Thoughts on Stuyvesant Admissions

I just spoke at Stuyvesant High School about the rise of hip hop in the Bronx to two New York History classes. There were at most 4 Black and Latino students among the 60 students I spoke to. The students at my lecture, probably 70 percent Asian and South Asian were attentive and asked good questions, but there was little electricity in the air. Frankly, the atmosphere would have been better if there had been a critical mass of Black and Latino students who were immersed in the cultural traditions I spoke about or lived in the neighborhoods where the music arose. And every student in the class would have benefited. Diversity doesn’t just help those who are given new opportunities by broadening admissions criteria, it helps every person in the institution being changed expand their cultural horizons and become better leaders.

I think Stuyvesant would be a better school if it were more diverse. Yet at the same time,I feel tremendous respect and admiration for the students who currently attend. To me, they seemed like a wonderful cross section of one portion of working class, immigrant New York. They were neighborhood kids who worked hard to get there and didn’t have a smug bone in their body. More than a few were the children of Muslim immigrants, people currently in the cross hairs of racists and xenophobes. I don’t like the idea of painting them as “privileged” especially now in a time of ascendant xenophobia.

I would like to see Stuyvesant be more diverse. I would like to see the school, like all schools, have multiple measures of admission. 
That is the moral framework from which I approach this. My support of multiple admissions criteria is consistent with my efforts to make Fordham SAT optional

But I don’t like to see the interests of working class Asians and South Asians pitted against those of working class Blacks and Latinos.

This whole issue is getting ugly in a way that is leaving a very bad taste in my mouth