Under the plan, families could apply outside their attendance area only to designated citywide programs, including language immersion, K-8 schools and special education. A competing proposal would have allowed families to apply to any school with available seats.

Superintendent Maria Su urged the board to adopt the more restrictive approach, known as Option C, after previously expressing reservations about a major enrollment overhaul. The vote aligned her with a board majority on a consequential district policy and widened a divide among parents and political allies who broadly agree that the current lottery is difficult and unpredictable.

Board Vice President Jaime Huling called the vote a turning point for families. But Rebecca Kee, executive director of the school-choice advocacy group SF Parents, said members were grieving the loss of their preferred option and felt caught off guard by the shift in support. The group had backed the alternative allowing applications to any school with room.

Supporters argue that guaranteed neighborhood seats could make school access more predictable, including for families who enroll late because of homelessness or recent arrival in the city. Board member Matt Alexander, who introduced the resolution, said district leaders must consider students whose families are not able to navigate school-choice options.

Opponents question whether the district can improve neighborhood schools quickly enough to keep families from seeking alternatives outside SFUSD. Board member Alida Fisher warned that current resources and neighborhood demographics shaped by historic zoning could leave some schools segregated without additional action. Nancy Tung, chair of the San Francisco Democratic Party and a parent in Portola, said her local school’s test scores do not give her confidence in its ability to educate her children.

The district’s own projections point to practical challenges: 19 of 58 attendance areas do not have enough kindergarten seats for resident children, a combined shortage of about 320 seats. At the same time, SFUSD has roughly 14,000 vacant seats across the system. Redrawing attendance boundaries could address about half the shortage; district staff have said that resolving the remainder would require converting some citywide schools to neighborhood schools, reducing the programs available to families outside their areas.

School funding is tied largely to enrollment, so schools with fewer students generally have less money and fewer teachers. Some under-enrolled schools combine grades in one classroom. The district says attendance boundaries, program changes and a draft policy will be presented in March before the board’s planned April vote.

The debate also carries consequences for school integration. San Francisco’s current system, adopted in 2010, lets families rank schools citywide and gives priority to students from designated Census Tract Integration Preference areas. Those areas include parts of the city with historically low test scores. The district has not decided what role that priority will play under the new model, and the boundaries that will determine neighborhood assignments have not yet been drawn.

San Francisco has repeatedly changed its school-assignment policies amid efforts to address segregation. A federal court found in 1971 that the district had intentionally drawn segregated attendance zones. A later citywide choice system was intended in part to reduce racial isolation, but district officials said elementary schools were more segregated in 2019 than they had been three decades earlier.

Su acknowledged that rebuilding confidence and improving schools would take years. Deputy Superintendent John Davis told the board that a districtwide transition of this kind could take five to 10 years or longer, adding that assignment rules alone cannot create strong schools. Principals’ union representative Anna Klafter also urged the district to ensure schools have the resources to serve students who may become more concentrated in particular neighborhoods.

The board’s next steps will determine how boundaries are set, which programs remain open citywide and what becomes of integration priorities. For families, the central question is whether the district can deliver stronger schools before the new system narrows their options.