For nearly two decades, the Independent School Entrance Examination, ISEE, has served as the deciding factor of students’ futures in Boston’s three public exam schools.
The ISEE exam was implemented by Boston Public Schools to determine which students are worthy of invitation to these prestigious schools. These schools ultimately provide students with superior resources, education and opportunity. The exam was originally created to measure students’ academic aptitude, so they could be placed in the appropriate environment to individually succeed.
However, the exam has actually been used to serve the district’s unfair agenda.
The company that created the ISEE exam accused Boston schools of misusing the test and urged the BPS to stop manipulating the results in a way that was differentially harming minority test takers. It was discovered that the test unfairly targets Black and Latino students.
On multiple accounts, the test makers have made certain requests that BPS repeatedly refused. They asked the district to stop combining the four measures of verbal reasoning, quantitative reasoning, mathematical achievement and reading comprehension into a single score. The district ignored this demand.
The company also reported being ignored when attempting to collaborate with district leaders, even when offering to fund the research to discover the most equitable and valid way to weigh ISEE scores.
After BPS was clearly warned to stop misusing the exam and refusing reforms, it was made obvious that equal opportunity was not a priority of BPS.
The ways in which Boston schools used the test perpetuated admission outcomes that disproportionately hurt minority groups. So, underrepresented children continued to be cycled through a system of white supremacy and financial segregation.
The Education Records Bureau officially decided to cut off BPS from accessing their tests due to eight years of an unjust misuse of the exam. The ISEE exam will no longer function as a method of robbing children of educational opportunities.
The Bureau made this decision after the most recent refusal from the district to reform their admission process and undergo a validity study. Yet, BPS kept silent about this. Later, the district claimed that it independently decided to stop using the ISEE because it was unfair.
BPS is now receiving backlash for hiding the racial implications from the public and attempting to cover up the real situation with the ISEE.
It is difficult to stomach the idea that BPS deliberately refused, on many accounts, to consider less discriminatory options to support children of color striving for access to elite schools and education. Having the opportunity to implement a fair process that considers children of all racial and financial backgrounds, BPS could have drastically changed the futures of some youth.
The U.S. Department of Justice and the U.S. Department of Education should take on the responsibility of investigating BPS and its efforts to isolate children in minority groups from exam schools.
The problem does not solely reside in the fact that BPS dismissed the test makers’ requests and perpetuated unfair admissions outcomes. Instead, it is that BPS hid from parents and the community that its implementation of the ISEE was deemed racially troublesome by the exam administrators themselves.
Parents throughout the district have threatened to sue BPS for discriminating against their children. Given that it was also Black History Month, the timing of this release is even more disheartening.
The ISEE exam scandal reveals Boston’s intentional attempt to exclude children of color from exam schools. Not only is this shameful and disappointing news, but it leaves the local community stuck in a place with little hope for the future of today’s youth and the education system.
