essential prek information

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By Joyce Szuflita
Here is what you need to know about placement:
You will be ranking up to 12 choices on your MY SCHOOLS application through March 16, 2020. Don’t wait until the last min., the website often gets glitchy. Take screen shots of any trouble you have and of your final list, just in case you have difficulty. You can always fix it at the Family Welcome Center if you tell them of your troubles in a timely way.

  • The biggest misunderstanding about prek is that you will be attending at your zoned school. There are about 75,000 kids on a grade in NYC. There are around 30,000 prek seats in public schools. Those seats, depending on the neighborhood, will go first to siblings of zoned students and then occasionally to some zoned students. The other 40,000 seats will be in a variety of places; NYCEEC’s, Prek Centers, a few Un-zoned schools and a few Charter Schools.

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how does kindergarten placement work?

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by Joyce Szuflita
This is what is going to happen:
You are now ranking up to 12 choices on your MY SCHOOLS application. Don’t wait until the last min., the website often gets glitchy. Take screen shots of any trouble you have and of your final list, just in case you have difficulty. You can always fix it at the Family Welcome Center if you tell them of your troubles in a timely way

  • You don’t need to rank 12, but why not add a few thoughtful choices as insurance.

  • You don’t have to rank your zoned school, but you will still likely get placed there, because it is the school for which you have the highest priority.

  • You are not “guaranteed” a placement in your zoned school, although it is VERY likely.

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disappointed!

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By Joyce Szuflita
Seems like the Kindergarten Connect notification is coming out today. This is what I expect to hear a lot of -

"I put down 15 choices! My zoned school was my last choice! I got my zoned school! "Choice" is not choice! Everybody and everything s#@*ks!"

This is exactly what I anticipated. Give yourself a moment to be disappointed, but then move on. Your hopes seemed to be dashed in an instant. What you need to understand is that this is how this system works for most people and you need to be patient for it to work for you. This is the starting pistol in a marathon. It is too early to freak. This is the baseline.

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"kindergarten connect" conspiracy theories

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By Joyce Szuflita
It is beginning.

I am starting to hear the inevitable creative, crazy, uninformed ways to strategise the Kindergarten Connect process to totally mess up the ranking of your potential kindergarten options. Can we all stop and take a breath? If the city wanted to create an elaborate, passive-aggressive algorithm that was designed to screw you, why would they go to all this trouble? Couldn't they just do that on their own? Frankly, if they were that diabolically dedicated to ruining your life, the whole city would run way better. See this for what it is - a very blunt instrument that assigns seats with certain priorities by random. Do you feel lucky? The vast majority of zoned kids will have a seat in their zoned schools if they want them. Most of you looking for out of zone seats will be lucky if you just keep your heads and stay in the game until the last wait list placements are made.

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