Professor Phil Lee will publish his article “Asian Americans and Selective Public High School Admissions: Deconstructing the Wedge” in the Asian American Law Journal at Berkeley Law. Here is the abstract:

Recent legal challenges to changes in admissions processes in New York City (NYC) and Fairfax County, Virginia are illustrative of the ways in which the history of racialized educational exclusion has been downplayed or completely ignored by some judges and decision makers. This history is relevant because it shapes how judicial decisionmakers construct the legal frameworks that govern challenges to educational access. The NYC and Fairfax County cases also highlight the ways in which standardized testing has been an impediment to educational inclusion for certain minority groups. Finally, they illustrate how Asian Americans have historically been used as a wedge between other minoritized groups and White people in the discussion of who gets to attend the selective schools.

In this Article, I aim to analyze the legal history of educational exclusion, make historical connections between Asian Americans and other people of color, and argue how a lack of understanding of these commonalities allows Asian Americans to be pitted against others as a wedge minority that justifies the racial status quo. My purpose is to demonstrate that the fight for educational access in this country has not been about combating racial classification in and of itself, but about pushing back against White supremacy and anti-Blackness.

This Article proceeds as follows. Part I summarizes the issues and the evolution of litigation concerning changes to admissions policies at selective public high schools in NYC and Fairfax County, Virginia. Part II explains the historical context of racial exclusion and inclusion in public schools. Part III argues for a contextual analysis, based on this history, of equal protection principles in school desegregation efforts. Part IV highlights the inadequacy of relying on standardized testing for admission into selective high schools. Finally, Part V explains how Asian Americans continue to be used in this debate as a wedge between White people and so-called “problem” minorities and calls for resistance against this divide-and-conquer strategy.