... The main concern is equity of access and none of the cases have been about the DoE requiring a school to remove tracking or honor classes. ...
I wasn't reacting to the Chester Finn article but to parts of the DOE press release, such as this snippet:
"As part of the agreement, which the district agreed to enter prior to any OCR compliance determinations, the district committed to take specific actions to ensure that it is providing an equal opportunity and equal access for black students to participate in its college and career preparatory programs, in particular its advanced courses and enrichment programs, IB program, AP courses, honors courses, and dual enrollment courses."
While the words sound fine at face value, those of you who work in highly regulated fields immediately understand that the best thing for the school district to do is to lower the standards for the AP courses. The regulators have already presumed guilt, and they will be happy if the percentage of minority students increase, and they will be highly unhappy if the school district comes back with a "we reviewed our procedures and decided they are fine and non-discriminatory as they are."
