EducationNews.org

Few topics in public education evoke as much angst as student assignment.

In Raleigh, sudden, drastic changes have led to community turmoil, with protests and arrests at school board meetings.

That's what the Charlotte-Mecklenburg Board of Education hopes to avoid with a review that starts Monday. The board is asking citizens to weigh in on broad guidelines before it proposes any changes in where kids go to school in 2011-12.

Stakes are high. School boundaries can shape property values, community identity and support for public education.

Today's CMS student assignment system has its roots in the 2002 "choice plan," which emerged as an alternative to court-ordered desegregation. Students were assigned to neighborhood schools, with magnets and some other options for those who didn't like their assignments.

But schools in affluent suburban neighborhoods quickly overflowed into encampments of mobile classrooms. Meanwhile, families fled schools in low-income areas, leaving many schools with rising poverty levels and plunging test scores.

The guidelines that have evolved since then embrace a range of values: Stability, diversity, schools close to home, logical planning.