When New London, working in conjunction with the state, announced plans to reinvent its school system as an “all-magnet” district, with new schools and curriculums built around specific fields of study, many a cynic told me that parents wouldn’t send their kids to schools in New London.

The success of the Science and Technology Magnet High School of Southeastern Connecticut, with its regional enrollment and record of student success, seemed to belie that concern. But it is one thing for a young adult to choose a regional high school, another thing for the parents of a grade-school child to send their daughter or son out of district.

Well, it turns out that as New London has built it, they have come.

In meeting last week with our editorial board, Superintendent Manuel Rivera shared with us the district’s enrollment trends. In the 2013-2014 school year, 280 non-New London residents were attending city schools, a number that as of the current school year has more than doubled to 574. Projections show out-of-district students almost doubling again to 1,122 by the 2020-2021 school year.

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“It’s all about trying to create really great schools that not only attract students, but you get the kinds of results that you would expect with really great schools,” Rivers said.

The Winthrop Elementary STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics) School and the Nathan Hale Arts Elementary School are now established magnet schools. C.B. Jennings Elementary will next year open its dual language program to kindergarten and first-grade students from other towns, gradually expanding to the other grades.

Rivera is also encouraged that more New London residents are choosing to send their children to city schools. In 2013-2014, 2,789 city residents attended its public schools, a number that has grown to 2,961. A little more than 1,000 students from the city now attend out-of-district schools, but the number is trending down, said the superintendent.

Big challenges remain. Rebuilding the high school as new and constructing a new middle school and facilities for performing arts and associated entertainment technologies will be necessary to provide magnet school paths from kindergarten to graduation.

The magnet plans suffered a setback when the city lost a $31 million grant the legislature had earmarked to build a performing arts educational facility in association with the Garde Art Center. School officials and the Garde administration could not agree on an approach to make it happen. The challenge will be completing construction within the $165 million approved by voters in 2014, with 80 percent reimbursed by the state.

Rivera knows that over time New London schools will have to demonstrate improving standardized test scores and better high school graduation rates if it does not want enthusiasm about the magnet program to wane.

“I think the perception of our schools is beginning to change,” he said. “But I fully acknowledge this is a work in progress. No one ever thought that transforming schools overnight was going to happen. That is just not how it works.”

Mayor Michael Passero, who also attended the board meeting, said improving city schools is vitally important to New London’s future, making it more attractive to live and buy homes there. Even in tough fiscal times he is asking the City Council to boost the city’s contribution to its public schools by $1 million, to $20.4 million. City taxpayers cover about one-third of the school system costs. The rest of the money for the $66 million budget comes from the state, payments for out-of-district students, and some from federal grants.

The increased state grants to support the magnet program make it a fiscal winner, Rivera said. An analysis of the Winthrop school, for example, determined it would take another $546,000 in local support to operate it as a traditional local-only school, he said.

“I’m repeatedly asked: ‘Is this costing us more because we are taking in all of these regional students?’ And the answer is clearly no,” Rivera told the board. “The bottom line is that for those who look at this through strictly a financial lens, it affirms the decisions that were made to move to an all-magnet district. We’re just happy we get multiple benefits by doing that.”

Paul Choiniere is the editorial page editor.