“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 that 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 “oopes” 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.”