Act Daily News
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The Fairfax County Public Schools superintendent denied any “division-wide effort to withhold recognition,” as a number of faculties in her district in Virginia are below investigation for allegedly failing to offer college students their National Merit Scholarship recognition in a well timed method, earlier than many college students submitted faculty functions.
Dr. Michelle Reid informed Act Daily News in an unique interview that the delay in notification was the results of not having a “division-wide protocol” in place for alerting college students about National Merit Scholarship recognition.
“When we make a mistake or there’s an error, we need to name it, apologize for it, own it, and then do everything we can to make it right. And that’s what we did immediately,” she stated.
State Attorney General Jason Miyares launched an investigation on January 4 towards Thomas Jefferson High School for Science and Technology for illegal discrimination, increasing the investigation 5 days later to incorporate the whole Fairfax County Public Schools system after receiving experiences that different faculties withheld recognition.
The National Merit Scholarship program is an “academic competition for recognition and college undergraduate scholarships,” its web site says. Students ought to have been notified in September as to whether or not they obtained commendations, based on the web site.
Some 34,000 of the highest 50,000 college students nationwide obtain commendations recognizing their accomplishments however that means they didn’t attain the semi-finalist degree and are out of the competitors for National Merit Scholarships, based on this system.
Of the 459 seniors at Thomas Jefferson High School, 393 have been both counseled or semi-finalists, based on the Fairfax County Public Schools system.
Independent faculty counselors informed Act Daily News that such recognition would probably not tip an admissions resolution from a prime tier faculty, however every faculty handles such awards in a different way.
Riti Liu, a senior at Thomas Jefferson High School, informed Act Daily News that none of her mates have talked about it “being something that they wish they had.”
Ranoj Ranjan, a mother or father of a Thomas Jefferson High School pupil, known as the state of affairs “not a very big thing” and posited it wasn’t finished “for a malicious reason.”
Nicole Oden, whose 17-year-old was counseled, added: “My son got noticed a little bit late. It did not impact his applications.”
Still, Virginia Republican Gov. Glenn Youngkin claimed these revelations have been a results of the “maniacal focus on equal outcomes for all students at all costs” and he has pushed for laws that will require Virginia faculties to tell college students and their mother and father about National Merit Scholarships and different awards.
“This overarching effort for equal outcomes is hurting Virginia’s children and their future. The failure of numerous Fairfax County schools to inform students of their national merit awards could serve as a Virginia human rights violation. As the attorney general follows through on my request to investigate the matter, we will get to the bottom of this,” the governor’s workplace stated in a earlier assertion offered to Act Daily News.
Reid, nonetheless, maintained Tuesday that “equal outcomes is the opportunity for each and every student to achieve their unique potential.”
The faculty district, she stated, will “stay relentlessly focused on the achievement of each and every one of our students.”