Today is Deadline to Apply for Christa McAuliffe Charter School

Today, Feb. 28 is the deadline for parents to apply for the admission lottery for the Christa McAuliffe Charter School in Framingham.

Applications must be received by 11:59 p.m. EST. To apply, click here.

McAuliffe is a public charter school, which means there is no tuition to attend the school. Admission however is via an annual lottery.

This year’s lottery will be held on Wednesday, March 4, at 6 p.m. at the school’s new campus location of 139 Newbury Street in Framingham.

McAuliffe will accept 140 students for the 2015-16 sixth grade.

No students will be accepted into the seventh or eighth grades at this time, although applications are still being accepted.

During lottery night, the charter school will place siblings of current students on the list first, after that names will randomly be drawn to fill the rest of the 140 slots. When all 140 slots are filled, then an ordered wait list will be created via a lottery.

Lisa Mandozzi, executive director of the MetroWest YMCA Framingham branch, will be the neutral party who will conduct the school’s lottery.

McAuliffe’s admission coordinator Cori Sage said “We expect to have about twice as many applicants as spots open in this year’s lottery. There are typically about 20-30 families with current scholars whose siblings will have preference in the lottery.”

The school’s enrollment policy outlines a lottery and admissions process that follows the state charter school laws and regulations that call for a blind lottery:

• First preference goes to students who have siblings currently attending the school.
• Next, students who are residents of Ashland, Framingham, Holliston, Hopkinton, Marlborough, Natick, Southborough, and Sudbury are drawn through the random electronic lottery tool.
• Students who live outside of the eight-town region may also apply to the lottery; the school draws from the non-regional pool after all sibling and regional student names have been drawn.

There were 283 applicants for the 144 slots for the current sixth grade class or the class of 2017. It was the largest applicant pool for the school’s largest class ever.

There were 261 applicants for the current 7th grade class and 214 applicants for the current 8th grade class. There were 150 applicants, the year before that.

Editor’s Note: My daughter is a grade 8 student at the Charter school.

Students selected in the lottery and those accepted off of the wait list have 10 business days to submit forms to enroll in the charter school.

As spots open up, the school will invite students off of the ordered wait lists.

“We encourage families who find themselves on a wait list to be patient as the enrollment process sorts itself out through the spring and the summer,” says Executive Director Kristin Harrison. “It is not unusual for families to be invited to enroll their child even during the summer months. Our Admissions Team will keep the wait list information updated on our website so that families can stay in the loop easily and be prepared for the invitation to join our community.”

The Christa McAuliffe Charter School is a diverse “Expeditionary Learning” public school for students in grades 6 through 8. The school’s hands-on curriculum cultivates high levels of student engagement, responsibility for learning, and enduring character growth. Learn more at www.mcauliffecharter.org