The Battle to Keep SHSAT Continues!
The PEP will vote on Dec. 18th on whether to approve the SHSAT exam for entrance into the specialized high schools. What you need to know…
Approximately 30,000 8th graders take the Specialized High Schools Admissions Test (SHSAT) every year. If you can’t afford to pay for a private high school, this is your only chance to get access to a rigorous and prestigious high school in NYC. Stuyvesant HS has a student body of 50% low-income students. However, this is all in jeopardy if the Panel for Educational Policy (NYC’s School Board) does not approve the contract to implement the test.
You can help by:
Sign the PLACE petition to keep the SHSAT
Submit a comment to PEP members asking them to approve the SHSAT contract
PLACE is Fighting for Merit and Admissions
The co-presidents of PLACE, Yiatin Chu and Lisa Marks, wrote an op-ed laying out all the crucial facts on the SHSAT and why parents should be alarmed by the PEP’s delay in approving this contract, and how this is the same playbook used back in 2021 when anti-merit activists used COVID as an excuse to eliminate the admissions test for G&T schools.
Lisa Marks was a Teacher of the Year in NYC, and you can read her profile here:
Wai Wah also wrote about the SHSAT on City Journal, and it is worth reading!
“New York Stands out as a Disproportionately High-Spending State”
Governor Hochul commissioned the Rockefeller Institute of Government to review the “Foundation Aid” formula - which is the formula to decide how NY spends its education funds.
The 314-page report states that we spend too much money and makes recommendations on how to improve the formula. Ken Girardin wrote an important op-ed with the key takeaways from the report. I testified during the hearings that what we need is universal school choice in NY, you can watch here.
What’s Next…
We need more NY families to be informed and demand better education for our kids. We are the #1 state on education spending, but our kids are getting mediocre results.
Please share this newsletter with your friends and families.
Contact me if you want to help bring universal education choice to NY! #SchoolChoiceNY
