Affirmative Action is partially responsible for my sister’s death…

When we were in third grade, back in the 80s, my sister and I both took a “gifted placement exam”, for the chance to be put into special, accelerated classes. She scored just one point below me. I got into the classes, and she did not. I found out later that her scores were actually better than some other students who got in to the class, but they had racial quotas to meet, so some black students were accepted despite their lower scores.

Specifically, 8 of the 30 students who were selected were black. Only two of them were still in the program by the time we graduated high school. All but one of the white students made it to graduation with us.

But anyway, from that point on, I was in “accelerated” classes, and my sister was in regular classes. I was surrounded by highly motivated students, and we were all respectful to the teachers, and the teachers did a great job as a result. My sister, just one hallway away, was surrounded by delinquents who disturbed the class and ruined her education from that point on.

By the time we got to high school, my classmates were filling out college applications, while her friends from her class were offering her drugs. She got addicted, got pregnant, and dropped out of high school. I got accepted to Duke, went there, and now have a very successful career, and a beautiful family.

After a 20-year struggle with drugs, she finally overdosed on morphine two years ago.

I know she’s responsible for her own actions. But still, a part of me feels like things would have been very different for her if she were in the gifted class with me. And the only reason she wasn’t was to make room for lower-scoring blacks.