WASHINGTON (AP) — The Supreme Court has rejected a parent’s request to block a new admissions policy at a prominent Northern Virginia high school that a lower court found discriminates against Asian-American students.
The high court did not explain its April 25 order allowing Thomas Jefferson Tech High School to continue using its admissions policy, while the Fairfax County School Board appealed the lower court’s decision.
Judges Samuel Alito, Neil Gorsuch and Clarence Thomas said they would grant a request by the parent group Coalition for TJ to suspend its admissions policy.
In February, the group persuaded U.S. District Judge Claude Hilton that a new policy to increase black and Hispanic representation amounted to an impermissible “racial balance” in elite schools near the nation’s capital.
It is regularly ranked as one of the best public high schools in the nation.
Asian-American students make up more than 70 percent of the student body. Under the new policy, the percentage of Asian Americans used to enroll in the school’s current freshman class dropped to 54 percent. Black students increased from 1% to 7% and Hispanic students increased from 3% to 11%.
Hilton has ordered a moratorium on the new policy, but a federal appeals court in Richmond, Va., said it could be used while the case continues in court.
“We hope we can win this battle to free up residency on the country’s highest court, but our fight for justice is not over,” the TJ Coalition said in a statement. “We are not dissuaded at all.”
