Open-Enrollment Notification Due Soon

Families who applied for seats through the Los Angeles Unified School District’s open-enrollment program should receive notification by mail between Monday and June 18 whether their child will be able to attend the school of choice, officials said.

Schools with more applications than vacancies held lotteries Wednesday after a monthlong period in which parents could apply to send their children to any open-enrollment school in the district, said Bruce Takeguma, an assistant director of the district’s school management services.

Notification is left to the individual schools, Takeguma said, adding that schools with more vacancies than applications will continue to enroll students until the school fills or mid-September.

So far, Takeguma said, the process “must have gone great because I haven’t heard much from the schools. The whole idea is to make sure parents know what’s happening before school lets out” this summer.

Only 6,000 seats at 120 schools were made available for the fall, 1,400 fewer than a year ago, officials said. The state-mandated program started in 1994 when some campuses were sparsely attended or closed. Close to 22,000 seats were available at 350 schools.

Officials attributed the decrease not only to the growing student population, which is expected to reach an all-time high of 709,000 this fall, but also to a strong Southern California economy that has enabled more families to afford higher housing costs in neighborhoods with better schools.