Brooklyn School's Racial Quota Is Under Fire

The Department of Education is asking a federal judge to lift a racial quota at a Brooklyn magnet school that has been in place for more than 30 years.

At issue is an order from a federal judge in 1974 requiring around 60% of the students at the Mark Twain Intermediate School to be white. The order was intended to prevent the school from segregating further, at a time when many white students were leaving the Coney Island school. The order still stands.

A court brief filed by the Department of Education says that for decades Mark Twain has been "an outstanding, competetive school" with a racially mixed environment, and calls for the court order should be withdrawn.

Last year an East Indian girl, Nikita Rau, was denied admission despite higher test scores because of the quota. Her situation drew widespread attention.

The brief leans on a decision issued last June by the U.S. Supreme Court that struck down racial quotas in school systems in Kentucky and Washington.

The same federal judge who ordered the quotas into effect, Jack Weinstein of U.S. District Court in Brooklyn, will decide whether to lift the quotas now.