# Selective Magnet School in Virginia moving towards a lottery system **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [October 6, 2020, 3:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/selective-magnet-school-in-virginia-moving-towards-a-lottery-system/922347 "2020-10-06T15:59:07Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![Ruken](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/f475e1/32.png) [@Ruken](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ruken)\ **Post date:** [October 7, 2020, 2:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/selective-magnet-school-in-virginia-moving-towards-a-lottery-system/922347/41 "2020-10-07T14:23:51Z")
If OP would like us to take the “should magnet schools even exist” discussion elsewhere, just holler. ---
**Author:** ![Kearsen1](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/3d9bf3/32.png) [@Kearsen1](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kearsen1)\ **Post date:** [October 7, 2020, 2:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/selective-magnet-school-in-virginia-moving-towards-a-lottery-system/922347/42 "2020-10-07T14:31:53Z")
Seems to me if you have double the amount of qualified students eligible to be enrolled, that simply creating a second school would benefit everyone. ---
**Author:** ![damuriajashi](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/ac8455/32.png) [@damuriajashi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/damuriajashi)\ **Post date:** [October 7, 2020, 4:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/selective-magnet-school-in-virginia-moving-towards-a-lottery-system/922347/43 "2020-10-07T16:08:07Z")
> [@Cheesesteak](#): > > Honestly, there’s something about this phrase that I find just despicable. Would you find it less despicab le if i said, nationally ranked high school. That was my intent. > [@Cheesesteak](#): > > It appears to me that the purpose of the school is to gather all the best students in the area into a single place so that they can be identified by others as the best students in the area. If they aren’t actually making the students better, then why should I care if the school is subverted? Yes, that is absolutely the purpose. Gather all the best students in one place so they can learn at an accelerated pace among a peer group that will push them forward faster. It is the gathering of the best students that makes those students better. When you dilute that the way they propose, you end up with little more than a good charter school, that subverts the the purpose of the school > [@iiandyiiii](#): > > This will still be true. LOL. True, they will all be considered to have reached the same lower standard, which is inconsistently applied from school to school. > [@iiandyiiii](#): > > I thought the purpose was to provide a great education for great students in the area. That purpose will continue – in fact, it will be improved, since it will be providing a great education for great students in the area in a much more diverse grouping than before. What purpose did you think the school served? No, that is not the purpose. The purpose is to gather the best students so that they could learn at an accelerated pace, and with the new standard, some significant minority of students will barely be grade level. > [@iiandyiiii](#): > > And it still certainly will! This won’t cease by any means, based on your own numbers. Wait, didn’t you say that tjhsst was a virtually brown free zone? I think this just highlights how little you consider asian kids in your philosophy and world view. > [@iiandyiiii](#): > > Not if you measure per capita or by % improvement. By those measures, by far the most benefit will go to deserving black and Hispanic kids. That is a stupid way to measure things. Even the proponents of the bill are concerned with the absolute number of black and hispanic students at the school. And how do you justify removing a bunch of asians to make room for more white kids? > [@iiandyiiii](#): > > Most of the Asian kids enrolled will still get to go to this school. Some will go elsewhere now, which is also fine, since there are plenty of great schools in the area. > > You’re satisfied with a great school with virtually no black and Hispanic kids. I’m not. That’s the difference. Maybe it’s because you don’t have black or Hispanic kids in your friends or family and I do. But if that’s the case, Asian kids will still be fine under my preference – tons will still be going to this school and other great schools. And this school will be have a more diverse student body, as it should. If this bill passes I suspect that eventually almost all the asians kids will decide go elsewhere. The benefit that tjhsst provides will be lost and it will no longer attract the best students. I think that all things being equal, diversity is a good thing but racial balancing should not be a primary motivating factor in all policy decisions. I would be much less opposed to a set aside for kids that qualify for free or reduced lunch or that go to title 1 schools. Applying the same standard that others seem to be applying here in determining whether tjhsst is actually a good school (whether they make their students better)… if black and hispanic students in a school district cannot compete academically isn’t