DO BLACK KIDS (ACTUALLY) MATTER: Black kids don't get into Stuyvesant!

TUESDAY, MARCH 26, 2019

Big newspaper shows that it cares:
Last Tuesday morning, right on its front page, the New York Times showed the world that it deeply cares.

The report was written by Eliza Shapiro, one of the paper's fairly recent ballyhooed hires. Her report concerned, or at least seemed to concern, the lives and the interests of black kids.

Shapiro's report concerned admission figures at New York City's most selective "elite" high schools. In print editions, the headline on her front-page report extended across five columns.

Lengthy hard-copy headline included, her news report started like this:
SHAPIRO (3/19/19): New York's Most Selective Public High School Has 895 Spots. Black Students Got 7.

Only a tiny number of black students were offered admission to the highly selective public high schools in New York City on Monday,
raising the pressure on officials to confront the decades-old challenge of integrating New York’s elite public schools.

At Stuyvesant High School, out of 895 slots in the freshman class, only seven were offered to black students. And the number of black students is shrinking: There were 10 black students admitted into Stuyvesant last year, and 13 the year before.
By any sensible measure, those numbers would seem to be startling. Stuyvesant High is New York City's most "selective" public high school. But out of 895 admission offers, only seven offers went to black kids this year.

In typical New York Times fashion, Shapiro never stated the overall percentage of black kids in Gotham's public schools. But in paragraphs 16 and 17 of her report, she finally offered the statistics we highlight below—and, by any sensible measure, these statistics would seem to be startling:
SHAPIRO: The question of how to racially integrate the city’s elite high schools underscores how hard it is to tackle educational inequality and discrimination. It is a struggle playing out in real time as the future of affirmative action is being challenged at Harvard University and as last week’s college admissions scandal revealed the extreme ways in which wealthy and well-connected families try to game admissions.

Though black and Hispanic students make up nearly 70 percent of New York City’s public school system as a whole, just over 10 percent of students admitted into the city’s eight specialized high schools were black or Hispanic, according to statistics released Monday by the city. That percentage is flat compared to last year.
According to Shapiro's report, black and Hispanic kids make up nearly 70 percent of the city's public school student enrollment. But black and Hispanic kids received just ten percent of admission offers to Gotham's eight "specialized" high schools, Stuyvesant included.

Despite their numbers in the system, they received just ten percent of offers! By any sensible measure, that's an extremely low number.

You'll note, of course, that Shapiro fashioned this state of affairs, in this passage, as a matter of "racial integration." She'd done the same thing in her opening paragraph (see above).

She also fashioned these enrollment figures as a matter of "discrimination." Lumping them in with an ongoing "college admissions scandal," she even possibly seemed to suggest that someone has been "trying to game admissions" to New York City's most competitive high schools.

Without any question, black and Hispanic kids are massively "under-represented" at Stuyvesant High, and at the seven other "specialized high schools."

In the course of her 1566 words this day, Shapiro never offered an overall breakdown of the enrollment figures at these famously "elite" public schools. Three days later, in a second lengthy front-page report, she managed to offer this somewhat jumbled account of Stuyvesant's student enrollment:
SHAPIRO (3/22/19): Asians make up roughly 73 percent of Stuyvesant’s 3,300 students, while white students are about 20 percent of the school. Hispanic students make up another 3 percent, with black students just under 1 percent. The city school system is nearly 70 percent black and Hispanic with white and Asian students making up roughly another 15 percent each.
Let's sort that out:

Asian-American kids are 15 percent of Gotham's citywide student enrollment. But they account for 73 percent of Stuyvesant's student body!

White kids are 15 percent of students citywide. They account for 20 percent of Stuyvesant's enrollment.

Meanwhile, black and Hispanic kids occupy just four percent of the seats at Stuyvesant High! They're massively under-represented there, as compared to their numbers—nearly 70 percent!—in the public schools as a whole.

When admission offers went out last week, the New York Times swung into action. Similar admission figures are reported every year, but the Times is skilled at declaring itself to be "shocked, shocked" every time this happens.

