New York City's elite public high schools are not a hotbed of racial and ethnic diversity.

There are nine "specialized public high schools" in New York City for either the "academically or artistically gifted" student. Eight of those schools require an admissions test. One, LaGuardia High School, which is more arts-based, requires an audition.

According to a report, those nine public high schools have appallingly horrible rates of racial diversity representing the city of which they are a part.

Of the eight schools that require testing, students identifying as African-American or black made up 3% of accepted students. Those identifying as Latino or Hispanic made up just 5%. When you consider New York City is made up of 70% of people identifying from those racial and ethnic backgrounds, this would seem like a tiny, slight imbalance.

At lower Manhattan’s Stuyvesant High School, considered the city's best public high school, nine African-American/black students were accepted for the next academic year, compared to 178 white students and 682 Asian students.

Time to pause. Those numbers might have blended in a paragraph for you, but this is important. Here it is again.

9 African-American/black students
178 white students
682 Asian students

...all accepted into next year's class at a public school.

If you're not sure whether grimacing, scowling, or awkwardly sighing is the right reaction to such a statistic, all three at once is acceptable!

Until you learn that Stuyvesant High School is a downright racial utopia. Why? At Staten Island Technical High School, another of the testing eight, not a single African-American/black student was accepted. Not one. Zero. Nada. Zilch.

0.

This is New York City we're talking about, not Salt Lake City.

This is a city where over 27,000 students took the specialized admissions test, a test with almost a 20% acceptance rate, better than most Ivy League and "second tier" colleges--and, this can't be noted enough, is still a public institution representing the city these schools exist within--a city that is 70% black or Latino. This is a city where the link to the city's specialized schooling website shows photos of six students on the page and four of the six appear to be either black or Latino. It's bad when stock website photography for a specialized school is more accepting than the actual specialized public school.

It's not just a New York City issue. It happens in every major city at their own "specialized" high schools. Chicago, Los Angeles, Boston, Washington, D.C., Philadelphia, and so on. Despite the obvious statistics, the moral outrage (hey!), nothing will be done to solve this. Politicians and school administrators and colleges and universities will pay wonderful lip service to say a change needs to be done. Studies will be commissioned. A movement will begin.

And the cameras and microphones will be put away. And there's another story to cover. And we forget. And we move on.

And, still, barely a single black or Latino kid will be admitted to an elite public school in the city of New York.