School choice meets specific education needs
Which learning environment will help your child most?
To ensure we meet the needs of every student, JCPS offers an array of learning environments and educational opportunities:
- Most parents always have the option of sending their child to the school serving the student's address. This often is called the resides school by JCPS staff. Our easy-to-use School Finder can help if you need to determine your resides school.
- JCPS elementary schools are grouped in clusters of five to ten schools. If you're the parent of an elementary student, you might want him or her to attend another school within the cluster of elementary schools serving the student's address instead of the resides school. Why? Because a program might not be available at the resides school but is available at another school within its cluster. Contact your resides school for information on the schools in the cluster serving your address, or click here for more details
- A magnet school is a school that provides a specialized learning environment or focuses on a specific academic area. For example, Central High School Magnet Career Academy offers a program for students who want to focus on law and government. Most magnet schools accept students from anywhere in the District. If a student is accepted, JCPS offers bus transportation regardless of where the student lives. Some magnet schools accept students only from specific areas. A magnet program operates in the same way as a magnet school, but it's a program within a school. Magnet schools and programs are offered at all grade levels-elementary, middle, and high school.
- A traditional school is a type of magnet school that focuses on basic skills in a traditional learning environment that requires uniforms, daily homework, and parental involvement. A traditional program operates in the same way as a traditional school, but it's a program within a school. Traditional schooling is available for elementary, middle, and high school students.
- A magnet career academy is a type of high school that lets students focus on training for a specific career. For instance, Southern High School Magnet Career Academy lets students focus on transportation technology. Doss High School Magnet Career Academy lets students focus on training to become teachers. JCPS offers more than a dozen magnet career academies.
- A Montessori school uses the Montessori approach to learning, which encourages critical thinking, exploration, and self-directed education. Coleridge-Taylor Montessori Elementary and Kennedy Montessori Elementary are magnet schools. Rangeland Elementary offers a Montessori Program that serves students in the Rangeland cluster of elementary schools.
- An optional program is a small, specialized program within a school. Cane Run Elementary, for example, offers the Creative Arts and Global Communications Optional Program. Many other optional programs are available for elementary, middle, and high school students. JCPS provides transportation for students in an optional program only if they live in the school's attendance area.
- High school open enrollment gives all incoming ninth-grade students an extra opportunity to choose a school. It offers a student who isn't interested in magnet or optional choices the opportunity to apply to a high school other than his or her resides school.
For more information:
We'll send you a free booklet describing all the programs at all of our schools. Just call the JCPS Fact Line at 485-3228 and ask for the Choices! guidebook. Or you can download a PDF version of the guidebook right now: click here.
To download a PDF version of the 2008-09 Application for middle and high school magnet schools, magnet programs, magnet career academies, optional programs, and high school open enrollment, click here.
You also might want to visit the home page for the JCPS office of Optional, Magnet, and Advance Programs.
If you would like to visit a school before your child applies to it, just call the school, and the staff will be happy to schedule a personal tour.
How to apply
If your child is entering JCPS for the first time and you want him or her to attend the resides school-the school serving his or her address-you need to follow only the basic enrollment process. If you want your child to attend an optional or magnet school or program, you need to submit an application to the office of Optional, Magnet, and Advance Programs.
You can get an application by calling that office (485-3323) or by attending the JCPS Showcase of Schools, usually held in October at the Kentucky International Convention Center.
The elementary application period is offered throughout February. The middle and high school application period is offered during November, December, and early January.
JCPS staff members will help you with any part of the application process. Contact Optional, Magnet, and Advance Programs (485-3323) or the Parent Assistance Centers (485-6250 or 485-6771).
