Setting Priorities in School Choice Enrollment Systems: Who Benefits from Placement Algorithm Preferences? Policy Brief

Many U.S. cities with school choice programs have adopted unified enrollment systems to manage their application and placement processes centrally. Typically, these systems use placement algorithms to assign students to schools. These algorithms make placements based on families' rank-ordered requests, seat availability in schools, and various priorities and lottery numbers that determine students' standing at each school. This study examines the placement algorithm--and broader school request, placement, and enrollment patterns--in New Orleans, which has a citywide system of charter schools. The authors explore whether the priority categories in the New Orleans placement algorithm tend to favor students of certain races or socioeconomic classes. Specifically, the authors examine cases where families of Black and white children, or lower-income and higher-income families, submit the same first-choice requests for kindergarten (a key entry grade for elementary school). In addition to examining whether certain groups of students are more likely than others to get school placements when they vie for the same seats, the authors run simulations to assess how placement patterns might differ with different policies.