i'm applying to kindergarten with a "bad" lottery number

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i'm applying to kindergarten with a "bad" lottery number

By Joyce Szufltia
This is something that middle and high school parents have had to address this year. It is in the wind and kindergarten parents have begun to ask. The “random number” aka lottery number has always been with us. It has just never been revealed by the DoE. This year, the DoE revealed the “number” to older kids and if you ask them, they will tell you too. It doesn’t predict your fate, but it does give you a little insight that may help you manage expectations.

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public kindergarten application and moving after the application deadline

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By Joyce Szuflita
I find that families get very agitated about missing the kindergarten application, particularly if they are moving. (By the way, we don’t have information on when the deadline in 2022 is yet).
Here are a couple of facts:

  • Everyone has a zoned school (except families who live in Districts 1, 7 and 23. These are “unzoned districts” and everyone has equal priority to all elementary schools in the district.)

  • You have the right to attend kindergarten and whether you make the k application deadline or not, you will have a k placement very very very likely in your zoned school.

Think of the kindergarten application as a kind of census that the City takes of five year olds. The DoE hopes that every five year old in the City will fill out an application. It is the first time they know how many k kids are out there and what zones have the potential to be full or under capacity. The application is easy after you register for an account on the application platform MY SCHOOLS. The DoE will make every effort to put you in your zoned school, unless you don’t like your zoned school and then they have a protocol in place for you to apply to up to 12 programs in your order of preference, so that they can try and place you in a school that you prefer. It is your most robust chance to get a seat at a school outside of your zone, but depending on the schools involved it may or may not be likely.

There are sibling priorities, and geographic priorities associated with zones and districts and you can read a lot about the algorithm and priorities on the City’s website as well as in other blogs on this website.

Where you live affects the school you are zoned for and perhaps other surrounding schools for which you might have a district priority. If you are moving after the application deadline, the City expects you to fill it out according to your current NYC address and notify them later about your new address. That is not a problem. If you know your new address and are moving very shortly after the application, then go ahead and use the new address, but generally the DoE doesn’t like future, prospective information. It can make things complicated.

You do not fill out a new application after the deadline. You just contact your new zoned school, let them know about your new status and they will arrange a time for you to pre-register.

2021 Kindergarten: Applying in a vacuum, Vol. 2

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By Joyce Szuflita
We have a few dates now. Surprisingly, the DoE is sticking to their regular K timeline. The deadline for your MY SCHOOLS application is Jan. 19. Here are some other insights that you are probably wondering about. Oh yes, and this application in mid January IS NOT the Prek application. That always happens way later, likely in mid to late March! That is why you don’t see any information about it.

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District 15 re-zoning: update 12/2020

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By Joyce Szuflita
The PAR Team recommended that the vote for rezoning be moved to late winter or spring. With the deadline for fall 2021 kindergarten coming up on Jan. 19, 2021, the recommendation is that any re-zoning plan go into effect for the 2022-23 school year.

The map for the re-zoning will be publicized in the new year, in line with vote.

One aspect of the possible proposal is to transition PS 676 to a middle school.

That’s all she wrote for now.

how does kindergarten placement work?

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by Joyce Szuflita
This is what is going to happen:
You are now ranking up to 12 choices on your MY SCHOOLS application. Don’t wait until the last min., the website often gets glitchy. Take screen shots of any trouble you have and of your final list, just in case you have difficulty. You can always fix it at the Family Welcome Center if you tell them of your troubles in a timely way

  • You don’t need to rank 12, but why not add a few thoughtful choices as insurance.

  • You don’t have to rank your zoned school, but you will still likely get placed there, because it is the school for which you have the highest priority.

  • You are not “guaranteed” a placement in your zoned school, although it is VERY likely.

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More about rezoning in D15

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By Joyce Szuflita
First, as many of you know, the rezoning plan for Bococa including PS 15, 29, 32, 38, 58, 261 and 676 has been postponed to distribute information more deeply and engage the community in the planning. As far as we know the current zoned lines will be in place for 20/21 admission season. So all of you with 2015 bday kids applying for kindergarten - it will be business as usual.
Any changes will be made in the fall/winter of 2020 and take effect for kids entering the schools in fall of 2021. Any students currently attending the school at that time in K-5th grade will be unaffected by the rezoning and can remain in the school even if their home zoning status changes.

The District has announced that there will be a new rezoning effort made in Sunset Park

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the latest on the D15 rezoning

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By Joyce Szuflita
First, this map, which you can see in detail in the presentation materials is NOT final. It is very much a work in progress and may have little to no bearing on the final proposal. There are two proposals being floated; rezoning with set asides for accommodating economic diversity, and a non-zoned ‘sub-district’ plan. There is also still room for other options. The timeline is also in question.

To make this work for kindergarteners who have to apply to programs by mid Jan. the DoE has to really get moving. After they present a final plan there needs to be a little over a month of public discussion before the D15 CEC will vote to approve or not. There has been talk of a possible temporary plan (PS 32 will have capacity for an additional 436 seats in their new addition beginning in the 2020-21 school year). There has also been talk of continuing the community outreach and debate about the best way to accomplish the goals and put off the rezoning until next year.

I stayed for the break out discussions and my group was solidly advocating for the unzoned subdistrict plan because of their passionate support of the need for diversity. I think the discussions in the room were very wide ranging. You can read Chalkbeat’s very good article on the meeting here.


