Chapel Hill – Carrboro City Schools is early on in discussions about redistricting.

The school board plans to establish a team for the redistricting of students for the 2021-22 school year.

Assistant Superintendent Patrick Abele said at a school board meeting last month that they intend to be as transparent as possible during this process.

“We do have several schools within our school zone that are currently overcrowding,” he said. “Although our long-term projections do not anticipate expected growth within the district, it’s because of overcrowding, some buildings being overcrowded, some buildings underutilized where space is available.”

According to the 2021-2022 Student Assignment Plan, students will be reassigned based on academic performance, socioeconomic indicators, demographics and program options.

A detailed timeline, available on the CHCCS website, lays out time for community and school engagement meetings along with a community feedback period.

Abele said they wanted to start the process with plenty of time to tackle the large task at hand.

“There’s a tremendous amount of work that has to happen behind the scenes, but we wanted to start planning  and putting information out to the board and to the public as well,” said Abele.

James Barrett, who has served on the CHCCS school board for eight years, said he wants to make sure that ample time is allotted for community engagement.

“I don’t have a problem with the timeline, although I think that you’ve got perhaps too much work in the background and not enough time for public engagement,” he said.

A quick link for student reassignment information is available at chccs.org.