Across the organs of the liberal world, others were shocked as well. Deeply caring professional liberals expressed displeasure with this latest example of "segregation," preparatory to crawling back into their logs and sleeping the sleep of the morally great for the rest of the calendar year.

Deeply caring self-approvers let us know how much they care about this troubling state of affairs concerning the lives of black kids.

Tomorrow, though, we'll show you the story which lies behind this story. More specifically, we'll show you the data you'll never be shown by the deeply caring Times.

Shapiro's deeply caring report touched off a wave of complaints across the nation's pseudo-liberal organs. With robotic precision, the usual complaints were rounded up and given voice:

The admission test for these schools must be biased. Someone must be "gaming the system," presumably through test prep. The admission procedure doesn't make sense. Gotham's schools are full of brilliant kids who are getting hosed.

As pseudo-liberals, we all know how to state these complaints, before we crawl back into our logs to sleep the sleep of the just. We also know what sorts of data we mist never report or discuss.

New York City, like our own Baltimore, is full of good, decent kids. We're struck by the decent young people in Baltimore every day of the week.

That said, do the lives and interests of black and Hispanic kids actually matter to those at the Times? To those at our pseudo-liberal organs?

We sometimes suspect that the answer is no. Tomorrow, we'll start to explain.

Tomorrow: The data you'll never be shown

22 comments:

  1. "She also fashioned these enrollment figures as a matter of "discrimination." "

    Liberals live and die by redefining words, to suit their agenda. In this case (as in most cases) their agenda is race-mongering; inventing bullshit grievances to amplify racial animosity.

    If it is discrimination, Madam Shapiro, then identify individual cases and bring them to court, end of story. And if you can't identify any, then get lost.

    Put up or shut up.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. "Liberals live and die by redefining words, to suit their agenda."

      Is that why they call the "Estate tax" a "Death tax", dembot zombie?
      Dr. Mao, heal thyself.

      Delete
    2. Yes, dembot, thanks. Calling the tax on inheritance "estate tax" is another example.

      But I'm glad we agree that in most cases it's race-mongering.

      Delete
    3. Remember when Conservatives kept telling us that they believe in "merit", and not people getting things for free, just before they tried to repeal the Estate Tax?
      It's almost like they're morons, except for the "almost like" part.

      Delete
  2. The Times is looking through the wrong end of the telescope. New York isn't letting blacks and Hispanics down; blacks and Hispanics are letting New York down. They're such poor students that hardly any of them can pass a test to enter a special high school.

    The huge Asian population at these schools obviously shows that racial prejudice is NOT the problem. Nevertheless, the liberals will probably have their way. They will damage one portion of New York City's education structure that's actually working extremely well.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Did you even read the fucking article, David? Due to the opposition of DEMOCRATS in the NY state senate and assembly, deBlasio’s plannus dead in the water.

      Somerby didn’t tell you that, did he?

      Delete
    2. @11:27 - I hope that opposition prevails and no change is made in the admission process for these schools. But, the NY Times is a powerful voice in NYC. I fear that some compromise will be reached whereby the admission tests aren't totally discarded, but something is done to get admit more blacks and Hispanics.

      IMHO what political leaders should be saying is that blacks and Hispanics need to study harder. For some reason, that position is unthinkable. It might even be considered racist.

      Delete
    3. I for one have never said “conservatives believe x” or “all conservatives are...”, because I understand there is nuance there, and I try to act on Somerby’s motto, that you shouldn’t judge a diverse group of millions of people as all having identical beliefs that you impose on them.

      But then he turns around and treats liberals that way, and so do you.

      You should stop it, but you won’t. This just contributes to the problems in our discourse.

      Delete
    4. 11:56,
      Hold your ground. Don't let David gaslight you into thinking all Conservatives aren't pieces of shit. They totally are.
      Did you see they're de-funding the Special Olympics so they can build a racist wall?

      In the words of Dennis Green, "They are who we thought they were."

      Delete
    5. I didn't know dembottery was an olympic discipline.
      But if you feel you need money to compete, why don't you ask Mr Soros? I hear he is very generous.

      Delete
  3. The main point of the article is that deBlasio’s plan appears dead in the water.

