Herndon high - what’s going on?

[Anonymous]

Until SBG as is implemented at HHS (and Madison?) is rolled out across FCPS, parents at DCUM faves can blissfully assume that problem is the student population and/or parents are the problem. La-la-la. Nothing to see here, folks.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

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Anonymous wrote:How is it fair to Herndon students who actually did learn the material by attending classes and completing assigned work so that they passed the first test and will actually retain the skills. Unlike students who passed version D of the same test, after seeing it three times in a row. It is not fair. Herndon teacher.

The idea is that grading, in general, creates disparity or in more relevant terms inequities. Ultimately, I think proponents of SBG systems and systems like it would prefer no grades at all; it should be about whether the student learned the material. Performance-based evaluation, e.g., who learned what faster or better, is unnecessary.

Of course, this leads to questions about what happens after high school, specifically with college admissions and even the workforce. If everyone is equal, then the sky is limit... lol.

"A new study has found that patients of newly trained doctors tend to have higher survival rates if the doctor scored highly on board certification exams. Tests, it turns out, might not be racist, but actually quite good predictors of competence." - The Free Press, https://hms.harvard.edu/news/resident-physicians-exam-scores-tied-patient-survival?utm_source=substack&utm_medium=email (Harvard Medical School)

I mean tests are ok, but we should look at decolonizing science and turn to other ways of knowing.

Exactly. You get the gist.

What does “decolonizing science” mean?!!!

It means looking at all of culture and knowledge and practices as somehow coming from a place of oppression and evil. Similar to acting like learning in school and grading somehow have no bigger meaning and purpose than to be oppressive and create a hierarchical society. Its looking at things in the world through a very narrow and misguided lens.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Until SBG as is implemented at HHS (and Madison?) is rolled out across FCPS, parents at DCUM faves can blissfully assume that problem is the student population and/or parents are the problem. La-la-la. Nothing to see here, folks.

I have no doubt that SBG is an absolute disaster and is a contributing factor to the problems at those schools. But it is a bit dismissive of a lot of other issues at Herndon to insinuate that that is the primary problem.

For more context, search for some of the historical threads discussing gang activity at Herndon.

*the moderators tends to delete the newer threads discussing gang activity. And some LWNJs will accuse you of being racist if you state that you don’t want your kids to go to school with gang members. It’s really bizarre.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Until SBG as is implemented at HHS (and Madison?) is rolled out across FCPS, parents at DCUM faves can blissfully assume that problem is the student population and/or parents are the problem. La-la-la. Nothing to see here, folks.

I have no doubt that SBG is an absolute disaster and is a contributing factor to the problems at those schools. But it is a bit dismissive of a lot of other issues at Herndon to insinuate that that is the primary problem.

For more context, search for some of the historical threads discussing gang activity at Herndon.

*the moderators tends to delete the newer threads discussing gang activity. And some LWNJs will accuse you of being racist if you state that you don’t want your kids to go to school with gang members. It’s really bizarre.

I have read those threads. And I am a HHS parent and I can tell that you do not know the reality of the situation at that school. Look at how well non-FARMS kids do and how many AP/DE classes are offered despite the challenges some students there face. Get off Fox News and take a better look.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Until SBG as is implemented at HHS (and Madison?) is rolled out across FCPS, parents at DCUM faves can blissfully assume that problem is the student population and/or parents are the problem. La-la-la. Nothing to see here, folks.

I have no doubt that SBG is an absolute disaster and is a contributing factor to the problems at those schools. But it is a bit dismissive of a lot of other issues at Herndon to insinuate that that is the primary problem.

For more context, search for some of the historical threads discussing gang activity at Herndon.

*the moderators tends to delete the newer threads discussing gang activity. And some LWNJs will accuse you of being racist if you state that you don’t want your kids to go to school with gang members. It’s really bizarre.

Yup. “Really bizarre” is the operative description of not only FCPS, but the current times in which we are living.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Until SBG as is implemented at HHS (and Madison?) is rolled out across FCPS, parents at DCUM faves can blissfully assume that problem is the student population and/or parents are the problem. La-la-la. Nothing to see here, folks.

I have no doubt that SBG is an absolute disaster and is a contributing factor to the problems at those schools. But it is a bit dismissive of a lot of other issues at Herndon to insinuate that that is the primary problem.

For more context, search for some of the historical threads discussing gang activity at Herndon.

*the moderators tends to delete the newer threads discussing gang activity. And some LWNJs will accuse you of being racist if you state that you don’t want your kids to go to school with gang members. It’s really bizarre.

I have read those threads. And I am a HHS parent and I can tell that you do not know the reality of the situation at that school. Look at how well non-FARMS kids do and how many AP/DE classes are offered despite the challenges some students there face. Get off Fox News and take a better look.

Though of course you’ll accuse me of lying, I can assure you that I am a moderate democrat who gets his news from the Washington Post. I truly wish for the best outcomes at Herndon high, and you may be right that the school is actually just fine and not deserving of its reputation as an under performing school.