that a failure of the school district? Haven’t they failed to improve the academic level of their black and hispanic students? And now they cover it up by pushing out asian kids to make room for their failures. What makes you think I don’t have black or hispanic friends and family? We can play that game but the merit of your arguments are not measured by who your friends are. And yes, you are correct. I am not as bothered by the discrimination in this as I am by the stuyvesant situation. The alternative to tjhsst is most likely still a very good local high school, this is mostly middle class kids being denied extra enrichment. If this law passes, I suspect the desire to attend will diminish to the point where this will be a very local magnet school. Noone from Loudon or Centreville will be putting their kids on a bus to the other side of the county to attend a school with such relaxed standards. I suspect many of the 8th graders at Longfellow and Cooper will opt to attend McLean and Langley rather than try out for tjhsst. I suspect that the kids at Rocky Run Middle School will just go to Centreville rather than take the long trip to tjhsst. The school will be significantly more diverse but noone will want to attend anymore and it will effectively be a selective charter school in alexandria. > [@Dewey\_Finn](#): > > Obviously the teachers come from the same (very large) pool of licensed teachers but my guess is the magnet schools (Stuyvesant and Bronx High School of Science, for example) are _very_ selective in which teachers they hire. Not really, the teachers are not hand-picked by principals. Half the vacancies at stuy are filled based purely on seniority (union contract), there is a selection bias in that the really crappy teachers don’t usually apply for the vacancies but there are several very bad teachers at the school, teachers that do not know the material they are teaching nearly as well as their students. The primary distinguishing factor between the faculty at stuy and other nyc public schools is that they have to be accredited to teach an AP class or one of the advanced electives but they are no better than the AP teachers at any other high school. In nyc, the primary benefit of going to stuy or bronx science (as opposed to a suburban kid going to tjhsst) is that you get to go to school where studious kids feel welcome and comfortable. There is no bullying going on and there isn’t a jock culture. You are going to school with 200 other kids who are all ap students and all taking advanced electives like biochem. > [@Chronos](#): > > Well, that’s great news, then, because it means that it’ll be really easy to make more schools like this. Take all the highly-motivated students that are applying there, pick out a number of schools that that number of students would fill, and send them all to schools full of motivated peer groups. Supply exactly matches demand. And if that was the plan, that would be a reasonable approach. But that is not the approach, they continue to use AP programs and IB programs at local high schools to achieve this differentiation. DC achieves the sort of thing youa re talking about with their charter schools. The students at charter schools are picked randomly but they all come from motivated families and are for the most part above average students and they achieve significantly better results as a consequence of this self selection. Their main objective is to remove this embarrassing racial disparity by whatever means necessary. Schools like tjhsst are reminders of the limits of public education and the actual disparities in academic achievement that exist along racial lines. > [@Fretful\_Porpentine](#): > > Also, Fairfax County needs to get a humanities magnet school. I would have rocked THAT application process if it had existed. My impression is that the other governor’s schools are much more ELA and humanities focused. > [@Johnny\_Bravo](#): > > The students who attend them would be high-performing at any school that offers advanced courses. What the schools do instead is to remove access to the best teachers and facilities from students who aren’t good enough to “deserve them.” The competition at schools like tjhsst does not exist at the local high schools. > [@Johnny\_Bravo](#): > > If Mr. Bravo is a star teacher, he should be teaching at a school where a broader group of kids will get a chance to learn from him. I don’t know how teachers are assigned to tjhsst, i do know how they are assigned to stuyvesant. If Mr. Bravo wanted to teach at stuyvesant, he would apply and for half the openings, he would be selected based purely on seniroty and for the other half of openings he would be selected based on being the senior most teacher accredited to teach ap courses. So I think you can set aside your concerns about these schools monopolizing all the good teachers. > [@Johnny\_Bravo](#): > > And yes, it must be very nice to have a school comprised of families willing and able to spend money on their kids. It makes for great extracurriculars when you have strong boosters and fundraisers. But when you’re concentrating those families in one school, it means less support for extracurriculars in other schools, which again limits opportunities. This may be the case at tjhsst but it certainly is not the case at