Palouse Prairie Charter School (PPCS) is a public independent charter school that serves students in kindergarten through 8th grade, with a total capacity of 222. The school is free and open to all Idaho students, regardless of race, color, national origin, ethnicity, religion, gender, socioeconomic status, or special needs.
As established by Idaho code 33-5206, PPCS holds an enrollment lottery each spring for those classes where the number of applicants exceeds the available seats. Information about the lottery, tour dates for prospective families, and lottery applications will be available on our website beginning each January after winter break. The deadline to submit lottery applications is 24 hours before the lottery takes place. The lottery will be held on the last Friday in March. The public is welcome to attend.
Once enrolled in the school, the student is guaranteed placement until graduation or departure. Each February, an Intent to Return form will be sent to currently enrolled families asking them to confirm whether they’ll be returning or not. This lets us know how many seats are available in the lottery.
In preparation for the lottery, the names, grades, siblings and a preference code will be printed on a card for each lottery applicant. Preference codes are used for sorting after the cards are drawn. Higher preference cards are moved above lower preference cards, while maintaining the drawn order. Preference codes are based on the following:
- Code A
- A child of a school founder (no more than ten percent of the student body)
- A child of a full-time employee
- A child who attended the school within the previous three years but who withdrew as a result of relocation due to sabbatical, employment, or military transfer/reassignment
- Code B
- A sibling of a currently enrolled student
- Code C
- A child who lives within the district and is none of the above
- A child of active military, currently out of state, who will be moving to Idaho
- Code D
- A child who lives outside of the district and is none of the above
On the day of the lottery, a neutral third party will conduct the drawing, first selecting cards each with a grade written on it. This decides the order in which the grades are to be drawn. Then the individual draws the applicant cards from each grade. After a grade’s applicants are drawn, the drawn order is written on each card, then the cards are re-ordered based on preference code, within the initial drawn order. The new order number is written on each card. Students for whom seats are available become enrolled students.
When two siblings are entered as applicants but have no currently enrolled sibling, they will both have the same non-sibling code. After a grade’s applicants are drawn and re-ordered by preference code, the cards of applicants who became enrolled (for whom a seat was available) are reviewed for sibling names. If a newly enrolled applicant has a sibling in a grade that has not yet been drawn, the sibling’s code is changed to B – A sibling of a currently enrolled student. Then the drawing continues.
When a seat is not available for an applicant, they are placed on a waitlist in the final order. The waitlist is maintained all year but does not carry over to future years. Families will be notified within a few days of the lottery results. An email will be sent requesting families confirm acceptance of their child’s placement and provide a digital signature by a given deadline. When a seat is declined or a family fails to respond after two more attempts to reach them, the next family on the waitlist will be contacted.
After the lottery, a post-lottery enrollment application will be available on the school’s website. Students are enrolled in classes when space is available and added to the waitlist when the class is full. Please feel free to contact the office with questions at office@palouseprairieschool.org.