    Guess why? Because of the opposition of parents, of course. But also because of the opposition of “Democratic leaders in the Senate and Assembly”.

    Does that keep those state Democrats from being “pseudoliberal?” Only Somerby knows.

    But, still, by implication we get:

    “Eliza Shapiro”=liberals

    and

    “New York Times”=“liberal organ”

    Since Somerby likes to single out one reader letter to draw conclusions about millions of people, perhaps he should take a look at the response to Shapiro’s story. It generated over 1500 comments online. You would be hard-pressed to find even a tiny handful supportive of deBlasio, and many of the critics are liberals.

    As far as NYT being a liberal organ, obviously conservatives think that. But liberals do not. The Times itself does not classify itself as ideological.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. AnonymousMarch 26, 2019 at 11:23 AM- for evidence that the NY Times has an ideological bias, read this
      https://www.powerlineblog.com/archives/2019/03/less-than-full-disclosure-from-the-new-york-times.php

      According to The Hill, both the DNC and the Clinton campaign used Perkins Coie secretly to pay Fusion GPS and Christopher Steele to compile a dossier of uncorroborated raw intelligence alleging Trump and Moscow were colluding to hijack the presidential election.

      Fake intelligence in that dossier was then used by the FBI as the main basis for seeking a Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) warrant targeting the Trump campaign in the final days of the campaign. After the election, the dossier continued to be used by those pushing claims of collusion.

      These claims led to the Mueller investigation. It’s unclear whether, without the dossier, there would ever have been an investigation into (nonexistent) collusion.

      Given the role of Bauer’s law firm in ginning up the collusion narrative, the Times should not have run an op-ed by Bauer about the Mueller investigation and where things stand in light of the collapse of the narrative that led to it. If the Times was going to run such an op-ed, it should have disclosed Bauer’s affiliation with Perkins Coie.

      Delete
    2. Congratulations, Sherlock.
      Of course the NY Times is ideologically biased. All corporate-owned media has a Right-wing bias.

      Delete
  4. “We're struck by the decent young people in Baltimore every day of the week.”

    Touching anecdote, Bob. Highly informative and uniquely personal.

    ReplyDelete
  5. The presumption that black and Hispanic kids must perform as well as whites or Asians is the most racist view of all. Suppose they are unable, which is a view supported by all the data we have? Are we now making a value judgment about human beings based on their ability to perform certain cognitive tasks?

    This presumption and the outrage that accompanies any suggestion that perhaps certain groups will perform poorly proportionate to other groups is mostly found on the left, the so-called "progressive" side, because they harbor the racist notion that if a person does not have a certain cognitive capacity, he is worthless. It's why they fight for the right to kill those found to have Down Syndrome.

    ReplyDelete
  6. What must it be like to live in a city that tells you if the racial group you belong to generally does not perform as well as another group on the skills required to be accepted into an institution for those who excel at those skills, there is a crisis or a problem in need of an artificial remedy? Cruel and backwards. Even Nazi-esque.

    ReplyDelete
  7. The comments at 12:31 and 12:37 have to be forgiven, since they are being made in reference to a Somerby post on “education”, which really means it is a post on the evils of liberals. His lack of nuance serves as a springboard for these kinds of comments. It would be different and he would not be so culpable if he himself didn’t make very similar nasty sweeping generalizations.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. I have to disagree with 1:07 PM.

      Constant liberal race-mongering, as manifested in the nytines column Bob quoted, is exactly the reason people continue thinking in terms like 'white', 'black', 'asian', 'hispanic'.

      Instead of, y'know, judging people as individuals, according to their personal qualities.

      Bob is right to point it out, and we all very much appreciate his effort in recording the atrocities...

      Delete
    2. Makes you wonder why Somerby keeps printing NAEP scores broken out by race, and worrying about the terrible achievement gaps of black v white.

      Delete
    3. Yes, I noticed it too. One day he denounces liberal race-mongering, and the next day he's seriously discussing 'racial' stats, operating with very unfortunate concepts like 'black students'.

      I'm afraid I don't have a good explanation; some sort of mental illness, perhaps? Multiple personalities?

      Delete
    4. Black Lives Matter

      Delete
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