An unexpected flood of students has swamped the area's two new public K-8 schools, forcing school officials to begin redrawing boundary maps so they can head off problems before the next school year.

After opening three shiny new public schools in Northeast Miami-Dade over the past two years, the school board should be entitled to a victory lap. Instead the beleaguered board, fresh from a bloody budget battle, is about to start a process that seems certain to anger many.

Enrollment at Aventura-Waterways School already exceeds capacity.

Paul Greenfield, an administrator with the district's Center 2 office, told the Sunny Isles Beach City Commission Oct. 29 that redrawing boundaries for the SIB Community School would be necessary. He said he'd made a similar presentation the previous night at Aventura-Waterways School. The Alonzo and Tracey Mourning Senior High School in North Miami Beach opened in August and isn't effected -- yet.

Before building the schools, Greenfield explained, the district ran computer models that showed SIB Community should open with about 800 pupils in grades K-6. Grades 7 and 8 would be added in subsequent years. The district added 100 to the projection on the theory that new schools with the latest facilities and technology sometimes attract pupils from nearby charter and private schools. But on opening day, the school had almost 1,100 pupils, not the 900 expected. Today, with 7th grade open, the school is already operating at about 96 percent of capacity. When 8th grade classes are added next year, there will be serious problems.

At Aventura-Waterways, a similar cycle has played out. With all grades operating this year, that school is at 107 percent of capacity.

So the district has begun the process of redrawing boundary maps with a goal of pushing the overflow of pupils south and southwest. No pupils living in the city of Sunny Isles Beach would be moved, Greenfield reassured the city commission, but areas on the city's edges likely would be removed.

The plan would likely focus on rechanneling younger students, ideally kindergarteners who hadn't started at SIB Community. He said the goal would be to uproot as few pupils as possible. There was some leeway to accommodate siblings of pupils already at SIB. And the delicate issue of children of staff at SIB Community also would be examined. He pointed out that few teachers and staff at SIB Community actually live in Sunny Isles Beach.

The good news, Greenfield said, is that all of the elementary schools in the area are rated A by state standards.

Greenfield acknowledged that one factor in the enrollment problem is likely pupils who really shouldn't be at either school. He said some parents, eager to have their children at the newest schools, have bent the rules by saying their children were living with relatives within the boundary area. It's a tough case to prove, Greenfield said, and the district would welcome any assist the city could provide.

The commission thanked Greenfield and the district for providing what amounted to an early warning of a problem and offered the services of the city's IT department to help weed out false pupil addresses.

The remapping process ahead is long with many public hearings, Greenfield said. Boundary issues are always touchy.

In Aventura, city officials are pressing the district for an explanation of its boundary decisions that exclude Aventura pupils from the new Mourning High.