The high school admissions process, which was overhauled last year and resulted in 14,500 eighth-graders being stranded without a high school, was smoother and more effective this year, Schools Chancellor Joel Klein said yesterday.

Despite some improvements, the process was far from perfect: 10,200 students didn’t get into any of the 12 high schools they listed on their applications and must enter a “supplementary” round of admissions.

The chairwoman of the City Council’s Committee on Education, Eva Moskowitz, praised the department for improving its success rate, but said more work needs to be done.

“More high school students will attend schools of their choice next year, and the Department of Education deserves credit for this accomplishment,” she said in a statement. “Families are also receiving notification about assigned schools earlier, which is crucially important to a successful transition from middle to high school for New York City public school students.”

But she said the process is still “Byzantine” and “this system’s supply is a long way from meeting the demand for quality high school options.”

The president of the principals union, Jill Levy, was more critical.

“I think they should stop wasting their time and our money compiling useless statistics and deal with the 10,000 students that are without placement,” she said in a telephone interview. “This is a public relations hype that they don’t need to waste paper and time on.”

Moreover, she said, the process doesn’t seem more effective than the one it replaced.

Standing in front of rainbow-colored bar graphs demonstrating improvements in the admissions process, Mr. Klein yesterday emphasized the positives.

Mr. Klein said 33,143 students were admitted to their top-choice school, representing a gain of about 5% versus last year and an increase of almost 50% versus two years ago, before the new process was implemented.

He also said 58,176 students, or 64% of those who applied, were admitted to one of their three top schools, and 70,048 students, or 77%, were admitted to one of their top five choices.

The number of students being forced into the supplementary round dropped by 29%, he said, adding that there are good slots available for those students, particularly in the new small schools the administration plans to launch in the fall.

Although there was limited demand for the newest small schools that were announced on February 1 – only 3,765 students changed their choices after the announcement to apply for one of the schools – the chancellor said demand was growing for the maturing small schools.

Last year, there were 53,290 applications to the small schools that opened in the falls of 2003 and 2004. This year, those schools received 84,241 applications. Now, there is more demand for the maturing small schools than for average high schools.

“The good news is we’re here a lot earlier this year,” Mr. Klein said. “The process is moving much more effectively and efficiently, and the better news is we’re getting really good results.”

In the next few days, the city’s eighth-graders will find out from their guidance counselors whether they are among the 80,481 who were admitted to a high school or among the 10,200 who didn’t get into any school.

The students who were not admitted to any school will be placed at a school by April 22, six weeks before students in the final round were notified last spring.