Dive Brief:

• Some have worried the New York City Department of Education was going to back off of a controversial plan to change the makeup of three schools on the Upper West Side and in part of Harlem, but department officials said they will move forward.
• The New York Times reports 11 school zones will be redrawn but two predominantly wealthy and white schools on the Upper West Side and one predominantly poor and black/Latino school in Harlem will be most affected.
• The school in Harlem is under-enrolled while one of the schools in the Upper West Side is overcrowded, and the rezoning would rebalance enrollment while also forcing greater integration between the disparate communities — though some parents have already threatened to sue if the plan moves forward.

Dive Insight:

Redrawing attendance boundaries is one of the most controversial undertakings upon which any district can embark. But population changes inevitably require adjustments as school attendance zones gain and lose students at different rates. In Chicago, massive school closings in 2012 were, at face value, addressing population losses in the city’s predominantly black and Latino communities that left schools severely under capacity. Maintaining buildings is expensive and extracurricular activities are limited when there aren’t enough students to field clubs and teams.

In New York City, highly segregated schools have been a target of education activists. The city’s Department of Education has largely left schools to make their own enrollment changes to encourage integration, but redrawing attendance zones is one way to improve diversity at a more systemic level.