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September 11, 2024

I am excited to announce that the School District of Philadelphia’s Find Your Fit school selection process for the 2025-2026 school year opens this Friday September 13, 2024 at 4:00 pm. The Find Your Fit school selection process allows students currently in pre-kindergarten through 11th grade to apply to attend any District school, with available space, outside of their neighborhood or catchment area for the following school year. The application will close on October 23, 2024 at 11:59 pm.

As we shared last month, there are a number of important changes to the school selection process that the District put in place to better account for student preference, provide more students with an initial offer, facilitate more acceptances in a shorter amount of time, and result in an overall reduction in the time it will take to fill open seats across our schools. We also implemented a new school selection system, in collaboration with our technology provider Avela, that will streamline and simplify the application process. I encourage all students and families who are planning to participate in school selection, to review these updates and changes before submitting an application.

In addition to these changes and our new system, we have also planned activities and developed helpful resources to assist you throughout the Find Your Fitschool selection process:

Learn More About School Selection:

• Application Assistance Labs: The Find Your FitS chool Selection team is offering Application Assistance Labs at schools across the city for families during the application window. Please visit the school selection website for the hours and locations of upcoming labs.
• How-To-Guides: The How-To-Guides are step-by-step documents that describe various actions that families will need to take when completing an online application. The guides can be found here with language translations coming soon.
• School Selection Town Halls: Watch the school selection town hall recordings, to learn more about the overall school selection and application process.

Learn More About Criteria-Based High Schools:

• New School Search Tool: Our new, user-friendly school search tool, called Explore, provides comprehensive information about each school.
• Criteria-Based High School Open Houses: Visit schools in-person and virtually, meet the staff, and learn more about the school culture. View the list of upcoming open houses here.
• Philly School Fair: The 2024 K-12 Philly School Fair is an opportunity for students and families to interact with the schools and programs available in the city, ask questions, and understand application requirements and deadlines. The fair serves as a one-stop-shop for public, charter, and private high schools to display promotional materials, videos, contact information, and post school-led virtual events. Learn more about the fair here.
• 2025-2026 High School Directory: The 2025-2026 High School Directory is also available, which provides a complete list of the various high school programs and experiences within our District and their locations. Students can search the directory to find the academic, school specialty, athletic, extracurricular and Career and Technical Education (CTE) programs available at each high school across Philadelphia.

We invite you to find answers to your additional questions at the school selection website. After reviewing the website, if you are unable to find the answers you need, please reach out to us via our two-way communication platform, Let’s Talk, by clicking the Contact Us tab at the bottom of the school selection website. We ask for your patience as we usually experience higher-than-normal call and email volume at this time of the year.

Thank you for choosing the School District of Philadelphia for your child’s education. We look forward to supporting you and your child throughout the Find Your Fit school selection process for the 2025-2026 school year. We are committed to partnering with you to prepare them to imagine and realize any future they desire.

In Partnership,

Tony B. Watlington Sr., Ed.D.
Superintendent
The School District of Philadelphia