NEW YORK – Justin Hudson has become somewhat of a heroic figure at Hunter College High School—a New York City public school founded in 1869 for intellectually gifted students.
This past June, Hudson, 18, used his graduation speech to challenge the high school’s admission procedures, which he says puts too much stock on a single, teacher-written exam for admission into the selective school that caters to students in grades 7-12.
Only elementary school students in New York City who score in the top 10 percent on the state English and math exams are invited by Hunter to take the admissions exam. In the past, individual elementary schools were chiefly responsible for getting the word out about when the exam would be administered.
That’s how Hudson, a native of Queens, found out about the school. His elementary school guidance counselor encouraged him to apply after Hudson performed well on the exam administered to him in the fifth grade.
But many faculty and students at Hunter, including Hudson, have long expressed frustration at the school’s admissions process, arguing that not enough outreach is done by school officials to encourage African-Americans and Latinos to apply for admission at the elite school that boasts a distinguished group of alumni, including U.S. Supreme Court Justice Elena Kagan and actress Ruby Dee.
“I feel guilt because I don’t deserve any of this and neither do any of you,” Hudson told his fellow classmates of 183 students at their graduation ceremony last June. “We received an outstanding education at no charge based solely on our performance on a test we took when we were 11-year-olds or 4-year-olds.”
Hudson’s speech, which called for a new and bold approach to recruiting and retaining a diverse student population, sent shockwaves across the school and the city and forced a discussion about diversity at Hunter College High School, which falls under the jurisdiction of Hunter College, a four-year institution that is part of City College of New York (CUNY)—one of the largest public university systems in the country.
