Photo by Adam Fagen

More than half of D.C. students who entered the citywide school lottery have a better idea of where they’ll hit the books this fall. In its third year, the My School DC lottery let families choose between more than 200 academic routes including most D.C. charter schools, all D.C. Public Schools pre-kindergarten 3 and PK4 programs, out-of-boundary schools, and selective high schools. Families were able to rank up to 12 schools for each child.

This year, 21,208 students applied—an increase of nearly 1,000 applicants since last year. Seventy percent of applicants were matched through the lottery, according to a release. Of those matched, 61 percent were offered a seat at their top choice, and 86 percent have the option of going to one of their top three school choices.

The lottery works by matching students through a combination of randomly assigned numbers, the amount of seats available at each school, the number of schools ranked for each student, and how they ranked those schools, Catherine Peretti, Executive Director of My School DC told DCist. Students who were not matched this time around can apply during the post-lottery period, as all schools are not full, Peretti says. They can also go to their in-boundary schools without participating in the lottery.

And applicants who didn’t get their top choice are placed on waitlists with the chance of being bumped up over the spring and summer.

By mid-April, parents will be able to go online to see the number of seats offered in the lottery as well as where students are on waitlists by grade and school, according to the release.

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