Officials are putting more definition on possible new tweaks to the admissions policy for the city’s highly coveted public exam schools. A report presented at the Boston School Committee meeting on Tuesday night unveiled a mixed bag of results from the changes made in 2020 and since revised.
The changes were aimed at making the demographics of the three schools— Boston Latin School, Boston Latin Academy, and the John D. O’Bryant School of Mathematics and Science— more “representative” of the school-age population of the city. Other goals were to increase the size of the applicant pool while maintaining academic rigor.
The mandated review comes as Mayor Wu, BPS Superintendent Mary Skipper, and an appointed task force weigh potential changes to the process, which critics say has made it more difficult for students from specific neighborhoods to win admission and created “tension” through a points system that includes bonuses to select students based on socioeconomic factors, such as residency in public housing.
The original admission policy has already withstood serious legal challenges from parents and advocates who have said it was unfairly weighted against Asian and white students. Last December, the US Supreme Court decided against reviewing a lawsuit filed by a coalition of plaintiffs who argued that zip codes were used as a “proxy for race” in determining the pool of admitted students.
Elements in the latest report shared on Tuesday allude to those concerns, but also note that the policy has already been altered several times since its original iteration in 2021-22.
“Some students and families are not applying to the exam schools at all because of a perception— real or not— that there is little chance of receiving an invitation for students attending certain schools or living in certain neighborhoods,” the report’s executive summary explains. The number of non-BPS applicants, the report notes, has declined by 16 percent since the 2021-2022 school year.
This week’s presentation to the School Committee included “data simulations” of three “potential future changes” that include changing the school-based point system” and “the way socioeconomic tiers are sized.” Also floated is “adding a citywide round for highly-qualified students.”
The three “policy options,” the report says, are outlined in for the committee and the public to consider, but without specific recommendations from BPS leadership that are expected later this year, according to the report, which states:
“In Fall 2025, the Superintendent will make a final recommendation to the School Committee for a vote. Any changes would go into effect for the admissions cycle to admit students for the SY26-27.”
On Tuesday, Mayor Wu said she and Skipper have not finalized any specific recommendations for the next school year. She noted that the “simulations” are meant to feed discussions that will lead to such changes.
“The main takeaways,” she said, “are that the admissions policy has been very successful in advancing toward the goals laid out by the city back in 2020 around making sure that the exam schools are rigorous and more representative of the racial, geographic, and socioeconomic diversity of the city.
“The big picture is we need a high-quality student experience for every single family that meets their needs. This is about ensuring that the exam schools are also a place where families understand what the options are and how the policy has been implemented over the last few years.”
She added: “There’s been this persistent and lingering concern that students can feel penalized by where their parents have chosen to live and where they go to school.
“And that’s been one side effect of how the particular pieces of the policy were implemented [and] there are some suggestions for what could happen if we tweak it.”
The report reiterates earlier BPS findings that the overall student body across the three exam schools has become more representative of the school-aged population of Boston since 2020. It notes that “the proportion of Asian students has decreased modestly, the proportion of Black and Latinx students has increased, and the proportion of white students has decreased.”
Past analysis has also shown geographic shifts over the last half-decade, with a decrease in the share of students from West Roxbury, Jamaica Plain, Back Bay, and Beacon Hill.
In that same timeframe, more invitations have gone to students from East Boston and parts of Dorchester west of Dorchester Avenue and Geneva Avenue, as well as adjacent areas in Mattapan and around Grove Hall, according to a December presentation to the School Committee.
In recent years, tiers with higher incomes have had larger applicant pools and lower acceptance rates, with a requirement for extremely high composite scores that some parents blamed for discouraging applicants. Instead, they suggested having admissions determined more by the size of the applicant pool.
A simulation of possible new options showed that tiers with applicant pools of equal size and admission rates would increase the number of white applicants by five percentage points, while decreasing Black applicants by as many four points.
Between 2020-21 and 2022-23, exam school invitations for Black students increased from 13 to 24 percent, while decreasing for white students, from 40 to 25 percent. For the year 2025-26, invitations for Black students entering the 7th grade declined to 15 percent, while increasing for whites to 32 percent.
“Applicant-based tiers would likely increase representation from neighborhoods with more applicants, making it less geographically representative,” the review cautioned. Since tiers would be determined by the numbers of applications in a given year, according to the review, the option “could create operational challenges, could be confusing to some applicants, and could delay invitations.”
Other new options included a 20 percent set-aside at each school or citywide for students with the highest composite scores—based on grades, test scores, and points related to housing.
Since the new policy was adopted, scores on the standardized MCAS test have declined for newer exam students, especially at Boston Latin Academy and the John D. O’Bryant School of Math and Science.
The review also drew attention to what happens after admission. “Our work to increase access to exam schools must go beyond admission policies alone,” said officials, “and requires more time to develop a broader, longer-term structure of supports, staffing, and facilities changes (at both the district and school levels) to accompany any change in policy.”
Reporter correspondent Chris Lovett contributed to this report.
