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[quote=Anonymous][quote]I felt strongly that each school should randomly order lottery #s until I ran through an example with separate lottery numbers from each school and with a single number, and it came out so much better with a single number. People are more likely to get into a higher ranked choice, and you don't have the situation where mutually-beneficial trades are possible (a terrible part of the prior system). If someone gets a relatively good waitlist number at several schools, that person will not be able to accept multiple spots, so the effect is to basically continue letting people into higher-ranked choices while they release their less desirable choices to those with worse lottery numbers. I think this algorithm is a huge improvement over last year's based on the simulation I ran.[/quote]

I've tried for the last five hours to make sense of the idea that one lottery number across all the schools on my list is somehow more beneficial to everyone.

And it just doesn't. Make. Sense.

First, if I'm #10,000 out of 10,000 total applicants for PK4, there's no way I'm getting in to any school anywhere.  If every school has a wait list that places me based on that number, I will be at the bottom every time.  Even if I have preferences, I'll be the loser in every tie-breaker.  That simply cant't be the way this thing is run.

What makes sense is that I get assigned a random number at each school on my list.  So I could be #303 out of 303 applicants at my top ranked school--the total # vying for PK4 seats at that school [i]only[/i]--with no preferences to put me higher on the list.  What gets me higher is that others have ranked the school lower and gotten seats at other schools. I'm still behind all the families with preferences, but above those who ranked it lower than #1. I'm in a "tie" with all the other applicants--for that grade at that school--and my sucky number means I'm never getting in.

At the same time (not in a different round) my tracking number is entered into a lottery at my number 2 choice.  Again, I have no preferences, and this time I've got a great number--#3!  But I'm up against 450 applicants-- vying for that grade for that school--and after the preference families are lined up, there are still another 200 families, also with no preferences, who listed it as their #1 choice.  Alas, I'm behind all of them.

My third choice is my inbound school and my so-so number, let's say #36 out 85, doesn't get me a seat, but I'm still ahead of an OOB, single-child family who got a better number--unless they ranked the school higher than I did.

Rank has to be that unnamed preference and there still has to be a separate lottery for each grade at each school.

But if I have a single sucky number across all schools, and my next door neighbor has #8 across all schools, she has a better shot at getting a seat at my 12th ranked school than I do.  At the very least, she has a better shot at our IB school, which is definitely somewhere on her list.  I can't see how I'm supposed to wait,  round by round, for my 10k number to make way for all other preferences at all schools. THEN I get to enter round 2 along with all the families who missed the March 3 deadline.  And then it's an entirely new lottery number that gets drawn at each school, but this time we're all vying for fewer seats and mostly trying for the best possible wait list number behind everyone who's already on it.

And now, I am completely worn out by the whole shebang.[/quote]

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