Thank you for sharing this story. This is sad beyond words. Thank you also, for validating a decision that my wife and I made when my son was in 6th grade. He was attending a racially mixed middle school on the upper west side of Manhattan. The school is selective, but not elite, in terms of NYC public schools. My son was the highest-performing student in the school (by a lot--he'd gotten a slow start in life and came roaring back by the time he was a teenager).

The school told us that he'd been selected to participate in a program in which minority students from the city were granted full scholarships to an elite boarding school.

My wife and I are not poor by any means (I work at Google and she is a clinical nurse director at a major NYC medical institution). But we don't run in those circles. And we knew that this offer was wrong and condescending and that it would ultimately be harmful to our child to be exposed to the cruelty of that world.

We already knew we'd made the right choice when our son excelled throughout middle school and gained admittance at one of NYC's elite specialized schools before going on to the honors program at the University of Delaware (where he's on the dean's list and getting straight As).

Thank you for this absolute confirmation that we made the right choice. I'm sorry that you and your friend had to pay such an awful price for your wisdom.