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The Prince George's County school board recently made sweeping changes to address overcrowding and underenrollment in an initial round of school boundary changes. Some schools were closed and others were consolidated in an effort to balance school populations.

Parents of students attending south county and inner Beltway middle and elementary schools — those reviewed in this first round of boundary changes — did not overwhelmingly welcome the changes, but understood the reasons for the modifications.

The school board was criticized largely by parents who wanted their children to remain at their schools, but officials stood firm in their decisions, which makes the light-handed proposal for the second phase of boundary reviews — in the northern and central county middle and elementary schools — extremely perplexing.

In the second round, Superintendent William R. Hite Jr. has proposed leaving 25 of the 44 overcrowded or underutilized schools under review as they are. Johndel Jones-Brown, director of pupil accounting and boundaries, described the schools as a "remaining challenge."

The decision to make such drastic changes at inner Beltway and south county schools, and be more reluctant to make changes elsewhere in the county, raises questions about equity.

Much of southern Prince George's lacks municipal governments, and residents there have expressed concern that their lack of local leadership puts them a step behind the northern part of the county, where municipalities abound. Inner Beltway communities, which are largely more urban and less wealthy than other portions of the county, have long complained about being ignored by officials. Such a move by the school board adds fuel to claims that areas with more money and clout get preferential treatment by county officials.

In addition, if the point of such a broad review was to level out schools, then the proposal should do just that — wherever it is needed.

Hite and Jones-Brown say some schools in the first round could have withstood more changes, but that the second phase has been more difficult. In their defense, school officials appear to be struggling to piece together a complex boundary strategy. But the way to handle challenges is to go back to the drawing board, not cobble together a plan as they go along.

Granted, there will be parents who want their children to remain where they are, regardless of the school's enrollment. If test scores and other measures seem to be sufficient, Hite may correctly decide to leave schools as they are in some cases. But to recognize that some school boundaries must be changed, and decide to do nothing about it, is unfair to those who would benefit, and unjust to those who were forced to endure changes and gives a bad perception about how residents are impacted based on where they live in the county.