EVALUATING SCHOOL FACILITY CAPACITY AND ATTENDANCE BOUNDARIES USING ALARGE-SCALE ASSIGNMENT ALGORITHM

With over 260 schools and almost 200,000 students, the Houston Indepen dent School District (HISD) represents one of the largest school syste ms in the United States. Population growth, geographic shifts in the p opulation, and historic policies have all contributed to a less than d esirable distribution of students within the district. Following a bri ef discussion of the problem faced by HISD, an algorithm for use in ev aluating competing school capacity plans is described. The potential i mpact of this algorithm is discussed both for HISD and for other schoo l districts facing similar problems. (C) 1997 Elsevier Science Ltd.