The parents of Eleanor Glewwe, who is Chinese-American, and Hana Maruyama, who is Japanese-American, wanted to take advantage of a public school "choice" program by transferring the girls from Takoma Park Elementary School in Takoma Park, Maryland, to Maryvale Elementary School in Rockville, Maryland, which features a curriculum in which only French is spoken. But the Montgomery County Board of Education rejected their applications because if the girls transferred it would mean too few Asians in their old school, thus increasing the "ethnic isolation" of the remaining Asian students.

Eleanor's mother Mary Yee then tried a different strategy: because her husband is white, she changed her daughter's racial classification from Asian to white and applied again. But school officials again denied the request, this time citing a policy that discourages transfers out of schools undergoing significant enrollment changes.

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