To which I respond with a question- then why is there such a push for the Forestville-will-be-our-savior redistricting?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Because it is ridiculously inefficient to bus kids from forestville to langley and keep McLean overcrowded.

McLean isn’t that overcrowded now that they spent $2-3 million to relocate and reassemble a modular there. And they just changed the boundary in 2021. Most at McLean don’t want yet another boundary change, much less one that is primarily a pretext to redistrict Langley kids. I also don’t get the impression Herndon families want an influx of Langley kids rezoned to Herndon against their parents’ wishes. They are proud of their school, too.

[Anonymous]

Herndon parent here and I think everyone is missing the point. The point is that the principal made a huge mistake by rolling out SBG without any teacher training or professional development so it failed. The teachers were miserable and the students were suffering. Parents tried their best to advocate for their kids all year and they were ignored. She threw the teachers under the bus and told us parents we needed to report the individual teachers who were being inconsistent. Parents continued to watch our kids fail. Finally after making enough of a ruckus and demanding data, in May, Liz produced the data which proved that SGB did bring grades down after all! So parents went to the higher ups at FCPS. They didn’t respond to parents but gave Liz choices for how to proceed. She chose the worst option for her staff - which was a logistical nightmare that forced them to go against all educational principles and allow retakes of all material - and then told the teachers it was all the parents fault. The teachers blame the parents instead of Liz and are taking it out on the students. The students were the pawns in her master plan to make a name for herself and no one but the parents cared. FCPS did these kids dirty.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Herndon parent here and I think everyone is missing the point. The point is that the principal made a huge mistake by rolling out SBG without any teacher training or professional development so it failed. The teachers were miserable and the students were suffering. Parents tried their best to advocate for their kids all year and they were ignored. She threw the teachers under the bus and told us parents we needed to report the individual teachers who were being inconsistent. Parents continued to watch our kids fail. Finally after making enough of a ruckus and demanding data, in May, Liz produced the data which proved that SGB did bring grades down after all! So parents went to the higher ups at FCPS. They didn’t respond to parents but gave Liz choices for how to proceed. She chose the worst option for her staff - which was a logistical nightmare that forced them to go against all educational principles and allow retakes of all material - and then told the teachers it was all the parents fault. The teachers blame the parents instead of Liz and are taking it out on the students. The students were the pawns in her master plan to make a name for herself and no one but the parents cared. FCPS did these kids dirty.

Thanks for getting back on topic about the current issues at HHS.

Ultimately this is a failure of senior FCPS leadership, because they incentivized principals to roll out half-baked grading policies touted in books and articles as “pro-equity.” Like anything else, things that sound plausible in theory often are a mess in practice unless properly designed, fully vetted, and fairly implemented. But Reid and others seem more interested in being seen as progressive than competent.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Because it is ridiculously inefficient to bus kids from forestville to langley and keep McLean overcrowded.

I looked yesterday to see quite how bad this claim is, and it turns out it is very misleading. Langley from Forestville is less than twenty minutes, Herndon High clocks in around fifteen. Turns out all this bus talk is just pure pretext BS.

[Anonymous]

West of Utterback still feeds to Langley. Takes my nephew at least 30 minutes to get to Langley; would be 15 to Herndon. That 3+ million dollar home is definitely not going to HHS, no matter what redistricting advocates say.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:West of Utterback still feeds to Langley. Takes my nephew at least 30 minutes to get to Langley; would be 15 to Herndon. That 3+ million dollar home is definitely not going to HHS, no matter what redistricting advocates say.

Not 15 minutes to HH with the same rush hour traffic that makes Langley half an hour. Gotta do apples to apples if we are going to use this as our pretext.

[Anonymous]

We live within earshot of the Herndon high school marching band when they are practicing, and it would take me exactly 6 minutes to drive to HH, but my child gets bussed into Cooper/Langley, which takes 30-40 min. It’s ridiculous, but it’s why we paid the price we paid for our home. We have tons more square footage and land than we would have if we bought closer to Langley. There is no way our neighborhood or the surrounding ones would allow the redistricting to happen.

[Anonymous]

We paid less than 1 million for our house 10 years ago for the sheer reason it’s in the Langley pyramid. We are the furthest away neighborhood from the school. All hell will break loose if they decide to send us to Herndon. Dont even.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:We paid less than 1 million for our house 10 years ago for the sheer reason it’s in the Langley pyramid. We are the furthest away neighborhood from the school. All hell will break loose if they decide to send us to Herndon. Dont even.

Not looking to be alarmist here, but I’d be pretty nervous if I resided in the Holly Drive section of Great Falls or south of route 7 Forestville homes. Not that anyone in that elementary school is safe (so really all Forestville should be nervous), but those homes seem particularly at risk of being redistricted by Robyn lady and Kyle McDaniel.

As I said earlier, might be a good time to reach out to Robyn Lady and the at large members.