A Cautionary Tale on Education Choices

When it comes to educating your kids, going all out on progressive ideals can backfire.

Nikole Hannah-Jones, the journalist from the New York Times known for her work on “The 1619 Project,” faced a challenging lesson regarding this concept. In a detailed article for the New York Times Magazine, she shares her experience of enrolling her daughter, Najya, in underperforming public schools in Brooklyn. Hannah-Jones believed that families like hers should put their integrationist values into practice, rather than simply opting for more advantageous educational environments.

It turns out, this experiment was far from successful for Najya. Hannah-Jones describes a range of problems: subpar teaching, ungraded assignments, minimal homework, chaotic classrooms, and significant gaps in essential math skills. Although they sought external tutoring and intervened consistently, the academic shortcomings piled up.

By the time Najya reached eighth grade, she expressed a desire to pick her own high school. Ultimately, she chose a demanding, predominantly white and Asian school but found herself struggling initially, lacking the preparation of her peers. Thanks to tutoring and support from her new instructors, she managed to catch up.

Her assessment of her educational journey was strikingly candid: “Sometimes I wish instead of always thinking about other kids, you would have thought about me. I never really got the education I wanted.” This prompted an apology from Hannah-Jones, who admitted, “I feel like you got cheated.” She reflected that, in hindsight, “I had not chosen her.”

While she acknowledges her missteps as a parent, Hannah-Jones clings to a broader critique of the education system that influenced her decisions.

Her essay continues to portray factors like segregation and school choice as key reasons behind the struggles of schools like the one Najya attended. She concludes with the assertion that it’s impossible to find absolution while affluent families rescue their children from failing institutions, leaving vulnerable black students behind.

However, her narrative highlights a more fundamental issue: Adding high-achieving students to a school doesn’t inherently improve its quality. High-performing families tend to gravitate toward schools that can demonstrate effective teaching, maintain discipline, and uphold high standards while holding both students and staff accountable.

Financial constraints also don’t fully explain the outcomes. New York City’s public schools boast a substantial budget, with over $45 billion allocated for the 2026 fiscal year—indicating that they are not lacking resources.

The more challenging question relates to the competence of school management.

In my experience teaching high school English, poorly managed schools often struggle significantly. Administrators avoid addressing disruptive behavior, teachers might lower standards to keep everyone progressing, grades often lose meaning, and, instead of addressing poor outcomes, there’s a tendency to keep shifting blame. This environment can lead to burnout among quality teachers while diligent students learn to fly under the radar, simply getting passed through the system.

Hannah-Jones’ reporting addresses many of these glaring issues, yet she doesn’t entirely connect the dots. Complaints from Najya about lack of homework, misleading grades, and the noisy classroom environment didn’t seem to land with Unison Principal Emily Paige, who fell back on the idea that these were just the realities of a segregated system, impacted not just by race and class, but also by students’ abilities. This, she suggested, was a natural result of the school-choice system.

This perspective is telling. If the challenges of the school can only be resolved by bringing in more capable students, the solution shifts the focus from the adults tasked with educating those already present.

Paige did mention something crucial to Hannah-Jones: “It is important to not, in our pursuit of being antiracist, lower expectations. Because this is what happens, right? It’s racism under the guise of antiracism.”

This is a more precise takeaway from Hannah-Jones’ story, albeit an uncomfortable one.

Freddie deBoer offers an almost opposing view. In response to Hannah-Jones’ essay, he suggests that long-term academic outcomes depend less on school quality and more on prior performance and intrinsic abilities.

But Hannah-Jones’ own narrative challenges that notion. Najya began high school with noticeable deficiencies in math, yet intensive tutoring and direct teacher support helped her achieve mostly A’s and B’s by semester’s end, even passing state exams. Regardless of what we may think about the general impact of schooling, targeted instruction made a visible difference for her.

Consider Mississippi—which, since imposing its Literacy-Based Promotion Act in 2013, has seen a rise in reading scores for fourth-graders. Four years later, Mississippi boasts significant improvements in literacy, not simply due to increased funding or changing demographics, but through effective measures like early screenings, training teachers, and setting clear promotion standards.

The takeaway here isn’t terribly complex. Schools that demand compliance, maintain competent teaching, provide meaningful evaluations, and hold high expectations offer a better learning environment. In contrast, schools that excuse chaos and mask failures with inflated grades won’t see their students thrive.

Hannah-Jones does deserve credit for being open about her experience. But that transparency should prompt deeper reflection.

If a student can secure high grades without mastering algebra, if parents must employ tutors to address years of unaddressed learning, and if a principal’s first line of defense is a lack of capable peers, then the issue isn’t that too many families made a choice. The real problem lies in the systemic failure to adequately serve the children already in attendance.