Orange County Public Schools (OCPS) has approved targeted rezoning changes affecting a small number of students in the Apopka area for the 2026-27 school year — in what District 7 School Board member Melissa Byrd described the changes as a targeted “cleanup” of existing attendance boundaries rather than a large-scale rezoning. 

The OCPS School Board approved the changes during a May 12 public hearing following several weeks of community meetings and workshops. According to district rezoning materials, the changes affect portions of the Kelly Park, Wolf Lake and Zellwood school areas.  

Byrd said a social media post wrongly warned parents that “a huge rezoning is coming,” when in fact the changes affect only two neighborhoods and a relatively small number of students.  

She said she has not received emails or other concerns from families about the targeted rezoning, noting that affected households were notified and had opportunities for public input at multiple school board meetings.  

“It’s a targeted rezoning, which means that it affects a small number of students, and we do those for different reasons every now and then,” Byrd said in a Monday interview with The Apopka Chief. “Sometimes we just have to go in and clean things up.” 

Unlike the large relief school rezonings that can shift hundreds of students to newly opened campuses, the changes were designed as a small er adjustment to clean up split neighborhoods, improve feeder patterns, and make better use of available school capacity. 

According to OCPS rezoning documents, one change will move students from portions of the Winding Meadows and Westridge Park areas so neighborhoods feeding into multiple schools would instead attend the same campuses together.  

In all, 105 students will be reassigned under the targeted rezoning – 92 elementary students and 13 middle school students – a fraction of the numbers typically involved in major relief school rezonings, according to Byrd. 

“It made it so these two neighborhoods, all the kids went to the same school,” she said. “It relieved a little bit of a couple elementary schools and the middle school in Wolf Lake that were a little overcrowded.” 

The changes reassign students within two split neighborhoods involving Zellwood Elementary, Wolf Lake Elementary, Wolf Lake Middle and Kelly Park K-8, so students living in the same neighborhoods attend the same schools. 

Byrd said the adjustments were partly driven by school capacity concerns.  

“Zellwood is getting a little more overcrowded, which is a good thing,” she said, noting the school had been underenrolled for years. “Wolf Lake Elementary was under capacity, so it had room.” 

District projections included in the rezoning presentation show Kelly Park School K‑8 operating below its permanent FISH (Florida Inventory of School Houses) capacity, while Wolf Lake Middle School remains above capacity.  

FISH is a state system used to measure a school’s permanent student capacity based on factors such as classroom space and facility design. OCPS uses permanent FISH capacity figures when evaluating enrollment trends, overcrowding and potential rezoning needs. 

Byrd also said the district considered transportation efficiency when reviewing the changes. 

“We don’t want to move kids if it’s going to add a bus route,” she said, adding that the approved adjustments may eliminate one bus route because some students would attend schools located closer to their neighborhoods.