Understanding Schools

https://www.jefferson.kyschools.us/ The Jefferson County School Website

https://apps.jefferson.kyschools.us/demographics/schoolfinder.aspx School Finder

Applying for school in Jefferson County? Read this first.

If you don’t live in Louisville KY, you probably think that the neighborhood that you live in determines your school district, right? Well you would be wrong. Louisville works hard to make sure that it creates diversity in its school system. It is thought that the Jefferson County School System is the the largest district in the United States to be truly diversified. Although diversity does come at a price. A price that does make it a little more difficult to determine which school your child will attend.

First you need to know that Jefferson County School District is broken up into “clusters”. A cluster is a group of schools ranging from low scoring to award winning that a parent can register their child for based on their home address. Cluster schools are normally within 15 miles of the child's residence. In each cluster there will be a “resides” school assigned for each address in Jefferson County. The “resides” school is the school closest to your home.

Each cluster will have  traditional and or magnet schools associated with it. Traditional schools feature highly structured, back-to-basics teaching styles. They do adhere to a strict dress code policy and nightly homework is required. Magnet schools are dedicated to specialized learning environments (like Montessori) or focus on a specific subject (like performing arts, technology or health). In order to be considered for one of these schools you must enter a lottery for your desired school. Chances of acceptance are approximately 1 in 4 depending on which school you apply for.

If you have decided to apply for a normal cluster school you will need to determine which school you would prefer your child to attend. When you go online to register you will be asked a series of questions. The most important will be the order in which you wish to be considered for a school. You have to pick three schools and rank them in order of preference. When filing school assignments three factors will be considered: income, education of the parents, and minority status of the parents in census tracts. Once this has been taken into consideration, the letters of assignment will be mailed out.

If you’re not happy with the school that was selected for you, you can appeal the decision and ask for a transfer, although transfers can be hard to get. You can also choose to enroll your child in a local private school or if you really don’t like the school, people have been known to put their house on the market and move to Oldham County or Anchorage where your school is determined by your geographic location.