Hillsborough Slows Down School Redistricting Plan: See How This Impacts Students

HILLSBOROUGH, NJ — The school district is taking its foot off the gas, but only slightly, when it comes to its redistricting plans in preparation for full-day kindergarten for the 2026-27 school year in Hillsborough.

Superintendent Michael Volpe said at the Dec. 22 Board of Education(BOE) meeting that while redrawing the school boundary lines and taking into account the upcoming housing developments, it became clear that plans needed to change.

"What we decided to do is to slow down the redistricting a little bit and shift so that we get to a more balanced approach and then reassess in a few years," said Assistant Superintendent Joel Handler, who is spearheading the redistricting process.

Handler said the district noticed that the timelines for the coming housing developments were not coming online all at the same time.

"Looking at that, we decided that maximizing or trying to push all the students to the other schools to allow space for the new students coming in when they weren’t coming in a timeframe was not in the best interest of the district," said Handler.

Updated construction projections show an immediate impact from three new housing developments to the school district, according to a video shown at the BOE meeting.

The Enclave at Roycebrook is expected to bring 33 new students into the Amsterdam Elementary area. Campus Associates will add 14 students to Sunnymead, and the Hillmont development adds another 26 students to Woods Road.

This is a total of 73 new students in the summer or fall at Hillsborough.

The new plan will follow a "dimmer switch" approach rather than "flipping a switch." Whereas a phased approach will be implemented.

The phasedapproach will follow three steps:

• Step 1 - Address immediate enrollment pressures from new developments
• Step 2 - Keep open rooms in schools for future anticipated growth
• Step 3 - Expand boundaries incrementally as other developments come online

The plan also promised that any future boundary adjustments would not send any previously redistricted students to another school.

"We’re talking about a phased-in redistricting that is going to happen this fall. And then maybe two to three years, we're going to change those boundaries again as these developments come online," said Volpe. "I want to assure you that we are not going to ping pong kids. Once a kid is captured in their new school. That is going to be their new school, and they are not going to be sent to a third school."

The plan for the fall takes into account three housing developments, and then, when the additional two housing developments move forward, the district will revisit its plan.

"We don't want to cause a problem. We don’t want the cure to be worse than the illness here," said Volpe. "We are playing it smart. We are playing it slow. And we are playing it kid-centered."

See the full presentation and new phased redistricting plan below:

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