stuyvesant. I don’t know how resources are distributed in fcps but I suspect that they are subject to the exact same funding formula as any other school in the fcps system. Stuyvesant received less money per student because we didn’t have very many special needs students or students that couldn’t speak english, etc. but we were subject to the same formula. Tjhsst is slightly different because they have richer students and a small endowment fund. But you shouldn’t fookl yourself into thinking that these resources would be evenly distributed. One of the biggest criticisms of tjhsst is that an overwhelming majority of the admits are from about 6 schools, that is where these parents will be returning to. > [@Ruken](#): > > That does require there being enough space to do it. And it’s not clear that’s what’s happening in Fairfax. Fcps schools for the most part offer ap and honors classes. I am not familiar with all the fcps schools but annandale high school which is one of the lower ranked schools has an IB program and ap classes. > [@Cheesesteak](#): > > It is a falsehood that scarce resources must be fought over. There is a difference between scarcity and selectivity. > [@Cheesesteak](#): > > Do we pit those students against each other in academic competition to decide who “earned” their place, or have a lottery system? Selectivity almost requires competition. > [@RitterSport](#): > > at least they won’t have to pay to get test training and tutoring to get into the magnet high school. We’ve debunked “test prep” as a significant source of disparity in admissions. This is simply a way for people to pretend that actual differences in academic ability developed over a lifetime are really the result of a 6 week prep course. > [@RitterSport](#): > > And it’s a small price to pay to slight equalized the opportunities for those motivated students who weren’t born to wealthy, highly educated parents, with the time to find tutors, etc., for their kids. I take it you’re from nyc. This “price” you talk about is being paid almost entirely by a politically weak minority group. They are also the minority group with the highest poverty rate in nyc. Stuy is about half free reduced lunch kids (if stuy was in staten island, it would be a title 1 school). Asian students at stuy are more likey to be on free or reduced lunch than the avarege stuy student. These are not students born into wealth. > [@Ruken](#): > > If OP would like us to take the “should magnet schools even exist” discussion elsewhere, just holler. This is fine. The underlying push for a lot of this stuff is an anitpathy towards magnet schools, tracking, etc. > [@Kearsen1](#): > > Seems to me if you have double the amount of qualified students eligible to be enrolled, that simply creating a second school would benefit everyone. Without changing the admission criteria, you would end up with similar demographics. If your measure of fairness is based on melanin content, then you need to adjust the criteria. Past attempts at this by changing the admissions process to include more holistic considerations just made the school richer, dumber and whiter. Attempts at other schools to have set asides for poor kids replaced middle class asian kids with poor asian kids (which seemed like a good thing to me) and a modest increase in urm students. ---
**Author:** ![Hari\_Seldon](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/hari_seldon/32/5173_2.png) [@Hari\_Seldon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hari_Seldon)\ **Post date:** [October 7, 2020, 4:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/selective-magnet-school-in-virginia-moving-towards-a-lottery-system/922347/44 "2020-10-07T16:13:44Z")
I started HS exactly 70 years ago and my experience at a selective HS was so different that it is perhaps not relevant. First, anyone who wanted to go could just choose it. Most didn’t for various reasons, but basically because it was seen as–and was–more demanding. When I was in 8th grade someone who had gone for one year and then dropped out, spent a half hour trying to convince me not to go. For one thing, it took an hour to get to. Bus to the el, el to the subway, subway to the (then) end of the line and walk three blocks. But his main argument was that in 9th grade we would have to read Silas Marner. (We didn’t, but Ivanhoe is scarcely an improvement.) I don’t know if there is any special selection of the teachers, but I suspect that the best–and most demanding–teachers were the ones that put in for transfer. Anyway, my real point is that if there is so much demand for this school, they should just open another one. And make it clear that you will work harder. When I got to college, one of my classmates there remarked at how much harder college was than HS. I didn’t find it so at all. Draw what conclusion you will from that fact. ---
