me.

    Noguera is exactly right. The politicians and the education experts who are so fixated on the racial balance at Stuyvesant neglect the fact that Stuyvesant is not built to support and nurture students who need care and attention to excel academically and socially. It is a school that allows ambitious students who know how to navigate their way around a maddening, complex bureaucracy to connect with other students with the same skill sets

    A bit of a racist argument here. That these 2 groups won’t materially intersect.

    I have a theory about declining white representation at Stuyvesant. I seriously doubt that it’s because New York City is no longer home to white eighth-graders from affluent families who have expansive vocabularies and solid critical thinking skills and who are more than capable of scoring well on the entrance exam. I’ve met more than my share of such young people. My gut tells me that Stuyvesant has grown steadily less attractive to white families with the kind of social and cultural capital that helps people get ahead in America. 

    Instead of reinventing Stuyvesant from the ground up, we should instead recognize that it never made sense for one warehouse of a school to hoover up such a big chunk of the city’s whiz kids. Better to spread gifted and talented kids across a wide range of schools offering different instructional models

    https://slate.com/news-and-politics/2014/07/the-case-for-shutting-down-stuyvesant-high-school-the-best-public-school-in-new-york.html

  • The History of New York City’s Special High Schools

    A 2014 timeline of SHSAT related events.

    2014 – New York City Council Introduces Package of Legislation to Promote Diversity in City Schools
    On Wednesday, October 22nd, New York City Council members introduced one bill and two resolutions intended to build momentum around tackling diversity issues in New York City schools. According to recent reports, such as one released by the UCLA Civil Rights Project in March, local schools are among the most segregated in the country. The report states that in 2010, for example, of 32 school districts in New York City, 19 had ten percent or less white students.

    http://www.gothamgazette.com/government/5392-the-history-of-new-york-citys-special-high-schools-timeline

  • Bangladeshi families prep for controversial specialized high school exam

    About 40 middle school children—all but one from Bangladeshi immigrant families in the Bronx—sat quietly inside a stark classroom at Khan’s Tutorial in Parkchester on a Sunday afternoon in September. Barely audible from the upstairs classroom were the sounds of children playing at a nearby park as the 12 and 13-year-olds reviewed fractions, greatest common factors and least common multiples.

    Still, for Rafsan, one wrong answer meant there was room for improvement. Parents said they can spend up to $4,000 for the year-long tutoring program. Their hopes for their children’s futures depend on a high score.


    “Every time the score comes back it gives me more information of what I need to study,” said Rafsan, tightly clutching an algebra practice book under his arm. The eighth grader expects to get into Stuyvesant High School in Manhattan, considered the best of the best of the elite schools that include Bronx Science, Brooklyn Tech and LaGuardia School of the Arts. Admissions decisions are based solely on results from the highly competitive SHSAT, a requirement that is currently up for debate in the state legislature.


    “It sets the way for college and career,” Rafsan said.

    For the last two decades, this private SHSAT tutoring company has successfully targeted the city’s growing Bangladeshi immigrant community. Khan’s Tutorial, a 20-year-old institution begun in Queens, recently set up its second center in the Bronx, following the Bangladeshi immigrant migration from Jackson Heights to Parkchester that began in the 1990s. The website advertises prices at $15 per hour. Parents said they pay as much as $4,000 for their children to attend tutoring nearly two years before the exam, hoping a high score will help guarantee placement in a good university down the road.


    Since its founding in 1994, Khan’s has sent 1,400 students to specialized high schools. Some students come two weeks prior to the exam for tutoring, some start as early as the sixth grade. The company’s administrators recommend that students prepare for the exam at least one year in advance. “For South Asians or Asian Americans, the SHSAT has been the common path to pursue in our culture,” said Sami Raab, director of Khan’s Tutorial in Jamaica Queens. “You see testing as important and that carries over to first generation children.”

    http://bronxink.org/2014/10/20/27031-bangladeshi-families-prep-for-controversial-high-school-exam/

  • Lawmakers, teachers union push to change elite high schools’ admission process, boost diversity

    State lawmakers, city officials and the teachers union have teamed in a fresh push to increase diversity at the city’s elite public high schools by overhauling their admissions process.

    Critics say the current state-mandated system relying on test scores from a single exam — which is used at Stuyvesant, Bronx Science, Brooklyn Tech and five other specialized schools — is outdated and discriminates against black and Hispanic kids.

    Teachers union President Michael Mulgrew joined lawmakers at the union headquarters in downtown Manhattan Monday to unveil a bill that would allow the city to also consider grade point average and other factors.

    https://www.nydailynews.com/new-york/education/pols-shake-hs-admissions-boost-diversity-article-1.1823183