Tomorrow's Journal Sentinel reports that a legislative committee shot down proposed rules to allocate school choice seats when enrollment hits the cap. The Department of Public Instruction had proposed the rules in the hopes of reducing the impact of the caps--for example, by giving priority to siblings.
By contrast, it appears that without the rules the impact will be harsher. Apparently, schools would estimate their enrollments, the estimates would be totaled, and if the total exceeded the cap all allocations would be reduced by the same percentage. This would seem to create a huge incentive to game the system: schools that overestimated their expected enrollment would see less of a cut than those who submitted a more honest estimate. At the end, it is possible that some schools would have to turn away students while others had unfilled seats.
Oddly, it seems clear that the committee rejected the proposed rules at the behest of school choice advocates. Apparently they hope that a messier implementation will create pressure on Governor Doyle to raise the caps. I am skeptical, but hope I am proven wrong. I expect the governor to blame any mess on the Republicans who control the legislature and the school choice advocates.
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