Exploring Attendance Area Scenarios

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While the optimal attendance scenarios in the Integrated Planning for School and Community (IPSAC) component may satisfy school board policy, there are always realities that must be considered that often cannot be formulated in the optimization model. The Operations Research and Education Laboratory (OREd) has developed tools that enable school districts to explore “what-if” attendance area scenarios that address specific student reassignment issues.

In most cases, relatively few attendance area scenarios survive as potential school redistricting plans after rigorous testing of optimization constraints. Understanding that student reassignments impact communities, bus routing patterns, roadway connectivity, and other factors that cannot be included in the model, OREd customizes a scenario builder tool so school districts can simulate “what-if” and further refine the attendance area scenarios.

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Once the optimal attendances are generated with constraints given to OREd, the scenario builder tool allows a school district’s redistricting study committee to evaluate the pros and cons of each proposal by using “what-if” scenarios. After the committee has exhausted all options using the scenario builder tool, a final plan is proposed and voted on by the school board.

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