The Daunting DC School Lottery System

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Are you already thinking about where your child will go to school next fall? Is it causing stress or anxiety in addition to a bit of excitement? You are not alone! If you are considering public schools (District of Columbia Public Schools, DCPS) or charter schools, keep reading for more information on the DC school lottery system.

DC School lottery
Photo by CDC on Unsplash

DC school lottery-An overview

The DC School Lottery system opens December 13 and closes in March each year. It is the system most public schools (DCPS and charter) use to offer seats to students at all grade levels (PreK3 – 12). This means that if you want your child to go to a public school in DC, you must know how to use the Lottery system. All children are guaranteed a Kindergarten spot at your in-boundary, DC Public School. If you are unsure how to find your in-boundary school (it is not always the one that is geographically closest to you), check out this site. PK options (for both PK3 and PK4) are not guaranteed anywhere. The DC School Lottery system is more chance than choice, but it does provide options. Keep reading to find out more about the system itself and how to ease some of your stress in the application process.

Why a lottery system?

All families throughout the city have the right to apply to any public school. The concept of school choice is decades old and has many implications, but the primary goals are to help improve all schools and to give all families options to send their child to a school best matched to their needs. It is also one way to create a more equitable playing field in the city’s educational system – where you can afford to live should not dictate where you can send your children to school. Even though the city’s demographics continue to shift and change, the reputation of the schools in lower income areas remains low and the reputation of schools in higher income areas remains high, regardless of the quality of the teachers and school overall.

On paper to online 

Not so long ago, families who wanted a spot at a school other than their in-boundary one had to wait in long lines to fill out an application at each school they were interested in. The timelines and processes differed significantly from school to school. This put an enormous burden on families and gave some an unfair advantage. If you didn’t have the resources to take time off and physically apply at each campus, you were left with just one option, your in-boundary school. In stepped My School DC. They created a system so that the majority of public schools, those within DCPS and public Charter Schools would use the same online lottery process.

How does It work?

In January, My School DC opens the process so that families can research and apply for the schools of their choice. Each child in each family can rank up to twelve schools. There are some preferences offered in some schools – including in-boundary, sibling attendance, and coming this year for eleven charter schools, an at-risk preference. See more about this headline here. The system closes March 1 and then an algorithm is applied to match children to schools. It is a very complex system, but the bottom line is you either win the lottery or you don’t.

Interpreting lottery results

There are only two results you get: accepted or waitlisted. If your child is offered a seat at a school, you can either accept or reject it. The reason to reject is if you have a change of family situation. Once you accept a seat, if you ranked other schools higher, you can still get off their waitlist but the offer guarantees your child a spot at one of the schools on your list. This is an important point to reiterate – you may not get your first (or second or third) choice. But if your waitlist numbers are good (usually less than 30), you still have a chance of getting in for the upcoming school year. Accepting a seat at a lower ranked school from your list does not take you off the waitlist for the higher ranked schools, but it DOES remove you from the waitlist of the lower ranked schools. I’ll share an example of this momentarily because it can be confusing!

Round 2

It IS possible to receive a waitlist result for every school on your original list. This happened to us when our oldest was in PK3. It was concerning because we weren’t sure what we would do with no school option. However, My School DC offers families in this situation a chance to try again. There is a second round where you can both rearrange your ranking order and add more schools to your preference list. In fact, once results are given, all families can rearrange the ranking order if you want.

If you are lucky enough to be offered a spot at your first ranked school, then that is your offer for the year. All remaining schools no longer become an option.

A real-life example 

Let’s see how the process works with a concrete example (with fake school names and a shortened list for condensed purposes):

In round 1, we ranked this way and received these results:

  1. ABC school – Waitlisted, 125
  2. MNO – Waitlisted, 89
  3. STU – Spot offered
  4. XYZ school

We will go ahead and accept the spot at STU school and wait to see if the waitlist changes for our top two schools. Most likely though, this won’t happen because these are very popular schools. This is where the previous phrase, you either win the lottery or you don’t comes in. We won the lottery perhaps because STU school is a newer school and not a known in the community yet, or some other reason. But ABC and MNO schools are very popular (for good reason), and don’t have many spots to offer because of sibling preference and the number of returning students each year.

So now what?

There really is no secret sauce to make the lottery work in your favor. It’s designed that way to provide more equal access for all DC families. My strongest recommendation is to decide what is most important to you, your family, and your child. You may want to start by asking yourself how important the following criteria are. Then, research to rank your schools with those criteria in mind.

1. Location

How far away are you willing to travel either from home or work?

2. Programs

Do you want Montessori? Reggio Emilia? Expeditionary Learning? Bilingual? Certain specials? (Not all schools offer Dance or Drama, but some do, for example.)

3. Student-Teacher ratio

This varies widely in schools. Is it important to you that your child receives more individualized attention in the classroom?

4. Facility/Amenities

How important is a modern building or technology to you?

5. Before/After Care

Do you need this? Which schools offer this and what is their program/model? Will you need it all year and for multiple children?

6. Test Scores

A note here: this may be important, but I would strongly urge you to look at growth over time rather than achievement on a test. Many of the “best” schools in terms of test scores get that way because students already come with a lot of capital. Teaching kids well, on the other hand, is a measure that can be observed through growth.

7. Makeup of the school

Where do families and staff come from?

8. Ratings

Be careful what you read on local blogs. Most folks will write more to complain than praise. Reach out to the school’s PTA or leadership to get connected to families at the school.

To learn more, check out myschooldc.org and consider attending EdFest on December 11 to virtually learn about many of the charter and public schools in DC.

And if I can answer any questions for you, or support you in the process, feel free to reach out. I do this as a service for free to our community.

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Lori Wilen
Lori Wilen is Mama to two school-aged littles. Lori, her wife, kids, and rescue dog live in Brightwood, DC. She has lived in the area since 1991 but grew up in Pittsburgh. Lori received her undergraduate degree from University of Maryland and her Masters in School Leadership from Harvard. She is an educator by training and passion and consults on various education projects. Lori is equally excited about yoga and meditation, practices she began 25 years ago. She is a certified yoga teacher for kids and adults. Lori loves learning and continues to dive into yoga's rich history, the intersection of yoga and social justice, and how bodies function. She began Mindful Yogic Parenting as a way to not only help herself, but to also connect with other parents who want to more mindfully engage with their kids, using yoga's philosophy and practices as support.