“Purposefully Unequal” By Concealing Merit

First, it was one high school in Virginia. Students at Thomas Jefferson High School for Science and Technology, already subject to controversy for its plan to end competitive admission  in favor of “holistic” admissions, given that the majority of its students were Asian, which meant they weren’t black. But at the time, there was another issue brewing that had yet to become known, that the principal concealed from students and parents the awarding of merit scholarship recognition.

While Fairfax County Public Schools Superintendent Michelle Reid claims the principal at Thomas Jefferson High School for Science and Technology withheld National Merit awards from students in a “one-time human error,” parents at two local high schools got a Friday and Saturday night surprise.

As it turned out, it wasn’t just one rogue woke principal who decided to deny students their merit awards, but three high schools. So much for “one-time human error.” What could have possibly caused high school principals, whom one would ordinarily expect to take comfort in the accomplishments their school attained for their students, to make the affirmative decision not only to fail to bask in the reflected glory of their charges, but to conceal from the students and their parents as they applied to college that they won a merit commendation?

However, for parents in the school district these examples of merit withheld from students raises serious concerns, particularly amid news that the FCPS superintendent signed a contract of about nine months, paying a controversial contractor, Mutiu Fagbayi, and his company Performance Fact Inc., based in Oakland, Calif., $455,000 for “equity” training that includes a controversial “Equity-centered Strategic Plan” with this goal: “equal outcomes for every student, without exception.”

“The equity imperative is to give each student what they need to meet equal outcomes. The goal is not equitable outcomes,” Fagbayi said early last year, promoting an identical strategy at a meeting with officials in Princeton Public Schools. A video recording of the April 26, 2022, meeting is posted on YouTube.

Not to go full Harrison Bergeron, but the notion that “equal outcomes for every student, without exception,” is beyond idiotic. Some students are taller and some are shorter, making their potential to play in the NBA different. The same is true with intelligence, or a facility in math or science or English. And some just aren’t very intelligent, no matter how well they’re taught. That’s the nature of human beings. It may not be what people choose to believe, but it remains reality. Except to equity consultants and, apparently, high school principals.

“The goal is equal outcomes,” Fagbayi explained. “And what we need to be equitable about is the access. In a very real sense, many districts struggle with this. To have true equity, you have to be purposefully unequal when it comes to resources. I want to say that again because most districts struggle with that. To have an equity-centered organization, we have to have the courage and the willingness to be purposefully unequal when it comes to opportunities and access,”

And what about the parents whose children were denied their merit commendations as they applied for admission to colleges without knowledge that the principal of their child’s school, following the admonition of Fagbayi to engage in intentionally destructive (and what, in the good old days, would have been flagrantly unlawful) discrimination against some to indulge an impossible fantasy for others? Were they cool with the sacrifice of their own children’s future for the sake of woke delusions?

For some local parents, the notion of being “purposefully unequal” is not only unethical and immoral but also potentially illegal.

There has been a war waged against the concept of merit as a legitimate distinguishing factor. Part of this war involves the eradication of “correct” answers, such as the 2+2= whatever effort to make math anti-racist. Another part involves the “privilege” of students with caring parents who help them to learn and instill the value of education.

Then there’s the parents’ financial ability to provide tutors or prep courses for standardized tests, such as the PSAT from which National Merit Scholars are chosen. More to the point, the challenge to merit is that it denies the influence of luck, something undeserved by any individual, in accomplishment.

At the same time, it denies the fact that these students received these awards, like other students across the nation, and were denied the ability to include and use them to gain admission to competitive colleges.

This, however, overlooks the fact that college admissions officers have already made life-changing decisions – including rejections –  based on incomplete information from students, missing this important award. According to a survey of opportunities available, the National Merit Commended Student recognition opens the door to millions of dollars in college scholarships, including a four-year scholarship at Liberty University, and 800 Special Scholarships from corporate sponsors. The deadlines for many of those scholarships have already passed.

Perhaps by concealing merit commendations from students who won them, students who didn’t wouldn’t feel badly about their own failure to achieve the recognition. The principals provide no explanation for their shocking concealment of the awards, suggesting that it was some accidental oversight, some big “oopsie” that somehow fell through the cracks for which they are “deeply sorry.”

Does Principal Greer “remain resolutely committed” or should she be? Helping students who are not reaching their “unique and fullest potential” is certainly a worthy objective, but when it comes at the cost of depriving students of their merit commendations, it’s unacceptable and deliberately damaging. What it was not is a “mistake.”

10 thoughts on ““Purposefully Unequal” By Concealing Merit

  1. B. McLeod

    At least in the long ago decades, the PSAT was used to select the semi-finalists, who then sat for the SAT to compete in the final selection process. Also in those days, students would receive correspondence directly from the National Merit Scholarship Corporation, and sometimes solicitations from colleges and universities (all of whom knew who made the list). A local principal could refuse to acknowledge their scholars, but had no real ability to conceal who had received the designation. If that is different today, it was a mistake to let it happen.

  2. RCJP

    The only surprising thing is that any one is surprised. Destroying the concept of excellence has always been the desired end-state. Diversity is the only excellence that matters, but only because it eliminates excellence as a construct.

    All brought to you by graduates of our most excellent universities.

  3. Kacie

    “Human error” is throwing the wrong switch on the train tracks, pressing the delete key at exactly the wrong time, or burning down the house because you left the iron on. It’s not acting on your misguided impulses. But trying to recast their deliberate omission as some kind of honest mistake is all they have.

    My son went to TJ several years ago and had a great high school experience there, but even then the school was on the road to trashing the admissions policies that made it a top high school. By following the misguided reasoning of the Ivies, like de-emphasizing standardized test scores, over the long term they will destroy themselves in a wash of mediocrity.

  4. Greg

    There are only 2 types of students.
    Those that can do the work and those who can’t.
    There are of course subgroups.
    The 2 largest are those who try and those who don’t.
    The only way to have equal outcomes is to drag everyone down to the level of those that can’t do the work and won’t even try.

    1. Hal

      There are only two kinds of students, those who can draw reasonable inferences/ conclusions from incomplete data.

  5. j a higginbotham

    The accession of such principals suggests that outcome is no longer based on applicants’ abilities. And a tummy rub for not being sidetracked into mentioning that the first act of these principals was to equalize compensation for all school employees.

  6. Redditlaw

    Does anyone here have any confidence that someone from the wrong side of the tracks, who happens to be white or Asian, and therefore privileged, would be identified and promoted based upon his test scores in grade school onto a advanced/honors track in Fairfax County?

    Better yet, does anyone here have any confidence that anything resembling an advanced/honors track still formally exists in Fairfax County?

  7. Mr. Ed

    “Equal outcome” is an insult to those youth who work hard and achieve a goal, despite the odds against them. It doesn’t matter if it is sports or academic.

    I have known some fine public teachers. But I have known far more that I wouldn’t trust to walk a dog.

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