**Author:** ![iiandyiiii](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/iiandyiiii/32/7924_2.png) [@iiandyiiii](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/iiandyiiii)\ **Post date:** [October 7, 2020, 4:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/selective-magnet-school-in-virginia-moving-towards-a-lottery-system/922347/45 "2020-10-07T16:19:47Z")
> [@damuriajashi](#): > > No, that is not the purpose. The purpose is to gather the best students so that they could learn at an accelerated pace, and with the new standard, some significant minority of students will barely be grade level. I’m unconvinced this will be the case. > [@](#): > > Wait, didn’t you say that tjhsst was a virtually brown free zone? I meant Hispanic and black. Apologies. > [@](#): > > That is a stupid way to measure things. Even the proponents of the bill are concerned with the absolute number of black and hispanic students at the school. They’re also concerned with percentages. If you can come up with a fair and equitable way to increase enrollment for black and Hispanic kids without raising it for white kids, I’m all ears. > [@](#): > > And how do you justify removing a bunch of asians to make room for more white kids? This doesn’t need to remove any kids at all. Just start it with the next class year to enter the school. > [@](#): > > Applying the same standard that others seem to be applying here in determining whether tjhsst is actually a good school (whether they make their students better)… if black and hispanic students in a school district cannot compete academically isn’t that a failure of the school district? Haven’t they failed to improve the academic level of their black and hispanic students? And now they cover it up by pushing out asian kids to make room for their failures. Or maybe it’s the fault of our broader racist and biased culture and society, which doesn’t give black and Hispanic (and probably Native American too) students the same level of opportunities that other students have. Considering all the data and statistics, I find that far more likely than some sort of inferiority, cultural or otherwise, in black and Hispanic kids. > [@](#): > > What makes you think I don’t have black or hispanic friends and family? We can play that game but the merit of your arguments are not measured by who your friends are. I’m guessing. If I guess wrong, I apologize. I’m just assuming someone with a lot of close friends and family who are black or Hispanic would be upset by a top-notch school in a very diverse area like NoVA that had almost zero black and Hispanic students. I find that unacceptable. If you don’t, why is this okay? ---
**Author:** ![RitterSport](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/rittersport/32/6326_2.png) [@RitterSport](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RitterSport)\ **Post date:** [October 7, 2020, 4:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/selective-magnet-school-in-virginia-moving-towards-a-lottery-system/922347/46 "2020-10-07T16:35:28Z")
> [@damuriajashi](#): > > I take it you’re from nyc. This “price” you talk about is being paid almost entirely by a politically weak minority group. They are also the minority group with the highest poverty rate in nyc. > Stuy is about half free reduced lunch kids (if stuy was in staten island, it would be a title 1 school). Asian students at stuy are more likey to be on free or reduced lunch than the avarege stuy student. > These are not students born into wealth. I thought we were talking about the Virginia school. Are you hijacking your own thread again? Anyway, yes, I’m from NYC. I live in NJ now and the high school my kids went to is extremely highly rated and many students go to top notch colleges – I think Vassar was where they 50th percentile went or something. And yet, there’s no entrance exam – it’s our neighborhood school and they take everyone who lives in the township. Lots of very smart, very motivated kids all doing just fine, and lots of kids with learning disabilities and other issues, who get extra help, etc. We don’t have the poverty and non-English speaking issues that some Virginia school systems have (my sister’s kids are in a northern Virginia school system, and I know of the issues her kids’ high school faces). However, my kids’ school seems to show that even a school that takes all comers can be very competitive. Certainly a local school that only took kids with 3.5 GPAs would also do just very well, even if some of those 3.5s would be 3.3s at a tougher middle school. The combination of a high GPA and the motivation to apply to the magnet school and travel to get there would be a pretty good filter for intelligent, motivated kids, even if they got in by lottery. So, I disagree that taking qualified kids by lottery will have a negative affect on the school, and the additional diversity may have a positive effect on the student body in general. I know you’ve said you’re for equality of opportunity – don’t you think this is a small step in that direction? ---
