Highlands Elementary School families are taking a stand against Naperville Unit District 203’s latest boundary change scenarios that would send as many as 176 Highlands students to other schools.

Parents say they don’t see why their neighborhoods are being divided, and one parent has even started a petition seeking the resignation of Superintendent Mark Mitrovich.

“It’s a community, it isn’t just a school. And they haven’t offered any kind of compelling reason for this,” parent DeAnn Kerr said of the proposed changes.

The district’s enrollment committee currently is studying ways to redraw district boundaries in order alleviate overcrowding at some north-side schools like Beebe and Mill Street elementary schools and also make room for schools to implement new programs like the proposed all-day kindergarten.

After a firestorm from parents district-wide over hypothetical boundary scenarios released last month, district officials say they are trying to keep neighborhoods intact, cause the least disruption and allow students who walk to continue to do so. A recent enrollment committee meeting convinced several former critics the district now is heading in the right direction.

Friday, the district released three draft maps showing changes that would move 6 percent of students throughout the district. But those 6 percent include either 147 or 176 Highlands students who would move to either Maplebrook or Meadow Glens elementary schools.

Highlands parents say, while they understand district boundaries need to change, they don’t believe the proposed swaps makes sense for their school since it is not over capacity and isn’t being used to alleviate overcrowding at other schools.

“Highlands is not overcrowded so why they are moving kids out of our neighborhood and not moving anyone in doesn’t seem sensible to me,” parent Jason Bednar said.

Enrollment projections show Highlands is currently right at its capacity of 600 students. Consultants provided the district with low, medium and high enrollment projections for the next five years that show the school staying under capacity if nearly all of the low or medium projections become reality. It would be overcapacity as soon as next year if the high-end projections came true.

Parent Sandy Cho has a child with special needs and said the friendships her family has made at Highlands have been “pivotal, lifesaving” and she would hate to see such a strong community divided.

Some parents like Kerr are questioning whether the high-performing school is being split up in order to help boost test scores at other schools.

“I sense the district wants to level the playing field by shipping us off to another school while … what we should do is take what we’ve done so successfully at Highlands and use it at another school,” Kerr said.

Laura Anderson’s son would switch from Highlands to Maplebrook under two of the proposed scenarios despite living closer to other elementary schools. Anderson said she does not want her son to have to ride the bus for 30 to 40 minutes twice a day or have to cross busy intersections like Washington and 75th Street to get to and from school.

“If change is necessary absolutely we are willing to do our part and embrace that, but this doesn’t t seem like a great solution,” Anderson said.

Jason Moede has became so frustrated with the boundary change process he started an online petition late Sunday night calling for Mitrovich to resign. Moede said the situation “has been mishandled from moment one.”

“He’s done a disservice to district in a big way and it’s clear he’s either A, completely out of touch or B, pushing an agenda not in the best interest of the kids,” Moede said of Mitrovich.

As of noon Tuesday, 124 people had signed the petition.

Asked about the effort, Director of Communications Susan Rice replied, “It’s the right of the individual to take such a step.”

Rice also addressed some of the specific concerns lodged by parents and reiterated that no plan will make everyone happy.

“The process is not about individual capacity of a single (school), but the balance of the entire district and the ability to provide quality programming now and in the future,” Rice said.

She said there are multiple factors that go into making boundary shifts including the need to accommodate magnet programs as well as ensuring there is enough space not only for the students who currently attend a particular school, but those who reside within the school’s attendance area and could attend in the future.

Rice also shot down speculation about moving Highlands students to redistribute their high-performers.

“At no time did the committee look at testing scores … at any schools as criteria for making changes,” she said, adding the other elementary schools also have strong academics.

As for transportation, she said the students who would move out of Highlands already take the bus to school so no current walkers would be switching to bus riders.

The district’s enrollment committee will meet at 6:30 p.m. Wednesday at Washington Junior High to continue to study boundary maps. Community members are allowed to attend as observers. The group is expected to update the school board when it meets at 7 p.m. Jan. 23.

The district has tentatively scheduled public input sessions for late January and early February with an eye toward holding a school board vote Feb. 21.