Arts and Letters may be merging

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Arts and Letters may be merging

By Joyce Szuflita
There are many unanswered questions, but finally the rumors about where Arts & Letters is probably relocating can be answered! They are likely moving and merging with PS 305. I have lots of questions about how prospective families will be considered, like, will it now be an exclusively zoned school rather than non zoned? Will it be some kind of hybrid? Will there be additional seats for K or MS? Inquiring minds want to know! I think this sounds like a great solution. A merge helps A&L find a new permanent home and it help bring thoughtful attention and popular muscle to 305, a local school that is drastically under-enrolled. It also helps PS 20 where A&L was formerly co-located. They now have room to come into their own.
Here is the parent blast from the Principals involved about it:

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D15 rezoning and diversity- listen up

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D15 rezoning and diversity- listen up

By Joyce Szuflita
Those of you who live in the part of Brooklyn Heights located in D15, Cobble Hill, Boerum Hill, Carroll Gardens and Red Hook, you need to be aware of this now (zones 261, 29, 38, 58, 32 15 and 676). I don’t want to hear -and I will- about how you were surprised by the rezoning plan in the fall and how fast this went down. It is way more transparent than I have seen with previous rezoning, with much more attempt at public engagement. Engage now! When you drag your feet, it is not their fault. There have been three public meetings so far (since April) and there will be several more, gathering parent feedback as well as informing the neighborhood. If you aren’t participating or staying aware, I don’t want to hear complaining.

Whether you are there or not, one of these things is going to go down. It would be better if you had a say. You may not get what you want, but you may get what you need - Mick Jagger

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The myth of the "best school" busted. Glory hallelujah.

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The myth of the "best school" busted. Glory hallelujah.

By Joyce Szuflita
I have been sitting in my tiny office spinning with rage about the lazy conversations that I hear around school quality. Let me say right up front this blog is NOT about equity. I think schools are better when they are filled with diverse learners and students of every race and class. Period.

This is about something else: how people talk about the elite schools that everyone is focused on. I think that the underlying premise is false and until we understand the schools with a clear eye - WE CAN’T SOLVE THE ULTIMATE PROBLEM of “school quality” which is poverty.

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My head is spinning with all the possible new school locations

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By Joyce Szuflita
There are lots of reports about locations for new public or charter school programs. While the news may be exciting, for many families they won't be open in time for your child to access them. Many of them are for 300 seat schools. Just so you know, that is a tiny school. Just because it is a new school site, doesn't mean that it will be a new school, or that it will mean rezoning in the neighborhood. There are several schools looking for new locations to expand; International Charter School of NY (D13, looking for room to grow to 5th grade), Success Charter Cobble Hill (D15, looking for room for their middle school), Arts and Letters (their community and their co-located school, PS 20 have preferred that the schools each have their own space), We just can't predict what the space will be used for ahead of time. Remember PS 133 used to be a zoned school in D13 - it is now an unzoned D13 school that serves both D13 and D15. Lots of things can happen.

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tale of two wait lists 2017

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By Joyce Szuflita
This is what happens at kindergarten placement time:

Expect to be placed in your zoned school (even if you have not ranked it on your application). That is generally what happens every year. A few people who wanted a school other than their zoned school will be lucky and the DoE's mission is to place you in the school that you have ranked high on your application, but the match also takes into consideration, your geographic and sibling priorities and that is the reason that you may not have gotten your heart's desire if it is out of zone.

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misunderstanding how the K application works

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By Joyce Szuflita
I have been getting a lot of emails and two questions have come up continually.
1. I put my zoned school first on my application and my friend who is also zoned put it third. We are in an overcapacity school and she got the placement and I didn't. Why did that happen?

This is a great example of how the algorithm works and more generally, why you should list schools in the order that you like them. Putting a school first doesn't give you special priority to that program. Your priority comes from being zoned, not how you ranked the schools. In this scenario: The school was over capacity. All zoned families are equal. There are more families than seats at the zoned school, so the computer randomly ranks families within the zoned priority (essentially a lottery among them that has nothing to do with their application's ranking). The family that ranked the school first was unlucky in the computer's ranking and didn't get a placement. The family that put the school third, didn't get a place at the two schools that they put first and second, but when the computer went to place them at their third choice (their zoned school) they were high in the lottery and got a seat. This is how the algorithm is meant to run.
RANK SCHOOLS IN THE ORDER THAT YOU LIKE THEM. This will be on my grave.

2. I put 7 other schools on my list besides my zoned school. Why wasn't I placed at any of them?
It is good to put a solid number of choices as an alternative, but if those schools are super popular zoned programs that never take anyone from out of zone, they will be very, very unlikely to be able to offer you a seat from out side of zone/within district priority at least in the initial offer (and probably never). if you just listed 4 super popular zoned schools and three super popular un-zoned schools, you just applied to Harvard, Princeton, Yale and Brown and bought 3 Powerball tickets. Miracles can happen and no one expects to be turned away from their zoned school (which is awful!) but having a minor safety in there somewhere (a school that might take you from out of zone sometimes) is never a bad idea.

These families will still be on the wait lists for any school that they ranked higher than the school that they were placed in. If they were placed in a school that they didn't list- they will be wait listed for ALL the schools. Miracles happen and as the lists move, they may get an offer from one of these, or even better, an offer back at their zoned school. Best of luck to everyone.

 

tale of two waitlists: there are too many people at your beloved zoned school

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By Joyce Szuflita
If you wanted your zoned school and there were too many other zoned families for the school to take everyone, and you received a placement at a school other than a school on your app or your zoned school, you may be on the Capped Zoned School wait list. It is a totally different animal from the wait lists that I described previously. Here is how it works.

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kindergarten placement 2016

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kindergarten placement 2016

By Joyce Szuflta
It looks like kindergarten placements may come in next week. Good luck to all.
Expect to be placed in your zoned school (even if you have not ranked it on your application). That is generally what happens every year. A few people who wanted a school other than their zoned school will be lucky and the DoE's mission is to place you in the school that you have ranked high on your application, but the match also takes into consideration, your geographic and sibling priorities and that is the reason that you may not have gotten your heart's desire if it is out of zone.

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