Service: Algorithmic school registrations

In many Belgian cities, there are problems when registering children for schools, especially when a lot of parents want to register their children at the same school. This has led to parents spending several nights in tents outside schools so that they can be the first to register their children. In response to this situation, which was considered unfair, several cities started organizing school registration via a central online system that uses an algorithm to decide in which school a child can be registered. In the system for primary schools, that is used in Leuven, a city east of Brussels, a number of variables are taken into account. On the basis of the answers given by the parents to a series of questions relating to the education level of the mother and whether or not the student receives a grant, students are then divided into ‘indicator students’ and ‘non-indicator students’. An indicator student is a student who is defined as having fewer life chances and is based upon the level of education of the mother and if the student is eligible for an education allowance. Further categorization happens on the basis of two criteria: distance from home to school and preference of school. The schools can decide how much weight they assign to distance and preference i.e. between 30%, 50%, or 70% for each (Meldjeaan, 2020). This weight can differ between cities, for instance, in Antwerp the schools have to assign a minimum of 50% to the distance criterium. For secondary schools, some cities also use an online registration system, which uses an algorithm to decide which school the child will go to. However, the system is not the same as for primary schools. As not every municipality has a secondary school, the distance criterium is considered discriminatory and, therefore, it is not taken up (Dierickx and Berlanger, 2019). The system does take into account priority students (i.e., children of the staff of the school) and indicator-students (see above). The algorithm works randomly on the basis of the first choice in three rounds (Aanmelden school, 2020). As the system does not take distance into account, this has led to situations where students from Brussels took up places in Flemish secondary schools outside of Brussels, and children, living close to the school not getting in and having to be registered in schools much farther away (Dierickx and Berlanger, 2019).