Free to apply. Chosen by lottery.

PPS's dedicated program for accelerated learners, where admission requires scoring in the 99th percentile on a nationally normed test, and students consistently post above 95% Level 4 in both ELA and math with a 98% science pass rate in 2024. High school credit is available before grade 8 and twice-exceptional students are explicitly welcomed.

Tuition-free K–5 Spanish immersion on a 90/10 model, starting with core subjects almost entirely in Spanish and easing toward a bilingual balance in the upper grades, with Latin American literature, history, and art woven through. Admission is by neighborhood boundary or PPS lottery with 50% of immersion seats held for neighborhood families, and the pathway continues at West Sylvan Middle School.

Tuition-free K–5 Spanish immersion on a 90/10 model, with 3 ESL teachers supporting a student body that is 25% English learners and a campus built around a native plant garden, a multicultural food garden, and an outdoor classroom. Half of immersion seats are held for neighborhood families and the rest fill by PPS lottery.

Tuition-free K–5 Spanish immersion running as 1 of 2 tracks on a shared campus, with 90/10 instruction in kindergarten moving to 50/50 by 4th grade and no translation or repeated lessons between languages. Immersion seats fill by PPS lottery with half reserved for neighborhood families, and the pathway continues through Ockley Green Middle School to Roosevelt High School.

Portland Public Schools' flagship technical high school, recently modernized with dedicated wings for engineering, computer science, and health occupations — a true maker's high school where students build, wire, and prototype.

A tuition-free K–8 PPS focus option built on a constructivist, inquiry-driven model, where students build understanding through hands-on science projects.

A tuition-free K–5 public arts-focus school where dance, drama, and visual art are woven into the core curriculum every day.

Tuition-free K–8 Spanish immersion on a 90/10 model that reaches 50/50 by the middle grades, sharing a campus with a neighborhood English program. Half of immersion seats are held for neighborhood families and the rest fill by PPS lottery, and the K–8 structure keeps students in one community through 8th grade before Roosevelt High School.

Tuition-free K–5 Mandarin immersion on a 50/50 model that builds bilingual, biliterate, and bicultural students across core subjects. Now a co-located campus, the Mandarin strand admits by PPS lottery and feeds a full K–12 pathway through Harrison Park Middle School and Cleveland High School.

PPS's tuition-free 6–8 arts magnet, where studio art, theatre, dance, and music are built into the school day, not tacked on after.

Tuition-free PK–5 Mandarin immersion on a 50/50 model, with a direct pipeline from Albina Head Start's Mandarin preschool and a lottery grouped by current pre-K students and siblings, transfer Chinese speakers, Head Start families, and general applicants. The Mandarin track continues at Harriet Tubman Middle School.

A tuition-free 9–12 high school with a nationally renowned dance program, home to the Jefferson Dancers and JD II performance companies. The arts also run deep beyond dance, with theater, ceramics, photography, and a full slate of music ensembles.

Tuition-free K–5 and the home of Portland's only Russian immersion program, opening at 90% Russian in kindergarten and reaching 50/50 by 4th grade. The program serves native Russian and English speakers together and continues through Lane Middle School to Franklin High School, with graduates of the full K–12 sequence eligible for Portland State University's Russian Flagship Program.

Tuition-free K–5 that converted to a 100% Spanish immersion school in 2023-24, so every classroom runs the 90/10 model easing toward 50/50 in the upper grades. Neighborhood families register directly for guaranteed kindergarten seats while everyone else applies through the PPS lottery. The pathway continues at Kellogg Middle School.

A tuition-free K–12 PPS alternative program using the Expeditionary Learning model — one of Portland's longest-running progressive public schools.

A tuition-free K–8 PPS focus option where multi-age clusters live inside one historical era for the year, taking on period identities and building toward full-cluster performances and culmination events.

Tuition-free K–5 and Portland's flagship Japanese immersion school, running a 50/50 model since 1989 in which math, science, and social studies are taught across both languages. Admission is by PPS lottery at kindergarten with upper-grade entry only by proficiency when seats open, and the pathway runs through Mt. Tabor Middle School to Grant High School.

Tuition-free K–5 and the district's home for Vietnamese immersion, launched in 2012 on a 50/50 model: students spend half the day with a Vietnamese-speaking teacher and half with an English-speaking teacher, with each grade taught by a paired team across all core subjects. No prior Vietnamese is required and seats fill by PPS lottery. The school hosts an annual Tết festival, and feeds Roseway Heights Middle School and McDaniel High School.

Tuition-free K–5 Spanish immersion open only to neighborhood residents rather than the district-wide lottery, running 90/10 in kindergarten and reaching 50/50 by 4th grade with content taught in each language without translation. Neighborhood families opt in through the PPS lottery window in ParentVUE, and the pathway continues at Roseway Heights Middle School.

A tuition-free PPS K–8 focus option where yearly themes and the Storyline method turn each year into one long inquiry, and middle schoolers spend Thursdays doing field research around Portland.

A K–8 public focus option with a heavy STEM emphasis. Every Winterhaven middle schooler takes accelerated math, finishing with Algebra 1-2 for high school credit in 8th grade, and 8th graders take high school biology. The only STEAM focus option reached through the PPS lottery.

