NY parents at wit’s end over elite-HS test mess

City parents are in a last-minute frenzy trying to help their kids finish this year’s murky, glitch-prone process of applying for the specialized high-school entrance exam.

With the crucial test set to be administered this weekend, some parents are learning of their children’s exam details only this week.

“What kind of confidence do you have in a system where these issues are happening in real time for a test that is happening this weekend?” Elissa Stein, an application consultant at local firm High School 411, told The Post Tuesday.

The Specialized High School Admissions Test (SHSAT) is currently the sole entry determinant for the city’s top public high schools.

Before last year, applications were handled primarily by school guidance counselors, who assisted the kids and their parents with the daunting process.

But registration must now go through a city Department of Education Web site, which parents and test-preppers say is confusing and mistake-prone.

Last year, applicants and their families had the benefit of knowing when signing up what time the exam would be administered. But the time option has been removed — and parents said the switch makes it difficult to prepare for what can be a pivotal day in their children’s lives.

It didn’t help that the Web site crashed Monday, greeting parents with a page reading: “Under Maintenance: MySchools is currently under maintenance. Please check back in a little later today,’’ said Frances Kweller of Kweller Prep in Queens.

She said her company has been inundated with calls this week from confused and concerned parents.

DOE officials “are setting an unnecessarily high bar for people to take this test,” she griped.

Ivan Khan of Khan’s Tutorial test preparation added, “I’ve had more parents running to us this year than any year before about the process.”

But the DOE insisted Tuesday that the vast majority of its SHSAT applications have proceeded smoothly and said test and admissions consultants have a vested interest in fanning discontent with the process.

“This afternoon, 18,500 students’ SHSAT tickets [which indicate testing dates, times and locations] were successfully downloaded, and we released tickets the week of the test — the exact same as in previous years,” DOE spokesman Will Mantell said in a statement.

“All students who registered will be able to take the SHSAT this weekend, and families are happy to have a one-stop shop to learn about school options and apply on any computer or mobile device.”

[Officials] are setting an unnecessarily high bar for people to take this test. — Frances Kweller, who runs a test-prep firm