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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]I am so confused by these Choice options.

Is there a place on the Arlington website that explains all the options?

It sounds like there are times when a family can choose (i.e. through a lottery) to not attend a neighborhood school and go to another school.  However, you can not lottery into any school in APS.  Just the ones that are open to the lottery.  These open to the lottery schools can be made up of all lottery kids?  Or part lottery and part zoned neighborhood?

There are also schools that you have to test into?  Like TJ High School.  Are there any elementary or middle schools that you can "test" into?

I need a place where this is all broken down.

I would also like to know the odds of being able to lottery into any of the lottery schools.  Is that recorded somewhere?[/quote]

To add to your confusion even more, the entire Transfer & Options policy underwent a major revision this spring, that will go into effect for the 2018/19 school year. But some aspects of it were tabled for further study and it may get revised again this year. If you dig around on google or on the APS website, you can probably find the revised policy that the School Board voted to adopt (although it will be a frustrating process to find it). There isn't any good resource that describes this process, and APS has not released the odds of getting accepted into any of the lotteries. In fact, there are allegations (on this site and elsewhere) that the lotteries are not fair and certain kids get in through backdoors-- that may or may not be true, just telling you the discussion is out there.

TJ High School is an entirely different animal. It is located in Fairfax County, but Arlington pays FCPS for a certain number of slots every year. It is highly competitive to get into, and yes, you do need to achieve certain test scores. Some people, including a current School Board member, have argued that Arlington should pull out of this arrangement because it just results in the cream of the crop of Arlington students going to Fairfax. I don't know whether this will happen by the time your kids are in high school. (From your questions, it sounds like you have little ones who are not yet school age.)

At the elementary level, your options are your neighborhood school, Spanish immersion (Key or Claremont, depending where you live), Drew Montessori and ATS. Some of the programs used to give admissions preference if you lived in certain neighborhoods, but that will be eliminated next year due to the Transfer & Options policy that was adopted last year-- then it is a straight lottery for everyone. There is also talk of opening a new "IB" lottery elementary school in 2021 in Westover in the building that now houses the APS daycare program.

A good resource is to join the "Arlington Education Matters" facebook page, which is a community of parent-advocates. It is less snarky than this website because it is not anonymous.[/quote]

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