Semi-elite

NYC has an elite school program. While mostly high school, one takes kids in the sixth grade. The top nine schools have greater than 90% college acceptance rate, one school has an average SAT combined score of  2200, one school is made up of greater than 50% native-Chinese speakers.

But there is a new plan to diversify these elite public high schools. And the plan is drawing fire from the minority group that has come to dominate the schools in recent years: Asian-Americans. Fewer than 10 percent of students who score well enough to gain admission to the schools are black or Latino, despite the fact that those two groups make up two-thirds of the city's 1 million public school students. "It's not fair. It's not inclusive. It's not open to all," de Blasio said. Such a change might mean many things to the good mayor but it also means "less elite."

"It's not fair. It's not inclusive. It's not open to all." This is a blind spot for many. "Elite" schools cater to elite students. So, indeed, they are not "open to all," they test for, and are open only to, elite students. You simply can not have an elite school that is  made up of the elite that is open to all--unless you want to change the meaning of words or are simply insincere. This blind spot makes discussion virtually impossible because it eliminates commonly held definitions and logic. Modifying words modify. The addition of "elite" to the word "school" modifies the word "school," defines it in a new and different way, like "horse" redefines "race" or "green" redefines "car."

Unless de Blasio wants "elite school" to mean something else like a school run for all in an elite way that everyone can go to. But if that is the case and you know how to run schools in an elite way, why not run all schools that way? And if that new meaning of "elite schools" is what you really meant, why do you hold competitive exams?

Posturing will always occur in voting communities but this is dangerously close to unreality as "fairness" and "inclusion" have become trump cards over both meaning and logic.