High School Choice in New York City

In recent years, school districts across the country have increasingly turned to school choice as a central part of education reform efforts. The New York City Department of Education created the high school match program in 2004 in order to provide students and their families more choice in high school admissions. Through this program, rather than simply being assigned to their zoned high schools, the Department of Education uses an algorithm (similar to that used by medical residency programs) to match students to schools based upon their respective rankings. This study examines the extent to which New York City public school students are ranking and attending high schools outside of their district or zone, thus taking advantage of the new high school match program. The team identified student, school, and neighborhood characteristics associated with the likelihood of ranking, and attending, non-zone or non-district schools.