**Author:** ![Cheesesteak](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/cheesesteak/32/3694_2.png) [@Cheesesteak](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cheesesteak)\ **Post date:** [October 7, 2020, 5:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/selective-magnet-school-in-virginia-moving-towards-a-lottery-system/922347/47 "2020-10-07T17:06:11Z")
> [@damuriajashi](#): > > Would you find it less despicab le if i said, nationally ranked high school. That was my intent. No, it’s basically the same. I find the idea of ranking schools inherently distasteful. I’ll get to the reasons shortly. > [@damuriajashi](#): > > Yes, that is absolutely the purpose. Gather all the best students in one place so they can learn at an accelerated pace among a peer group that will push them forward faster. It is the gathering of the best students that makes those students better. I don’t believe that the desirability of the school is tied to the extra Calculus chapters they expect to cover in a school year. It’s tied to the exclusivity of the school, the external signaling that Student X is better than Student Y because TJHHST is on X’s application. The students aren’t “better” because of something special happening within the school walls, they’re “better” because they were chosen to be in a special caste of students. Ranking schools increases these divisions, but doesn’t teach children more. ---
**Author:** ![MandaJo](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/ac91a4/32.png) [@MandaJo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MandaJo)\ **Post date:** [October 7, 2020, 5:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/selective-magnet-school-in-virginia-moving-towards-a-lottery-system/922347/48 "2020-10-07T17:13:02Z")
> [@Cheesesteak](#): > > I don’t believe that the desirability of the school is tied to the extra Calculus chapters they expect to cover in a school year. It’s tied to the exclusivity of the school, the external signaling that Student X is better than Student Y because TJHHST is on X’s application. > > The students aren’t “better” because of something special happening within the school walls, they’re “better” because they were chosen to be in a special caste of students. Ranking schools increases these divisions, but doesn’t teach children more. That’s just objectively not true. The curriculum we offer is completely different than a comprehensive HS. You think they learn nothing in three years of AP Physics? In two years of CS? Our kids are in math or computer science classes for 4 out of the 8 classes a day they take Freshman year. Of course they come out of that knows a lot more math than they would otherwise–just as the kids at the Arts school, who draw 4 hours a day, come out more accomplished artists, and the kids who play football 4 hours a day come out better at football. ---
**Author:** ![TriPolar](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/tripolar/32/3008_2.png) [@TriPolar](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TriPolar)\ **Post date:** [October 7, 2020, 5:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/selective-magnet-school-in-virginia-moving-towards-a-lottery-system/922347/49 "2020-10-07T17:40:57Z")
> [@Hari\_Seldon](#): > > I started HS exactly 70 years ago… Did Socrates assign a lot of homework? 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![doreen](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/858c86/32.png) [@doreen](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/doreen)\ **Post date:** [October 7, 2020, 5:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/selective-magnet-school-in-virginia-moving-towards-a-lottery-system/922347/50 "2020-10-07T17:52:04Z")
I don’t think Cheesesteak is talking about the education, exactly. He’s talking about the desirability of the school, which may or may have anything to do with the education itself… Imagine if you will, a different high school. One that has enough good students to be able to offer freshman 4 hours of math or computer science a day , and three years of AP physics etc . But in addition to those good students , there are also not-so-good students- and even bad students. That school is not going to be as desirable as the exclusive school. Not because the quality of the education is worse for the good students- but because all the other students dragged the schools average down. And those schools ( or something similar) exist. I went to a HS that was terrible on paper- yet my peers and I got a good education there in our honors and AP classes. We got college scholarships and a number of us found college easier than HS. It may have been only 30 of us in a class than had 1100 when we were in 10th grade- but the other 1070 did not affect my education one bit. ---
**Author:** ![damuriajashi](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/ac8455/32.png) [@damuriajashi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/damuriajashi)\ **Post date:** [October 7, 2020, 5:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/selective-magnet-school-in-virginia-moving-towards-a-lottery-system/922347/51 "2020-10-07T17:54:25Z")
> [@iiandyiiii](#): > > They’re also concerned with percentages. If you can come up with a fair and equitable way to increase enrollment for black and Hispanic kids without raising it for white kids, I’m all ears. They are not at all concerned with percentage increases, they are concerned with overall percentages. The overall percentage of whites increase at the expense of asians. How do you justify this? At least you seem to be recognizing that this is not a fair and equitable way to increase black/hispanic admissions. We will call that progress. Now, if we could only get you to recognize that discrimination against asians is unacceptable. If you want to increase black/hispanic admissions then have a set aside for kids on free-reduced lunch. Or have set asides for kids coming from title 1 schools. This would shift the burden of your social