by Kerry Dougherty
Imagine for a moment that you’re a top student in a highly competitive science and technology high school.
In your junior year you take the PSATs and enter the prestigious National Merit Scholarship Program competing against the elite students in high schools from coast to coast. Imagine that in mid-October of your senior year your school principal is notified that you are a “Commended Student” in that competition, meaning that out of roughly 1.5 million entrants, you scored in the top 3%.
Applications for early decision to the most selective colleges and universities close on October 31 and this sort of distinction could be the difference between an acceptance or a rejection.
Now imagine that your school sat on your award and didn’t bother informing you that you are a Commended Student until mid-November, when it was too late to add that to your resume.
Oh, and instead of announcing your name over the school’s public address system or holding a ceremony to honor you, your teacher simply slapped your certificate on your desk.
You see, school administrators in your high school are apparently more concerned with “equity” and equal outcomes for all kids than in singling out high achievers.
Sucks to be you.
This really happened. At Fairfax County’s Thomas Jefferson High School for Science and Technology, perhaps the most prestigious public high school in the country.
The National Review reports that a story that ran in the New York Post and City Journal documents a series of events that resulted in students not being notified of their Commended Student status until November 14th of this year.
Leaders of Virginia’s Thomas Jefferson High School for Science and Technology waited for about a month to distribute certificates to National Merit commended students and semi-finalists, past the October 31 deadline for students to note the awards on their applications for early acceptance to select colleges, according to a report in City Journal and the New York Post…
The report by journalist and activist Asra Nomani links the delay of National Merit awards to Thomas Jefferson high’s equity efforts, and its new “equal outcomes for every student, without exception” strategy. Most of the students who had their award notification delayed were Asian, Nomani reported…
Nomani also released a series of redacted emails from concerned parents to Thomas Jefferson high administrators, which reveal growing frustration over Fairfax County’s school policies.
Unsurprisingly, TJ parents are livid. Turns out some students in recent years claim they were never informed of their honors.
One parent, Shawna Yashar, whose son was notified of his National Merit commendation on Nov. 14th, characterized the careless behavior of TJ administrators as “theft by the state.”
The author of the news story, Nomani, claims her own son graduated from Jefferson in 2021 and only learned of his status recently.
If that is true, heads should roll.
Stay tuned. I smell lawsuits.
This column was first published in Kerry: Unemployed and Unedited and is republished with permission.
