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Finding the right school for your child is just a click away.

The admissions process to get into a school in NYC (especially public schools) can feel like Harry Potter’s Hogwarts: ever-shifting and labyrinth-like.  Some schools require admissions tests for kids as early as pre-k, others are basically closed to you if you live out of zone. There are lotteries, applications, phone calls and tours.  Then comes the research. It’s enough to cause any parents’ head to spin. We recently discovered some school review sites and test prep sites that are designed to make this process a little easier by providing insider tips, test prep examples, and search tools to help you find excellent schools in your neighborhood. Good luck! (We can all use it!)

1. For Testing:
These days kids are tested as early as 4 years old to determine their placement in pre-kindergarten. This can be stressful for both kids and their parents as they try to figure out how to prepare for a school’s admissions. Testing Mom, an online resource for parents, is designed to help parents through the testing process by providing them with daily test prep questions and materials, education experts, home assessments and much more.

Stated by Karen Quinn, creator of the test prep game IQ Fun Park and author of Testing For Kindergarten, and Michael McCurdy, a daddy blogger who founded the Gifted & Talented NYC blog, Testing Mom is designed to prepare children for standardized tests as well as improve their performance.

To test out the site, you can sign up for a free trial where you will get over 5,000 plus downloadable practice questions. I recently tested out the site and received tons of practice questions for tests such as Otis-Lennon School Abilities Test (OLSAT), Cognitive Abilities Test – CogAT Practice Test and CAT test (CogAT), Educational Records Bureau (ERB), Bracken School Readiness Assessment (Bracken) , WISC, Stanford-Binet, etc. I was pretty amazed that they provided so many examples for children to practice as well as strategies to help in admissions for public and private schools and gifted programs. Additionally, the site features a kindergarten prep kit, test prep product reviews, online seminars, tips, access to experts who can answer your specific testing questions, and daily emails with tips and practice tests. For additional information, follow their tweets at @TestingMom and click here for additional information.

2. For Finding Public Schools:
Many people think that there are only good schools in expensive areas in the Brooklyn or the city. However, there are tons of amazing public schools within affordable areas – but the problem is you have to locate them. School Fisher, an online school search resource, is designed to help New York families find excellent public elementary schools within their neighborhoods.

Created by Eric Grannis, a founding Board Member of the Bronx Preparatory Charter School, School Fisher not only makes searching for schools easier but the site has its own grading system: not the one established by the New York City Department of Education’s grading system, which the website calls “useless.”

To use the site, users provide basic information (apartment size and maximum price), and the site displays all of the high-performing public schools in neighborhoods that match the search criteria. The site also offers information about these schools, guidance on how to evaluate that information and links to apartments near those schools. Users will also find tips on how to apply to charter school, information about schools, guidance on how to evaluate that information, links to apartments near those schools, a blog on education, and an online forum and real estate. For additional information, please click here.

3. For finding reviews of public schools and school news:
Insideschools.org is an independent resource featuring news, school reviews, and information about public education in New York City.

Through Insideschools.org, users can find reviews about public schools in New York City, search for schools based on a zip code, borough, or for specific grade levels. Parents and users are then given a list of schools including staff reviews and what they liked about a school after a visit. You will also see a list of unzoned schools located throughout the city and outside your immediate neighborhood or district. This can be good to know if you can’t find a good school option near your home or if you are looking for specialized schools outside of your district.

Through the site users will also find a forum, news section, informative articles, and a marketplace for classified ads and books. For additional information, please click here.

4. For questions about schools:
When you are looking for a new school for your kids there are always questions that will come up during the research phase such as: what curriculum does a school focus on, what are the teachers like, what is the class size, etc. You can learn a little about a school from their website or through a tour but to really understand a school you will need more insight from other parents who already have children in these schools or those that are going through the admissions process themselves.  A great way to have your questions answered is through the online community called The School Boards.

For Brooklyn, the site featured pages of topics like kindergarten admissions and wait lists, new high school openings, charter schools, testing, gifted and talented programs, budget cuts, playgrounds, issues with principals and teachers, and much more! Through this free online network parents can honestly connect and share information in order to find the best schools for their children. Simply register online – providing some basic information and start a discussion, join in on one or simply look around and gather information. For additional information, please click here.

5. For information about schools in Brooklyn:
Joyce Szuflita, school consultant at NYC School Help and our School Expert, is always on top of what is going on within the NYC school system. She offers numerous consulting services to parents to help them through the NYC school admission process covering Brooklyn nursery schools through Brooklyn high schools. She also has several informative talks throughout the year where parents can learn in detail about the preschool and kindergarten admissions process, public schools and prep for the NY High School Fair. Szuflita also has a blog packed with current information about education, curriculum, the Department of Education, various schools, testing and much more. For additional information and to sign up for her newsletter, please click here.

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