Tuition-free K–5 where each Mandarin immersion grade pairs a Chinese DLI teacher with an English DLI teacher, so core subjects are taught in both languages. Seats fill by PPS lottery, the parent nonprofit Shu Ren of Portland backs the program, and the pathway continues through Harrison Park Middle School to Cleveland High School.

A tuition-free K–12 public charter built for homeschooling families, with curriculum funds, certified-teacher support, and a flexible mix of home and on-campus learning.

Tuition-free K–5 Spanish immersion charter that opens at 90% Spanish and moves toward a balanced bilingual model by upper elementary, with Singapore Math and NGSS science both taught in Spanish. Admission is by independent lottery with priority for siblings and Beaverton district residents, and a second campus is planned for Tigard opening K–2 and adding a grade each year.

A 6–12 public magnet built entirely around STEM, where a full Career & Technical Education curriculum lets students specialize early in biotechnology, electronics, and engineering through hands-on, project-based labs.

Cascade Heights' defining feature is its adherence to the Core Knowledge Sequence, a highly specific, content-rich curriculum where students study distinct historical events, scientific concepts, and literature at precise grade levels to prevent knowledge gaps.

A half-day public charter where 11th and 12th graders dive into hands-on Career & Technical Education — engineering, computer science, and industry-partnered pathways — alongside their home high school. A pure maker's program.

A tuition-free PK–8 charter following the EL Education (Expeditionary Learning) model — learning organized around real-world, project-based expeditions.

An accelerated public charter where motivated students split their week between campus and Clackamas Community College, graduating with an average of 65 college credits, about 1.5 years of a degree, alongside a 96% 4-year graduation rate.

David Douglas Arthur Academy uses Direct Instruction, a structured mastery-learning model where reading, math, spelling, and language are taught through highly scripted, incremental lessons with frequent assessment.

HOLLA School is a tuition-free public charter in the Reynolds School District, created to “change the academic narratives” of Black, Brown, and Indigenous children through culturally responsive teaching and tight family partnership.

Tuition-free K–8 Chinese immersion charter with a model that shifts by grade band: 65% Chinese in K–2, an even split in grades 3–5, and 35% in middle school as students prepare for high school. Chinese and English teachers pair to synchronize lessons against ACTFL standards, Chinese-speaking staff work the front desk and lunch service, and the 2023-24 4th grade cohort ranked 1st statewide in both ELA and math.

KairosPDX weaves culturally responsive teaching into a curriculum designed to close opportunity gaps and foster joyful learning.

Tuition-free K–8 French immersion charter and IB Primary Years Programme school, with 80% of the day in French through 4th grade and Singapore Math throughout. Admission is by an independent blind lottery outside the PPS ranked choice system, with no preference for fluency or heritage speakers, and Spanish joins as a third language in 3rd grade.

Oregon's largest public Montessori charter (K-8), with AMI-trained guides, multi-age classrooms across 3 Gresham campuses, and a 4-day school week. Middle schoolers run a working greenhouse, go on multi-day expeditions, and operate a student micro-economy; younger students learn through long, uninterrupted work cycles and daily neighborhood walks to parks and the library.

A tuition-free 9–12 arts academy embedded inside Milwaukie High School, where every core class is taught through an arts lens to a small cohort of roughly 270 students, while the full MHS elective and athletics menu stays open. An updated arts center anchors the campus with a 500-seat auditorium, black box theatre, dance room, ceramics studio, and band/orchestra space.

MLA operates an elementary campus in Fairview and a middle-grade campus in Troutdale (both running on a 4-day M-TH week) offering a K–8 charter pathway that emphasizes Education for All, teaching to multiple learning modes, visual, auditory, and kinesthetic, and tailoring instruction to how individual students learn.

Portland Arthur Academy is a public charter school that delivers direct-instruction reading and math in a structured, sequential format, using the Reading Mastery phonics program for literacy and Connecting Math Concepts (CMC) for math.

A tuition-free Waldorf K–8 where subjects are taught in 3 to 4 week blocks instead of daily periods. Students knit, sew, and learn woodworking, study Spanish from 1st grade, and go outside twice a day plus a weekly hour of park play. No screens in the early grades and a junk-food-free campus.

A grades 6-8 option program where environmental science is the STEM: 6 core teachers integrate science, math, language arts, and social studies around systems, change, and sustainability. Students gather real field data for community partners on almost weekly site visits and present at the annual Science Expo.

A tuition-free K–8 charter built on place-based education — the island's farms, river, and wildlife refuge become the project-based classroom. Campus also includes a STEAM Lab where every students gets guaranteed time to bring projects from design to real world building.

Sherwood Charter School's defining feature is integrated thematic instruction.

A tuition-free K–8 charter using place-based, project-based learning anchored in environmental science, outdoor fieldwork, and school gardens.

A tuition-free K–8 charter built on place-based learning. Each trimester is one integrated project on a Portland social studies or science theme, taught through social-justice and eco-justice lenses.

A tuition-free K–5 PPS charter centered on the Project Approach — multi-age K/1, 2/3, and 4/5 classes run long investigations of real-world topics, with regular field studies on foot and by transit.

Tuition-free public Montessori for K–8 in North Portland: 3-year multi-age classrooms with 1 lead and 1 assistant, middle schoolers in a 2-teacher humanities and math cohort, and an anti-bias stance the school funds and names.

A tuition-free 4–8 charter where students pick a topic for a term-long Independent Projects, grades mix, and every teacher works with every student.