Under pressure to diversify New York City’s public schools, Chancellor Carmen Fariña has proposed linking kids of different backgrounds by making them pen pals.

“We adopt schools from China, Korea or wherever. Why not in our own neighborhoods?” Fariña asked at an Oct. 14 town- hall meeting, when asked how she’d diversify the city’s elite high schools.

“This is what we should be doing with the city. It also means the kids are pen pals. They visit each other” . . . and “understand that they live in different neighborhoods, but they’re basically the same kind of kids,” the chancellor added in remarks that were first reported by dnainfo.com.

Department of Education spokeswoman Devora Kaye said Fariña also spoke at length on the importance of diversity and is proposing to rezone District 3 on the Upper West Side to make schools more racially diverse. “We need to make sure zones reflect the population in a community” and the city, Kaye said.