A middle school in northern Virginia is under fire for offering a college preparation course to only non-white and “economically disadvantaged” students. The state is now threatening to sue. 

The state attorney general, Jason Miyares, said Friday that the school must cancel the college prep course or face legal action. “It’s shocking that we continue to find such blatant examples of racial and ethnic discrimination in the Fairfax County Public School System,” Mr. Miyares said. “Every student should be able to apply for the College Partnership Program and have the same opportunities as their peers, regardless of race.”

“If the middle school fails to comply,” the attorney general will “ultimately file a lawsuit against the school under the Virginia Human Rights Act,” he added. The human rights act bars discrimination in employment and education on the basis of race, color, sex, religion, national origin, and disability. 

The attorney general’s office said it received a copy of an email sent out to parents at Cooper Middle School to offer college preparatory courses to students who are “either Black or African American, Hispanic, still learning English, or potentially the first in their family to attend college.”

In a statement to Fox 5, the Fairfield County school system called the attorney general’s assessment of the situation “wholly inaccurate” and said it received no communication from Mr. Miyares’s office that this would be made public. 

“Publishing false narratives like this undermines public school efforts to boost U.S. educational achievement,” the statement said. 

Mr. Miyares’s office is also investigating another Fairfax County school for racial discrimination. Thomas Jefferson Middle School — a prestigious science, technology, engineering, and math school — is being investigated by the Office of Civil Rights for allegedly decreasing the number of Asian-American students in the name of equity and inclusion. 

In 2020, the school abolished its admissions exams, removed the application fee, and instituted a “holistic” review process that now takes into account students’ economic background and race. 

“Racism and race-based government decision-making in any form is wrong and unlawful under Virginia’s Human Rights Act,” Mr. Miyares said when announcing the investigation in January. 

“The controversial admissions policies at” Thomas Jefferson Middle School, Mr. Miyares added, “which have significantly decreased the amount of Asian American students enrolled in recent years, is another example of students being treated differently because of their ethnicity.”