Many discussions of equal opportunity focus on equal opportunity for education. This focus is even more emphasized in policy discussions of equal opportunity. Yet, what is the purpose of this kind of equal opportunity?
There are two generic reasons why something is good: it is either intrinsically good or instrumentally good. The first kind of good is simply good in and of itself. The second kind of good is only good because it does in fact lead to the first kind of good.
Lack of opportunity is a huge source of economic and social dissatisfaction. Income and wealth inequality aren’t pleasant, and many people want some redistribution, but most seem to accept that luck, drive and natural advantages inevitably create some degree of inequality. But when people feel like they don’t have a chance to move up in the world even if they try hard and do all the right things, that’s when they break out the rakes and pitchforks and storm the castle.
IN A complaint filed last week, the NAACP Legal Defense Fund charged that the admissions procedures of Stuyvesant High School and other specialised high schools in New York City are “unsound and discriminatory” because the Specialized High School Admissions Test (SHSAT)—the sole factor in admissions—has yielded striking racial imbalances in the schools’ student bodies. They are asking the federal department of education to investigate:
Year after year, thousands of academically talented African-American and Latino students who take the test are denied admission to the Specialized High Schools at rates far higher than those for other racial groups… For example, of the 967 eighth-grade students offered admission to Stuyvesant for the 2012-13 school year, just 19 (2%) of the students were African American and 32 (3.