New York specialized high schools admit very few Black, Hispanic students

Just 3 Black students won seats in Stuyvesant High School’s incoming ninth-grade class of 777. Stuyvesant remains the most selective of New York City’s eight specialized public high schools. Black students received 3.5% of offers across the eight schools this year, while Hispanic students received 6.5%, little changed from the prior cycle’s 3% and 6.9%.

About 26,123 eighth-graders took the Specialized High School Admissions Test this year, and 4,023 received offers. Roughly 140 Black students received offers to any specialized high school, even though Black and Hispanic students together make up about two-thirds of New York City’s public-school students.

The test remains the sole admissions factor for the eight specialized schools, except for LaGuardia High School, which uses auditions instead. Supporters call the SHSAT a clear, objective measure. Critics say the exam rewards families that can buy years of preparation and reinforces inequalities that start in elementary and middle school, long before students ever sit for the test.

This year’s cycle was also the first to use a digital SHSAT, and an additional 200 students took the exam in the new format. The admissions process still uses one test and one ranking system for a small number of seats at schools such as Stuyvesant, Bronx High School of Science and Brooklyn Tech. In 2025, Stuyvesant admitted 8 Black students, down from 10 in 2024.

The city’s Discovery program offers one limited alternative for students who narrowly miss the cutoff. For the 2025-26 cycle, about 800 students who just missed the SHSAT threshold were invited to Discovery.

Zohran Mamdani, a Bronx Science alum, said during his campaign that he would not eliminate the SHSAT, even though he had previously favored abolishing it. His administration said it would review the latest results and consider an independent analysis of the exam for gender and racial bias.