A new policy in the Fort Bend Independent School District (FBISD) has sparked outrage among some parents and students, particularly at predominantly Black schools.
The policy, voted on in 2019, went into effect this year and allows students who have never attended a particular campus to be ranked according to the school they are zoned to based on their home address. That means if a student chooses to attend one of the district’s nine programs of choice at the high school level, their class rank will be calculated by comparing them to students that attend the campus they are zoned to attend rather than comparing them to students at the school or program where they actually take classes.
How can you be #1 at a school you never attended?
In 2019, then-Superintendent Charles Dupre and trustees said they needed to find a more equitable way to rank high school students at campuses that had school-choice programs. Texas universities offer automatic admission to students who graduate in the top 10% of their class. Since school choice programs/academies (similar to magnet programs) were introduced in the district, Dupre said academy students were the majority of top 10% grads at these schools, leaving other students out.
To address the discrepancies, the board at the time decided to base high schoolers’ class rankings on how they perform relative to their peers at their zoned school, even if they never set foot on their home campus. Those students are considered “dual enrolled.” At the time, parents and community members expressed concern that come 2024, the policy would hit Black schools the hardest, especially since many grants, scholarships and automatic college placements use rankings in their decisions.
“Charles Dupre didn’t see it as an issue then. And now that 2024 is here, he is gone and our students are left to deal with the very issue we told them would be a problem,” said parent Asha Martin.
Black, Brown students affected
The new policy means that students who attend predominantly Black schools, like Thurgood Marshall and Willowridge, are finding their rankings lowered because of the change. In fact, four of FBISD’s eleven valedictorians actually attend Dulles High School, and two took the number one spot at Willowridge and Marshall (two of the three predominantly Black schools in the district).
“The real Valedictorian at Marshall High School, who is Black, and attended the school, was already heartbroken to find she had been pushed to number two. Then, she found out she was actually number 48 at Elkins, based on the new policy. That’s a big difference, from the scholarships and merits that she would’ve gotten, to the honor it was for her family. Not to mention how she has sacrificed and worked so very hard for four years at Marshall,” said Stephanie Brown, community activist/advocate and PTO President at Thurgood Marshall. “The #3 position at Marshall has been taken by a student who spent all four years at Ridgepoint.”
The district has not yet released its complete list of Valedictorians and Salutatorians for 2024, but several schools have posted congratulatory messages to the students. Parents say they have no issues with non-Black students who actually attend the schools taking the top honors, but it’s disheartening when that student has never set foot on campus.
“These kids never walk the halls of a school for four years and can come back and claim Valedictorian at a school where kids have worked hard for four years,” said Brown, who is also the founder of the Marshall Advocacy Focus Group, which represents Marshall High School and its feeder pattern.
Brown’s sentiments echo the frustration felt by many parents and students as they highlight the disparity in the schools, noting that students from schools with more resources, such as Dulles High School, have an unfair advantage due to access to weighted courses like AP and dual credit programs, as well as specialized academies.
“I’m not going to say that our kids are not smart enough to get the top position. We just don’t have the same opportunities as far as course selections,” Brown said. “The curriculum is not the same. They don’t have the same weighted classes to offer at these schools, and it’s just not the same race that they are running in to be able to come back and take that away from the kids who have worked so hard at their community schools. There is no way a Marshall student can compete with that inequity. These are two separate races.”
FBISD Racial Breakdown
27.8% Black
14.6% White
26.9% Asian or Asian/Pacific Islander
26.5% Hispanic/Latino
0.4% American Indian or Alaska Native
0.1% Native Hawaiian or other Pacific Islander.
The policy change has broader implications beyond graduation honors. It affects students’ rankings, including the top 10% with automatic admissions to colleges and universities, scholarships, and more.
“My heart goes out to all the students and families this policy has affected,” said Brown. “It will affect all students’ rankings.”
Gaming the system
School board officials, who would not speak on the record, say the current board, under the direction of president Judy Dae, has reversed the 2019 policy, but the reversal won’t go into effect until 2028. Dae was a vocal opponent of the 2019 policy. Parents question why the policy can’t be changed immediately but board members say they have to allow time for the students who were subject to the 2019 change to graduate.
One board member says the biggest issue now is that parents are taking advantage of the 2019 policy. The original decision was an effort to balance the scales in the district and has now become problematic because people have found a way to cheat the system.
“You have parents buying a home in these neighborhoods, some not even living in them, but using the address so their child can be zoned to a lower-performing school. Then they send their child over to one of the ‘better’ schools, reaping the ranking benefits without ever having to deal with the day-to-day inadequacies at their zoned school. Meanwhile, our children don’t have that luxury, they navigate their campuses with pride….only to be knocked down by this policy,” said Martin.
Parents moving into districts to give their children an upper hand is nothing new. But in the past, those students still had to attend the school. Now, not only do the Valedictorians get to choose what school they want to graduate with (which will most likely be with the kids they know), but they get to just “take the ranking without any obligation,” Martin added.
Beyond graduation
As the community grapples with the fallout from this policy change, questions linger about fairness, equity, and the impact on future graduating classes.
“I realize that this is not the fault of the students who are Valedictorians and I take nothing away from their academic success, however, they should be ranked at the school their parents chose for them to attend for four years, not where they claim to be zoned. This loophole is going to definitely change the end results for students all over the district,” Brown said.
The ranking policy has now been changed under the current board, but the change will not go into effect until 2028. As of now, the 2019 changes will apply to the next three graduating classes due to the former administration’s recommendation that there be no change to class ranking for students who had already made high school decisions (meaning current 8th graders who had already chosen academies, chosen classes, etc.) before the policy was changed.
Meanwhile, the district has made no plans to change the policy and responded to our request for a comment with a statement reconfirming the district’s policy, “Currently, class rank for high school students is established based on the campus where a student is zoned,” they said.
