US Dept. of Education "Blue Ribbon" schools; as usual, difficult to understand their choices

The US Ed Dept just announced seven NYC schools selected as Blue Ribbon exemplary high performing schools.

Three out of the seven – all in Manhattan D2 -- have low numbers of Black and Hispanic students and low levels of poverty.   

According to DOE School Performance Dashboard , these are the schools’ demographics, roughly speaking.  You can compare their Economic Need Index (ENI) to the citywide average of 71%; and their percentage of Black and Hispanic students to the citywide average of 63%.  

• PS 234 Independence School, New York City Geographic District # 2.  (11% ENI, 10% Black and Hispanic)
• PS 290 Manhattan New School, New York City Geographic District # 2.   (10% ENI, 15% Black and Hispanic)
• PS 41 Greenwich Village, New York City Geographic District # 2. (10% ENI, 11% Black and Hispanic)
• Bayside – Nathaniel Hawthorne Middle School 74, New York City Geographic District #26  (40% ENI, 15% Black and Hispanic)
• Brooklyn – PS 249 Caton (The), New York City Geographic District #17.  (77% ENI, 88% Black and Hispanic)
• Brooklyn – The School for Future Leaders, New York City Geographic District #20. (88% ENI, 10% Black & Hispanic)
• Bronx – Icahn Charter School 3. (59% ENI, 92% Black and Hispanic)

Only one school of the above, PS 249 in D 17, has an ENI or percentage of Black and Hispanic students nearly as high as the citywide average.  The Icahn Charter School comes second, which caps all class sizes at 18 in grades K-8.

As usual, it is difficult to understand the rhyme or reason for these particular selections.  Interestingly, not a single school in the city or the entire state of New York is on the list of schools was honored as  exemplary for closing the Achievement gap.