New York City’s school system is the largest in the country. It's also one of the most segregated.

One of the latest data points: Only seven black students were admitted to the elite Stuyvesant High School this year , out of 895 seats.

The system was already deeply divided when Mayor de Blasio, a former school board member whose children attended public schools, took office in 2014 .

Since then, he has made reducing inequality a cornerstone of his tenure.

Now, a panel he appointed wants to eliminate many of the gifted programs and selective admissions processes that have led to mostly white and Asian schools in a largely black and Hispanic school system.

[Eliminate gifted programs in New York? It’s a momentous decision for Mr. de Blasio.]

The problem

As The Times’s Eliza Shapiro wrote: “New York screens more students for its schools than any other city in the country, and those screened schools tend to have a disproportionately white and Asian enrollment.”