In Evanston, the location of your residence determines which school your kids attend.  In Boston and Cambridge, there is a lottery system that determines where your kids end up.  You list schools in order of preference.  If your first choice is oversubscribed, you get to try for your second choice.  But, at this point, people who listed your second choice as first are ahead of you.   This gives you the incentive to lie and perhaps put your true second choice as your first.  Because of these problems, Boston has changed its system to one that is resistant to such gaming (Al Roth, his students and co-authors have been at the forefront of this research and its application).

There is one other issue.  An obvious response to this lottery is just to get out.  Go to a suburb with better public schools where you are not subject to the random outcome of this strategic casino game.  The price you pay is extra property tax.  Or you might like living in cosmopolitan Boston or university-rich Cambridge.  Welcome to suburbia, former bohemian.  What impact does this have in the city you left behind?  I guess richer people leave.  Or people who do not get their first choice, presumably the best school in everyone’s ranking.  The more concerned parents are about education, the greater will be their outflow.

I guess it actually requires a model to work out the equilibrium impact on the quality of students left in each locale.  It would be surprising if it resulted in higher quality students in Casino School Districts.