Matthew Barakat
Associated Press
Alexandria, Va. (AP) — A federal judge has again ruled against a northern Virginia school system that was found guilty of discrimination in an overhaul of admissions policies at a highly selective high school Crimes of Asian American Students.
On March 11, U.S. District Judge Claude Hilton denied Fairfax County Public Schools’ request to delay enforcement of his ruling on Thomas Jefferson Tech High School’s new admissions policy.
The school system argued that the selection process for the freshman class was going well and that implementing his ruling now would throw the selection process into chaos.
But Hilton said the school system had been aware for months that its procedures could be in jeopardy, and said it should now be ready to make changes to it to remove aspects he believes are unconstitutional.
He said there was a risk of “irreparable harm to students found to have been discriminated against” if the school system were allowed to use the same process for the second year in a row.
The case has come under scrutiny as courts continue to assess the role race can play in deciding who should be admitted to a particular school. Similar debates have emerged in elite public schools in New York, California and elsewhere. Earlier this year, the U.S. Supreme Court agreed to hear a similar case accusing Harvard of discriminating against Asian-Americans in its admissions process.
Hilton ruled last month that an impermissible “racial balance” was a central factor driving the county school board to overhaul admissions at “TJ,” a highly sought-after school close to the nation’s capital that is regularly rated the best in the country public high school. nation.
Black and Hispanic students have been severely underrepresented in the student body for decades. The school board eliminated standardized tests at the heart of the admissions process after criticism of the lack of diversity. Instead, it opted for a program that reserved places at every secondary school in the county. It also includes “experience factors” such as socioeconomic background.
A parent group filed a lawsuit in federal court alleging that Asian Americans, who make up more than 70 percent of TJ’s student body, are unfairly targeted under the new policy.
Current freshman classes at schools admitted under the new policy see markedly different racial makeup. Black students increased from 1% to 7%; Hispanic representation increased from 3% to 11%. At the same time, the percentage of Asian Americans dropped from 73% to 54%.
It’s unclear what Fairfax County Public Schools must do to make their admissions policies compliant with Hilton’s order. In a statement released after the March 11 hearing, the school system said it was considering an appeal against Hilton’s ruling.
“This ruling is so inconsistent with current diversity efforts laws that we cannot stand idly by and leave it unchallenged,” said school board chair Stella Pekarsky. “After so much progress toward a fair and equitable system, we cannot go now. open.”
The school system insists its new policy is race-neutral, and that the panel evaluating applicants does not even know the applicant’s race when they conduct the review.
In the ruling, however, Hilton said the changes were implemented against the backdrop of a heated debate over the racial makeup of the student body that “infected discussions of racial balance from the very beginning.”
School officials said they could not restore standardized tests used in past years because one of the components had been discontinued by a supplier.
Asra Nomani, a former TJ parent and co-founder of the TJ Parent Group Coalition, which filed the lawsuit, said another standardized test could be easily and quickly scheduled as an alternative if the school system wanted to. She called it “unconscionable” that the school system was still defending its policy after a judge found it discriminatory.
“It’s nothing but systemic racism against Asian Americans,” she said.
Erin Wilcox, an attorney for the Pacific Legal Foundation, which represents the TJ Coalition, said after the hearing that it is up to the school board to set alternative admissions policies, but “no matter what they do, they cannot discriminate against a group of students based on their race.”