engineering from asian kids to white kids. But that is probably why it would never have the political traction that this bill has. > [@iiandyiiii](#): > > This doesn’t need to remove any kids at all. Just start it with the next class year to enter the school. The studies done by FCPS specifically point out that asian admissions will shrink and black/hispanic/white admissions will increase. How do you justify rejecting more accomplished asians to make room for less accomplished white kids? > [@iiandyiiii](#): > > Or maybe it’s the fault of our broader racist and biased culture and society, which doesn’t give black and Hispanic (and probably Native American too) students the same level of opportunities that other students have. Considering all the data and statistics, I find that far more likely than some sort of inferiority, cultural or otherwise, in black and Hispanic kids. Considering how dominant asian kids are in this arena, your reasoning would imply that society is actually favoring asian kids over white kids, by a lot. Why would the powers that be in virginia do this? > [@iiandyiiii](#): > > I’m guessing. If I guess wrong, I apologize. I’m just assuming someone with a lot of close friends and family who are black or Hispanic would be upset by a top-notch school in a very diverse area like NoVA that had almost zero black and Hispanic students. I find that unacceptable. If you don’t, why is this okay? Why would someone with lots of close black and hispanic friends and family be upset that the most selective school in virginia has a low black/hispanic population? Academics are not the only measure of a person’s worth. I don’t like the racial imbalance but I do not believe that a disparity in results equal racism absent some actual evidence of racism. What brand of racism is causing the underrepresentation of hispanic students while at the same time causing overrepresentation of asian students? ---
**Author:** ![Chingon](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chingon/32/17645_2.png) [@Chingon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chingon)\ **Post date:** [October 7, 2020, 5:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/selective-magnet-school-in-virginia-moving-towards-a-lottery-system/922347/52 "2020-10-07T17:59:34Z")
> [@damuriajashi](#): > > What brand of racism is causing the underrepresentation of hispanic students while at the same time causing overrepresentation of asian students? The racism that says Latino students are dumb and lazy, while Asian students are smart and work hard. ---
**Author:** ![RitterSport](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/rittersport/32/6326_2.png) [@RitterSport](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RitterSport)\ **Post date:** [October 7, 2020, 6:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/selective-magnet-school-in-virginia-moving-towards-a-lottery-system/922347/53 "2020-10-07T18:07:10Z")
> [@damuriajashi](#): > > Now, if we could only get you to recognize that discrimination against asians is unacceptable. I don’t understand how the lottery system discriminates against Asians. Can you spell it out? ---
**Author:** ![TriPolar](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/tripolar/32/3008_2.png) [@TriPolar](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TriPolar)\ **Post date:** [October 7, 2020, 6:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/selective-magnet-school-in-virginia-moving-towards-a-lottery-system/922347/54 "2020-10-07T18:21:01Z")
A lot of this issue is not clear to me, but it does smell like a back door approach to quotas. That may be some of the reasoning to say that high performing students will do well in other schools anyway, but it is does have the look of manipulating the system to get a desired result. I don’t know how the predictions of a new distribution made in the OP were arrived at. Would a random selection of less than 500 students tend to match the population at large for those demographics? Anyway, I do see the problem of setting up a system of acceptance originally based on some system of merit and then changing the standard to achieve a different mix of people that are accepted. The problem with the random system assuming just one possible specialized school is that it diminishes the highest levels of merit. Why should the highest ranking student in reasonably fair measures of merit risk being excluded from the best school to suit such a person? ---
**Author:** ![RitterSport](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/rittersport/32/6326_2.png) [@RitterSport](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RitterSport)\ **Post date:** [October 7, 2020, 6:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/selective-magnet-school-in-virginia-moving-towards-a-lottery-system/922347/55 "2020-10-07T18:35:13Z")
Once you get to very high levels of achievement, it can be difficult to really differentiate between the students anyway. Who are the top 20 rock bands of all time? Sure, you can tell Led Zeppelin from, say, The Knack, but at the top levels, the differences are smaller. Just because it was originally set up a certain way doesn’t mean it can’t be changed to achieve other goals, right? I don’t see how this leads to quotas of it’s a random drawing. ---
