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Ignore the school boundary changes recently proposed for northern and central Prince George's County — Superintendent William Hite Jr. announced Monday that the school system will instead focus on five priority schools and the schools that feed into them.

The schools — Barack Obama Elementary in Upper Marlboro, Charles Carroll Middle School in New Carrollton, Calverton Elementary School in Beltsville, Whitehall Elementary School in Bowie and Thomas Johnson Middle School in Lanham — will be the center of the plan. Obama Elementary is set to open in the 2010-2011 school year.

Feeder schools connected to the five priorities will also be impacted to level out enrollment in congested pockets of the county, Hite said at the school board's biannual retreat Monday.

The boundary changes are the second phase of a countywide plan to level out enrollment. The current changes are focused on elementary and middle schools. In the first round of boundary changes, which addressed elementary and middle schools in southern parts of the county last year, eight schools were closed. The third and final round of boundary realignments will address county high schools and could start as soon as next week. A tentative community forum is scheduled Jan. 11 at Laurel High School to garner suggestions from residents about high school overcrowding.

The overhauled boundary plan will be released today, according to the school board's agenda. Officials would only say that the plans focus on five priority schools and did not provide details about what changes are proposed at the schools.

Of the priority schools, Charles Carroll Middle School is underenrolled at 87 percent capacity with 744 students. However, the real problem is in the elementary schools that feed into Carroll, Hite said, which vary in utilization from 85 to 135 percent. Carroll's feeder schools include Beacon Heights in Riverdale, Carrollton in New Carrollton, Glenridge in Landover, Woodridge in Hyattsville and Lamont in New Carrollton.

One of the other priorities, Calverton Elementary, which feeds into Buck Lodge and Martin Luther Jr. middle schools in Adelphi and Beltsville respectively, is overenrolled at 131 percent with 733 students. While details of the plan were not given, Hite did say moving sixth-graders from Calverton to both middle schools would ease overcrowding.

Whitehall Elementary is overenrolled at 119 percent capacity with 433 students this year.

Thomas Johnson Middle School is underenrolled with just 68 percent capacity at 631 students.

Board members agreed that Thomas Johnson Middle presents a unique challenge, as the majority of its feeder schools, which include Gaywood, Glendale and James McHenry elementary schools, are all overcrowded and range between 116 and 126 percent capacity.

Board Member Rosalind Johnson (Dist. 1) said she has been curious about Thomas Johnson's chronic underenrollment for several years.

"You see the kids walking to elementary schools in packs and then it's just a trickle to the middle school," she said of Thomas Johnson.

Dist. 2 board member Heather Iliff blamed the school's low attendance on its recent performance on state assessments.

Thomas Johnson teachers were replaced by "highly qualified" teachers among seven county schools in 2008, as part of plan enforced by the state board of education to increase test scores after failing to meet adequate yearly progress for several years.

Thomas Johnson also failed to make adequate yearly progress last year, which measures a schools progress on the state assessments and other factors, such as attendance. Approximately 43 percent of students passed the math portion of state tests and 66 percent passed the reading portion, according to the Maryland Department of Education.

"Across our system, our underperforming schools are underenrolled," Iliff said, adding that residents find ways to send their children to other local schools.

E-mail Megan McKeever at mmckeever@ gazette.net.