With an acceptance rate below 10%, Hunter College High School is one of the most competitive public high schools in New York City. It’s also one of the least diverse.

Hunter’s 15.3% student poverty rate was the lowest of any public high school in the city, according to public data from the 2024-25 school year. By comparison, Bronx Science and Stuyvesant, two of the city’s specialized high schools, each had about 50% of students from low-income households.

The lack of socioeconomic as well as racial diversity at Hunter — which is run by CUNY’s Hunter College — doesn’t get as much attention as the demographics at Stuyvesant, Bronx Science, and other specialized high schools in the five boroughs. Like those coveted institutions, Hunter also bases admissions on a test. Except to even qualify for Hunter’s test, you have to be invited, based on state test scores.

Now, with Mayor Zohran Mamdani and his administration backing efforts to bolster integration in public schools, some Hunter students are fighting for change from the inside.

Producers Roberto Bailey, a senior at Hunter, and Zoe George, a senior at Bard High School Early College Manhattan, know the landscape of competitive high school admissions well: They’ve experienced it.

We also hear from Hunter student and activist Kassidy Khuu about the admissions process at the Upper East Side institution, what she and others are doing to try and change it, and the underlying question of who gets access to a “gifted” education.

P.S. Weekly is available on major podcast platforms, including Apple Podcasts and Spotify. Reach us at PSWeekly@chalkbeat.org.

P.S. Weekly is a collaboration between Chalkbeat and The Bell, made possible by generous support from The Pinkerton Foundation.

P.S. Weekly episodes will also be featured in the Miseducation feed.

Miseducation is a podcast of The Bell that equips New York City public high school students with the tools to report on inequities in the nation’s largest school system.