Today is the first day Denver students and families can submit their school choices for next year.
Under Denver Public Schools’ unified enrollment system, families fill out a form listing their top five school choices for 2017-18. The district especially encourages families with kids entering so-called transition grades next year — kindergarten, 6th and 9th grades — to fill out a form.
The forms are due by 4 p.m. on Jan. 31. The district will inform students and families in mid-March of their school placement for 2017-18. Whether a student gets into a school depends on that school’s admissions priorities and available space, according to DPS.
If students don’t fill out a form, they will be assigned to their boundary school or to a school in their enrollment zone. DPS now has 11 enrollment zones all across the city: two for elementary schools, seven for middle schools and two for high schools. Students who live in a zone are guaranteed a spot at one of the schools in their zone, though it may not be their first choice.
This is the sixth year DPS has used a unified enrollment system for its charter, innovation, magnet and traditional district-run schools. In school choice lingo, students who choose to attend a school other than their boundary school are considered to have “choiced out” of their boundary school and “choiced in” to another school.
We combed through district data from last year’s school choice process and pulled out several interesting pieces of information, including which schools students most want to choice out of, which schools they most want to choice into and how many get their first-choice schools.
Top 10 Schools with the Highest Choice-Out Rate in 2016
Manual High School — 88 percent
Marrama Elementary School — 87 percent
Morey Middle School — 83 percent
West Campus High School Enrollment Zone — 79 percent
Abraham Lincoln High School — 72 percent
George Washington High School — 70 percent
Northfield High School — 70 percent
North High School — 69 percent
Gilpin Montessori School — 64 percent
Stedman Elementary School — 64 percent
Where are those kids going? Let’s take Manual as an example. District data shows the schools students living in the Manual High School boundary choiced into in 2015.
Top 10 Schools Students in the Manual High Boundary Choiced Into in 2015
Bruce Randolph School — 310 students
East High School — 159 students
DSST: Cole High School — 116 students
Denver Center for 21st Century Learning at Wyman — 51 students
North High School — 42 students
South High School — 37 students
Venture Prep High School — 36 students
STRIVE Prep – Excel — 35 students
Emily Griffith High School — 35 students
DSST: Stapleton High School — 24 students
On the flip side, some schools have very low choice-out rates, which can mean most seats are filled by students who live in the boundary — and few are available for choice students.
Top 10 Schools with the Lowest Choice-Out Rate in 2016
Slavens K-8 School — 3 percent
DCIS at Fairmont — 10 percent
Grant Ranch ECE-8 School — 10 percent
Carson Elementary School — 11 percent
Stapleton-Area Elementary Schools Enrollment Zone — 12 percent
Steck Elementary School — 15 percent
Bromwell Elementary School — 16 percent
Greater Park Hill/Stapleton Middle Schools Enrollment Zone — 17 percent
University Park Elementary School — 18 percent
Southmoor Elementary School — 22 percent
Which schools are most popular? District data from 2016 shows the top 10 schools requested at the so-called transition grades of kindergarten, 6th grade and 9th grade.
Top 10 Schools Listed as Incoming Kindergarten Students’ First Choice in 2016
Swigert International School — 188 students listed it as their #1 choice
Escalante-Biggs Academy — 130 students
William “Bill” Roberts K-8 School — 125 students
Odyssey School of Denver — 105 students
Highline Academy Northeast — 105 students
High Tech Elementary School — 102 students
Park Hill Elementary School — 99 students
Brown International Academy — 99 students
Slavens K-8 School — 86 students
STRIVE Prep – Ruby Hill — 85 students
Top 10 Schools Listed as Incoming 6th Grade Students’ First Choice in 2016
McAuliffe International School — 411 students listed it as their #1 choice
DSST: Green Valley Ranch — 351 students
Denver School of the Arts — 328 students
Kunsmiller Creative Arts Academy — 267 students
DSST: College View — 253 students
DSST: Byers — 199 students
Skinner Middle School — 198 students
STRIVE Prep – Westwood — 197 students
DSST: Stapleton — 191 students
Denver Center for International Studies — 157 students
Top 10 Schools Listed as Incoming 9th Grade Students’ First Choice in 2016
East High School — 669 students listed it as their #1 choice
South High School — 295 students
Northfield High School — 207 students
CEC Early College — 202 students
George Washington High School — 174 students
Denver School of the Arts — 165 students
Kunsmiller Creative Arts Academy — 162 students
DSST: Green Valley Ranch — 155 students
STRIVE Prep – SMART — 155 students
Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. Early College — 154 students
So how many students get into their first-choice school? District data from last year provides a percentage of students in each transition grade.
Percentage of Transition Grade Students Who Got their First-Choice School in 2016
Kindergarten — 86 percent
6th Grade — 80 percent
9th Grade — 87 percent
Chalkbeat is a nonprofit news site covering educational change in public schools.
