Years after parents and advocates argued that an initiative by New York City officials violated the Equal Protection Clause, a federal judge dismissed the lawsuit Wednesday. According to NBC News, Judge Edgardo Ramos denied the request from two Asian civil rights groups, a parent-teacher organization, and Asian American parents to stop a diversity initiative that has been instituted in New York City’s most selective high schools since 2018.
The Southern District of New York judge dismissed the lawsuit, which accused city leaders of “gerrymandering” the city’s high school admissions process. Plaintiffs said the process discriminated against Asian Americans by increasing enrollment of disadvantaged students. According to Ramos, the policy could not have been discriminatory because more students of Asian descent had been offered admission under the measure, not fewer.
The dispute began four years ago when former New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio and former New York City Department of Education Chancellor Richard Carranza developed the initiative to increase the representation of Black and Latino students in eight prestigious schools. When announcing the initiative, the mayor’s office noted that while Black and Latino students made up nearly 70% of all students in New York City, only 10% of students enrolled in the selective schools were Black or Latino.
To address this issue, they expanded the city’s Discovery program, mandated by a 1997 state law, that aimed to increase the number of low-income students in the city’s most selective high schools.
Ramos noted that prior to the expansion, the “highly prestigious” schools in question only admitted students through a high-stakes test or Discovery program.
Expanding the city program allowed for more slots at the school to be available, increasing the Discovery program by 5% to 20% in each school's incoming class.
In addition to adjusting the eligibility criteria to specifically recruit from lower-income schools, the two recommended doing away with the Specialized High School Admissions Test. According to NBC News, this plan failed.
While many applauded the former mayor and former department of education chancellor for the expansion, several Asian American parent groups argued in December 2018 that the initiative violated the Equal Protection Clause. Because a majority of the low-income students who qualify for the Discovery are Black or Hispanic, Asian American parents felt it was unfair that a fifth of the seats available to incoming students was being set aside, claiming it was preventing their children from competing for them.
The court Wednesday denied the parents’ attempt to stop the initiative, and the decision came for the second time, Bloomberg Law reported. According to Ramos, while Asian American parents argued it prevented their children from having equal access, data from 2019 and 2020 showed that the number of Asian American students at selective high schools increased after the changes had taken effect.
“This decision is a victory for diversity and equal opportunity in education for the city’s multi-racial, multi-ethnic student body,” Rachel Kleinman, senior counsel at the Legal Defense Fund represented a group of intervening defendants, said in an email to NBC News.