(The following is an updated version of my blog from December 2018!)

I often get the question, “We’ve done all this work submitting applications, now what happens and why does it take so long to get results?” 

The bad news is, there’s a somewhat agonizing wait for 8th (and some 9th!) grade families across the city to receive their high school results.  The good news is, there are valid reasons why. 

The following is a mere sampling of these activities:

  1. High schools will diligently review required assessment and audition materials. This process can take several weeks, at best, and begins in earnest in mid-December.
  2. The Department of Education (DOE) works with schools to finalize the number of offers that will be made to each high school program, taking into account expected yield (i.e. number of seats that will be filled based on number of offers made).
  3. Offers to the specialized high schools, and corresponding qualifying scores, are calibrated in a time-consuming process that balances enrollment management at the schools with maximizing offers.
  4. The DOE runs its matching algorithm multiple times in an extensive, iterative process to ensure quality control.
  5. Only once the optimal number and type of matches are made can the DOE actually begin the production process. This involves creation, quality control, production and upload of over 70,000 results letters.
  6. At the same time, the DOE must ensure that the online application system, MySchools, is properly prepared for this distribution process, involving uploading of all data and a quality control procedure of its own.
  7. Don’t forget, a small percentage of students (but who number in the thousands) who do not match to one of their application choices or a specialized high school will be given a high school placement.  This is also a time-consuming process performed manually by DOE staff.
  8. Concurrently, the DOE will prepare for the waitlist process that commences immediately after results are issued.  This includes determining waitlist positions for every student automatically assigned to a waitlist, as well preparing for the process by which families can voluntarily add themselves to other waitlists.

All told, when one considers all that must take place in what amounts to a 2-month+ period, it’s no wonder it takes so long for results to come out.

Unfortunately, this makes it no easier to wait.  But at least now you have some idea of why.

Interested in what happens AFTER results come out, including the waitlist process?  Join us on March 5, 2024 for our free webinar, “Everything You Need to Know After Results Come Out.”

Registration and details here:

https://bit.ly/4179mye