Even though spring has just sprung, families are already looking toward the fall semester. More than 14,120 families applied for transitional kindergarten, kindergarten, 6th grade and 9th grade atSan Francisco's system allows parents to choose whichever school they want in the city and then enter a lottery. "What the lottery does is sort of sorts families into schools and parents get in," said Lauren Koehler from SFUSD's Educational Placement Center.
The district says more than 88% of students will get one of their top three choices; families need to respond to the district and enroll students by April 8. But Helen Smolinski says her son fell into that 12% who didn't get one of the schools they want, instead her son was assigned to a school across town.
"They asked for five choices, I put down five choices. Guess how many I got? Zero," said Smolinski. "I know lots of us parents are experiencing this right now." Smolinski says she's frustrated that her son will have to keep re-applying to get into a school that he lives near and wants to go to. "Can we just have real solutions for real people," asked Smolinski.
In fact in the 2024-25 school year San Francisco will be changing the elementary school selection process, allowing families to pick from about a dozen schools close to where they live.