Designing Secondary School Catchment Areas Using Goal Programming

Falling school rolls have necessitated the widespread revision öf school catchment areas. It is argued that an appropriate technique for solving this problem is weighted goal programming. A study of Reading has shown that this technique is feasible and can produce results that dominate those produced by the ad hoc methods of the local education authority. Since goal programming is a very flexible technique, various ways of developing this approach to designing catchment areas are considered. Among these developments are the inclusion of additional goals (such as safety, parental choice, and compactness), goal interaction, allowance for the effects of parental choice, multiperiod models incorporating school closures, and the allocation of entire primary schools. The effects of the redefinition of the decision variable to require the joint allocation of the boys and girls at the same primary school are investigated using data for Reading.