A Different Kind of Elite
I never thought about whether my high school was elite until I started looking this semester at what that designation actually means. In the past I never would have entertained that thought as I went to a public school in a not so great neighborhood in the Bronx. It was almost a point of pride that I didn’t go to the ritzy private schools on a hill in Riverdale or on the upper east side of Manhattan. I felt as though being a part of the largest public school system in the U.S. made me more down to earth and relatable. However, after exploring what it means for a school to be elite I may have to reevaluate what my high school experience actually provided me.
Exhibit A
I chose to apply to the High School of American Studies at Lehman College (HSAS) as my family and I thought that it was a great under the radar opportunity. It was much smaller (360 students total) than the other schools I was looking at, the teachers were the most enthusiastic that I had ever seen, and it really felt like a place I could call home for 4 years. In terms of admission, entrance was based solely on the results of the Specialized High School Admissions Test. In high school I never thought of this as a way to screen for elite “clientele” as the student body was pretty diverse and came from very different socio-economic backgrounds. Looking back now it is pretty clear that was due to the fact that the school was fairly new (I was part of the 10th graduating class) and was not well known by name by the Manhattan upper class. I spoke to one of my old teachers over the summer and apparently diversity is waning every year. The fact that I was in a test prep course and had a tutor I saw once a week was normal in my eyes as that was what all of my white friends from my upper west side neighborhood were doing.
Once I got into HSAS I thought I was having a normal high school experience. However, it is only now that I realize how lucky I truly was.
From learning chemistry in a modern science lab to having access to a college athletic center, I had resources most students could only dream of. HSAS offered college classes as electives and had more after-school clubs and athletic teams than high schools 5x our size. We even traveled to historical sites in Massachusetts, Washington D.C., Manhattan (duh), and my personal favorite, Hyde Park, courtesy of the Gilder-Lehrman Institute of American History. Additionally, we had amazing guidance counselors who started working on our college plans in sophomore year. The year I graduated we had students accepted to some of the best colleges and universities in the country (I mean sheesh, we had 3 kids go to Princeton out of a class of 88).
As I continue to research how elite schools differ from a normal educational experience it is becoming more and more apparent that I belong to this “exclusive” community. No, HSAS doesn’t have a pristine 20 acre campus and no I didn’t have to pay a crazy amount of money for tuition, but there is more to being elite than that. My school prepared its students for a successful future in academics, there is no denying that, but they also truly cared about cultivating individuals to be good people as well. Though community service wasn’t mandatory, I can’t think of anyone of my peers who didn’t have at least 50-100 service hours my senior year.
This research project has definitely opened my eyes as to how fortunate I was with my educational experience and how easy it is to not recognize privilege when you are the one experiencing it. Don’t get me wrong though, I do still love the look I get from others at Colby when I tell them I went to public school in the Bronx.