**Author:** ![MandaJo](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/ac91a4/32.png) [@MandaJo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MandaJo)\ **Post date:** [October 7, 2020, 6:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/selective-magnet-school-in-virginia-moving-towards-a-lottery-system/922347/56 "2020-10-07T18:42:01Z")
My school started explicitly as a desegregation magnet, as part of a court order. For decades, we had explicit racial quotas. When that order was finally lifted, this is the system we adopted: - Assign each students a score. It includes middle school grades and standardized test scores, but the bulk is our in-house assessments. - Set a minimum standard for qualified. - Top 30% of slots are awarded to the highest scoring applicants, regardless of address. - After that, we reserve a certain number of seats for students who would otherwise have gone to each HS (a feeder pattern), in proportion to that High School’s size. This ensures that even if the kids who come from a certain area of town have lower scores, as long as they qualify, they have a chance to get in. Within a set of seats, we award them based on score–so if 15 kids from a feeder pattern have qualifying scores, but the feeder pattern only has 5 slots, the top 5 get in—even if they some of the “nos” have higher scores than kids who got in from a different feeder patterns. - After all the designated slots are awarded, there are usually still slots–some feeders don’t fill their slots. Then we put everyone left in a big pile and take from the top. - If we place ALL the in district kids, we can admit out of district kids. Children of employees first, then based on scores. Overall, it works pretty well. That top 30% ensures that the kids who are so advanced they will really be underserved in a traditional HS get in; the feeder pattern system ensures that kids from all over the city have a chance and we continue to represent the whole city. ---
**Author:** ![damuriajashi](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/ac8455/32.png) [@damuriajashi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/damuriajashi)\ **Post date:** [October 7, 2020, 6:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/selective-magnet-school-in-virginia-moving-towards-a-lottery-system/922347/57 "2020-10-07T18:47:14Z")
> [@RitterSport](#): > > I thought we were talking about the Virginia school. Are you hijacking your own thread again? I think the conversation about the national trend towards dumbing down academic competition is relevant to this thread. if you would prefer a more pure discussion about tjhsst, please feel free to start another thread.; > [@RitterSport](#): > > However, my kids’ school seems to show that even a school that takes all comers can be very competitive. I’m gonna guess it’s just a typical well funded suburban nj high school and not one of the many magnet schools in nj. The high schools in fairfax county are mostly the same. There is a huge difference between the student body at our local high school and the student body at tjhsst. It’s not even close. > [@RitterSport](#): > > So, I disagree that taking qualified kids by lottery will have a negative affect on the school, and the additional diversity may have a positive effect on the student body in general. The kids getting 3.5 at longfellow middle school are (on average) much more prepared than the kids getting 3.5 at poe middle school. This is largely a function of differences in parental income. All things being equal, I am in favor of diversity. But I don’t think there is enough benefit to diversity for diversity’s sake to merit significant preferences. What I think you are looking for is actual parity in results and being unable to get that, you are willing to settle for the appearance of actual parity in results through racial balancing. That superficial change comes at a price. A price to asian kids that are denied opportunities they have earned. A price to qualified urm kids who are now lumped in with all the other diversity admits. > [@RitterSport](#): > > I know you’ve said you’re for equality of opportunity – don’t you think this is a small step in that direction? I don’t think there is a right or wrong racial mix “direction”. I happen to believe in merit. If merit is not equally achieved across racial lines then we can investigate why there is a disparity in academic achievement (and fix anything that might be wrong) but unless all else is close to being equal, I am generally not in favor of diversity for diversity’s sake. I think this sort of thing is easier to swallow in an affluent suburb (where 30% of county the kids are on free or reduced lunch but only 2% of the kids at tjhsst are on free or reduced lunch), but i would much prefer to see income diversity, I suspect it would go a long way towards achieving more racial diversity but at the expense of privileged white and asian kids (whose local higyh school is likely to be Langley or McLean) instead of the poor asian kids that barely make the cut because they can’t afford all the fancy shit that helps more affluent kids get in through the tjhsst holistic admission process. I believe in the power of education to help bright poor kids break into the middle class. I was a poor kid at stuy and most of my friends