Thread by @DefendingEd

THREAD: One way we’re defending education is through litigation, and a week ago, before our public launch, we filed a motion to intervene in an important new education case in NYC. Here's what's happening: 1/

We’re intervening on behalf of a group of @DefendingEd members who are parents with kids at NYC’s gifted and talented (G&T) public schools. We can’t tell you more about our parents without compromising their anonymity, but they needed an advocate. 2/

G&T schools are renown for providing an elite private school level education to gifted kids, often low-income and/or immigrants, who don't have the same opportunities as wealthy smart kids. You’ve probably heard of them: Bronx Science, Stuyvesant, Brooklyn Tech, etc. 3/

You’d think woke activists, who claim they want more opportunities for disadvantaged kids, would embrace these schools. But G&T schools are in their crosshairs: they hate merit-based education & are trying to shut it down across the country because they claim it’s racist. 4/

Two weeks ago a coalition of radical legal activists filed a lawsuit against NY city & state govts demanding G&T entrance qualifications like grades and test scores be declared illegal – because the qualifications allow the admission of too many Asian and white students. 5/

The lawsuit received glowing coverage from the NYT's @elizashapiro, who hailed it as a historically important civil rights challenge to “segregated” NYC schools. 6/
nytimes.com/2021/03/09/nyr…

But the lawsuit demands the *opposite* of civil rights. It asks the court to upend Constitutional and other bedrock civil rights protections in favor of “antiracist” & “equity” dogma that demands not equality of opportunity but equality of racial results. 7/

Aside from the lawsuit’s attack on the basic concept of individual rights, it is also an attack on scholastic excellence. Why bother trying to improve poor-performing schools when you can simply accuse high achievers of racism? 8/

Here’s the truth about G&T schools – far from being “racist,” they are highly effective at giving elite opportunities to kids who otherwise would never get them. From our motion: 9/

More truth: the Asian students who are offered admission to G&T schools have the same poverty rate as black students and a higher poverty rate than Latino students: 10/

The lawsuit from the woke legal activists portrays Asian students as privileged, but this couldn’t be further from the truth: 11/

Finally, there are the Constitutional and civil rights violations that the woke activists are demanding the courts embrace: 12/

Our full motion is at this link. We will keep you updated on this effort. Meanwhile, please visit our website and sign up for email updates or become a @DefendingEd member to support this important work. /end
defendinged.org/lawsuits/paren…