Tex. Education Code § 12.117

(a) For admission to an open-enrollment charter school, the governing body of the school shall:

(1) require the applicant to complete and submit the common admission application form described by Section 12.1173 not later than a reasonable deadline the school establishes; and

(2) on receipt of more acceptable applications for admission under this section than available positions in the school:

(A) fill the available positions by lottery; or

(B) subject to Subsection (b), fill the available positions in the order in which applications received before the application deadline were received.

(b) An open-enrollment charter school may fill applications for admission under Subsection (a)(2)(B) only if the school published a notice of the opportunity to apply for admission to the school. A notice published under this subsection must:

(1) state the application deadline; and

(2) be published in a newspaper of general circulation in the community in which the school is located not later than the seventh day before the application deadline.

(c) An open-enrollment charter school authorized by a charter granted under this subchapter to a municipality:

(1) is considered a work-site open-enrollment charter school for purposes of federal regulations regarding admissions policies that apply to open-enrollment charter schools receiving federal funding; and

(2) notwithstanding Subsection (a), may admit children of employees of the municipality to the school before conducting a lottery to fill remaining available positions, provided that the number of children admitted under this subdivision constitutes only a small percentage, as may be further specified by federal regulation, of the school's total enrollment.

(d) Notwithstanding Section 12.111(a)(13), an open-enrollment charter school may admit a child of an employee of the school as provided by this section regardless of whether the child resides in the geographic area served by the school.