Romney's scholarship plan favors richer school districts
Suburban whites would largely be tuition winnersBy Anand Vaishnav and
Bill Dedman, Globe Staff and Globe Correspondent, 3/7/2004
A scholarship proposal that Governor Mitt Romney is touting to help working-class families would give the edge to richer school districts, a Globe analysis shows.
Romney's Adams Scholarship program, which he announced during his State of the State address in January, would award free public college tuition to the top quarter of MCAS scorers. Because the scholarship selection would rest solely on test scores and because wealthier students tend to score higher, the students most likely to qualify would need the help the least.
The districts with the largest share of winners under Romney's proposal are overwhelmingly affluent, suburban, and white, according to the Globe's review of MCAS scores for this year's junior class.
Christy Zweig, a junior at Dover-Sherborn Regional High School, would be a shoo-in for the scholarship. But Zweig, who attends school in one of the state's wealthiest school districts, is not even considering attending a Massachusetts public university. At Dover-Sherborn, where the median family income is $148,000, two out of three juniors would qualify.
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