The DOE's repeating the 'hybrid' middle-school admissions process it piloted last year -- applications and calendars centralized by DOE but individual schools, programs, and districts setting entrance criteria and making actual admissions decisions and offers -- and middle-school fairs commence this week, across the city's school districts.
Unlike high school fairs, which are offered city- and borough-wide on different dates, each school district has one date for its middle school fair, which takes place in the early evening, generally from 5:30 to 7:30 pm. And again unlike high school admissions, where students and families received handbooks months ahead of the fairs, elementary-school students and their parents will get middle-school directories after the fairs conclude, in mid-December. Information sessions explaining middle-school choice are planned for late December, but you can get a jump on the process here.
Tours and auditions are taking place now -- adding an extra layer of complication for families unaware of all of their district's middle school offerings -- and completed applications are due to elementary-school guidance counselors a week after kids go back to school in January, on the 9th.
Admissions decisions will be announced "in early May," according to the DOE. So while the process is more compressed than the high-school equivalent, it still involves plenty of waiting.
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