GothamSchools — daily independent reporting on NYC public schools

As a parent of a student who applied to public HS I think it would be useful for the DOE to publish the number of applicants to all HSs for a greater degree of public transparency which would also include where that HS was on the list of 12 schools students rank order. One of the uncertainties and anxieties of a parent applying to a top school is that if you don’t get accepted to your first HS, presumably your application is sent to the 2nd on your list (and so forth). But after the first round of acceptances if you don’t get accepted by the 1st school, the 2nd and 3rd schools on your list are probably already filled up very quickly from the first round applicants and your child is less likely to get in there either and the effect snowballs for subsequent rounds down to the 12th school. We were lucky we got a good school, but from news evidence, many parents were not. So I don’t think this works the way it should.

Also, as an alternative to closing schools, I think the DOE should have some method of shrinking schools if their applicant pool is smaller than the HS available seats. Otherwise, as at my “failing” HS, the HS becomes a simple dumping ground for students who can’t get in anywhere else and just lowers the quality of the school further heading to you know where eventually. By shrinking schools with low applicant pools, you potentially reach an equilibrium which brings the school back to viable and quality status with no need for closure, or at least you know the students who are there want to be there which selects for motivation and the ground work for success.

Students which no HS wants to accept should be automatically sent to charter schools, since they claim the expertise to innovate in education. So, let’s put them to a real test rather than this fake creaming of the better public school students.