Larry Cary, 1952-2021

NEW York just lost a longtime voice for excellence at the city’s top high schools. Labor lawyer and education advocate: Larry Cary, a Brooklyn Tech grad who fought hard to ensure that foolish “racial justice” reforms didn’t destroy the excellent education they pretend to redistribute.

A man of the left, he upset his fellow progressives with his impassioned defense of the the race-blind admissions test where they wanted purely subjective criteria.

Critics claim low black and Hispanic enrollment proves the test is somehow racist (though they never address why Asian minorities handle it just fine). “Instead of scapegoating the test, the city should be investing in returning enhanced academics to black and Latino communities where students succeeded on the test before those programs were taken away,” Cary told The

Post in April 2019.

As he noted, black and Hispanic admissions to the elite high schools faltered the last two decades after the city closed the feeder G&T programs at middle schools in minority areas. And he acted on his words: Thanks to him, the Brooklyn Tech Alumni Foundation runs a STEM Pipeline Program offering classes and test prep to students in Brooklyn middles school in those underserved areas.

Larry’s approach is winning: Mayor-elect Eric Adams and his schools chancellor, David Banks, vow to expand Gifted and Talented opportunities in black and Hispanic communities and open new selective high schools so more kids can benefit.

Larry Cary left us too soon, but his legacy will boost whole generations of future New Yorkers.