City Schools of Decatur held its Pre-K lottery on March 10, and 73 residents are on the waiting list to enroll their children in College Heights Early Childhood Learning Center.

That’s up from last year’s lottery, which placed 47 residents on the wait list. There were 190 slots available, school spokeswoman Courtney Burnett said.

“We had a total of 47 residents on the wait list for the entire year last year,” Burnett said. “Of the 47 residents, 30 families were offered slots this year and 17 still remain on the wait list.”

Burnett answered several questions about the lottery in response to an inquiry from Decatur Metro. She said this will “probably” be the first year that kids on the wait list aren’t admitted before the start of the school year.

“This will be the first year that families who participated in the lottery ‘probably’ will not be offered a slot prior to the start of school,” she told Metro. “However, we currently have 17 residents on our 2013-14 wait list that never got off.”

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