were poor (I think there was 1 kid I knew at stuy whose parents were wealthy). I would not be opposed to more opportunities for all bright poor kids of whatever race. Build more schools for them, invest in them, they will more than make up for it in the extra taxes they will pay over their lifetimes. > [@Cheesesteak](#): > > The students aren’t “better” because of something special happening within the school walls, they’re “better” because they were chosen to be in a special caste of students. Ranking schools increases these divisions, but doesn’t teach children more. I think a lot of it depends on whether you think that having a more competitive peer group pushes you to work harder and do better. I think it does. I think really smart kids can coast through some high schools without really being challenged by their peers. > [@doreen](#): > > But in addition to those good students , there are also not-so-good students- and even bad students. That school is not going to be as desirable as the exclusive school. Not because the quality of the education is worse for the good students- but because all the other students dragged the schools average down. > [@doreen](#): > > And those schools ( or something similar) exist. I went to a HS that was terrible on paper- yet my peers and I got a good education there in our honors and AP classes. We got college scholarships and a number of us found college easier than HS. It may have been only 30 of us in a class than had 1100 when we were in 10th grade- but the other 1070 did not affect my education one bit. That is pretty much every high school in the fcps system. What tjhsst offers is a competitive environment with a much wider selection of advanced classes and a huge pool of kids interested in the same sort of interests and extracurricular activities as you. ---
**Author:** ![damuriajashi](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/ac8455/32.png) [@damuriajashi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/damuriajashi)\ **Post date:** [October 7, 2020, 6:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/selective-magnet-school-in-virginia-moving-towards-a-lottery-system/922347/58 "2020-10-07T18:49:35Z")
> [@RitterSport](#): > > I don’t understand how the lottery system discriminates against Asians. Can you spell it out? The point of this bill is to elevate the population of every other race at the expense of asians. ---
**Author:** ![damuriajashi](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/ac8455/32.png) [@damuriajashi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/damuriajashi)\ **Post date:** [October 7, 2020, 6:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/selective-magnet-school-in-virginia-moving-towards-a-lottery-system/922347/59 "2020-10-07T18:53:58Z")
> [@TriPolar](#): > > I don’t know how the predictions of a new distribution made in the OP were arrived at. Would a random selection of less than 500 students tend to match the population at large for those demographics? “While the current Thomas Jefferson freshman class is 73 percent Asian, 18 percent white and 5 percent or less other races, FCPS officials estimate the “Merit Lottery” system would alter those percentages to more equitably represent Fairfax County, resulting in a student body that is 54 percent Asian, 25 percent white, 8 percent Hispanic, 7 percent Black and 6 percent two or more races.” > **[Loudoun School Board criticizes proposed Thomas Jefferson admissions changes](https://www.loudountimes.com/news/loudoun-school-board-criticizes-proposed-thomas-jefferson-admissions-changes/article_1f1bc11a-0192-11eb-b584-6338e995292c.html)** > > On behalf of the Loudoun County School Board, Chairwoman Brenda Sheridan (Sterling District) penned a letter Saturday to the Fairfax County School Board expressing concern with potential changes to the > [@MandaJo](#): > > Overall, it works pretty well. That top 30% ensures that the kids who are so advanced they will really be underserved in a traditional HS get in; the feeder pattern system ensures that kids from all over the city have a chance and we continue to represent the whole city. This seems better than a lottery. Where is this? ---
**Author:** ![RitterSport](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/rittersport/32/6326_2.png) [@RitterSport](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RitterSport)\ **Post date:** [October 7, 2020, 6:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/selective-magnet-school-in-virginia-moving-towards-a-lottery-system/922347/60 "2020-10-07T18:58:12Z")
This is different from the kind of rules that accidentally/on purpose target minorities (the disparate impact). A random drawing of highly qualified candidates seems exceedingly fair to me. Randomness is not going to discriminate. Merit tests are pretty imperfect, so replacing those with a more fair random system that also happens to bring in more diversity and gives opportunities to smart kids who would otherwise not have that is a step in the right direction. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/selective-magnet-school-in-virginia-moving-towards-a-lottery-system/922347.md?page=2) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/selective-magnet-school-in-virginia-moving-towards-a-lottery-system/922347.md?page=4)