MCPS planning very limited regional program transportation (HS pickups only)

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Help me understand the issue. If you live far enough away from your home high school (the one you’re zoned for) to get bus service from your neighborhood to your home school, will that bus get you to your home school in time for you to catch a bus from your home school to your regional special program? Or is the issue that the buses to regional special programs leave home schools early enough that your neighborhood bus won’t get you to your home school in time?

If you live too close to your home school to qualify for busing from your neighborhood to your home school, then the burden was already on you to come up with your own transportation to your home school, so there’s no difference between getting yourself there to attend that home school versus getting yourself there to catch a bus to your regional special program.

Currently, how many locations do high school magnet buses depart from besides home high schools?

Lets say I live in Mt.Prospect, Travilah:

Mt.Prospect neighborhood to Wootton (wherever it may be) - 6 miles

Prior situation:
Mt.Prospect to Travilah ES - 0.5 to 1 mile (group stop for magnets) - my kid walks or I drop kid at the ES which is close by and kid goes to the magnet program
Travilah ES to RM - 7 miles
Travilah to Churchill - 7.5 miles


Now if it was buses only from the high schools to the regional magnets, kid first catches a neighborhood bus to Wootton/Wootton@Crown - 6 miles
Then from Wootton, kid catches another bus to go the next 2.5 to 3.5 miles.

If there is traffic on Wootton Pkwy/Great Seneca/Sam Eig/Muddy Branch, kid misses the bus that goes from Wootton/Wootton@Crown to RM or Churchill or Rockville HS.

You also have the dozens of buses in the high schools.

How is this feasible?

It was a nightmare when we had a half day last week and all the magnet buses and elementary school buses were at the ES.

Can you imagine how it would be in a high school? All these high school buses coming in and the regional magnet will leave on time regardless of whether all the kids got in or not. And then what happens? Are the parents supposed to come and pick up the kids to drive them to their chosen magnet school?

If my kid got into RM before these regional magnets, there would have been a group bus stop at Travilah ES.

Nope, it is even worse than this. The kid is almost certainly not going to be able to take a neighborhood bus to Wootton and then transfer there to the regional program bus (unless MCPS wants to piss off all HS families by shifting all neighborhood bus routes 20+ minutes earlier)-- by the time the neighborhood buses get there, the regional program bus will most likely be gone. So either you would need to drive your kid to Wootton (or all the way to the regional program), or if you can't/won't, then your kid can't attend.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Help me understand the issue. If you live far enough away from your home high school (the one you’re zoned for) to get bus service from your neighborhood to your home school, will that bus get you to your home school in time for you to catch a bus from your home school to your regional special program? Or is the issue that the buses to regional special programs leave home schools early enough that your neighborhood bus won’t get you to your home school in time?

If you live too close to your home school to qualify for busing from your neighborhood to your home school, then the burden was already on you to come up with your own transportation to your home school, so there’s no difference between getting yourself there to attend that home school versus getting yourself there to catch a bus to your regional special program.

Currently, how many locations do high school magnet buses depart from besides home high schools?

Lets say I live in Mt.Prospect, Travilah:

Mt.Prospect neighborhood to Wootton (wherever it may be) - 6 miles

Prior situation:
Mt.Prospect to Travilah ES - 0.5 to 1 mile (group stop for magnets) - my kid walks or I drop kid at the ES which is close by and kid goes to the magnet program
Travilah ES to RM - 7 miles
Travilah to Churchill - 7.5 miles


Now if it was buses only from the high schools to the regional magnets, kid first catches a neighborhood bus to Wootton/Wootton@Crown - 6 miles
Then from Wootton, kid catches another bus to go the next 2.5 to 3.5 miles.

If there is traffic on Wootton Pkwy/Great Seneca/Sam Eig/Muddy Branch, kid misses the bus that goes from Wootton/Wootton@Crown to RM or Churchill or Rockville HS.

You also have the dozens of buses in the high schools.

How is this feasible?

It was a nightmare when we had a half day last week and all the magnet buses and elementary school buses were at the ES.

Can you imagine how it would be in a high school? All these high school buses coming in and the regional magnet will leave on time regardless of whether all the kids got in or not. And then what happens? Are the parents supposed to come and pick up the kids to drive them to their chosen magnet school?

If my kid got into RM before these regional magnets, there would have been a group bus stop at Travilah ES.

Nope, it is even worse than this. The kid is almost certainly not going to be able to take a neighborhood bus to Wootton and then transfer there to the regional program bus (unless MCPS wants to piss off all HS families by shifting all neighborhood bus routes 20+ minutes earlier)-- by the time the neighborhood buses get there, the regional program bus will most likely be gone. So either you would need to drive your kid to Wootton (or all the way to the regional program), or if you can't/won't, then your kid can't attend.

And there won't be regional activity buses so kids can forget after school activities unless they have their own transportation home.

[Anonymous]

So what? If you're choosing to go to a program outside of your local school, find your own way there and back just like COSA students. Instead they're currently using special ed busses to pickup your students causing SN kids to be on busses for an hour+ ride. Absolutely ridiculous. I wish they would stop using special ed busses for convenience.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:There is no way that transportation will be $1.3M per year. Maybe per region, but not for all of the HS programs.

PP here. I think they're pretending that there will be significant offsets from ending county-wide magnet transportation and DCC/NEC transportation. I checked at one point and I think RMIB has about 24 buses and I think the Blair magnet has 18. Other magnets only have a couple of buses apiece. Not enough to offset the whole regional model. And the new model will probably have about equal to the transport needs for the DCC and NEC. Offsets might mitigate some of the costs, but not the whole number.

Yup-- look at page 15 here: https://go.boarddocs.com/mabe/mcpsmd/Board.nsf/files/DNLJXC4F4A19/$file/Regional%20Program%20Model%20FY2027-2031%20Budget%20251120.pdf

They calculate $3.5M in transportation costs in year 1 and $5.3M in year 2 (it's not double because it is "built on a factor of 1.5 for shared ridership," whatever that means.) Then the costs magically go down to $2.6M in year 3, $1.3M in year 4, and then in year 5 they just say "net reduction in transportation costs realized."

(Then again, in their calculations they repeatedly add five 1s and get 4, if that tells you how much to trust their numbers...

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:So what? If you're choosing to go to a program outside of your local school, find your own way there and back just like COSA students. Instead they're currently using special ed busses to pickup your students causing SN kids to be on busses for an hour+ ride. Absolutely ridiculous. I wish they would stop using special ed busses for convenience.

They claim the reason they're shaking everything up and spending millions of dollars on this new structure is to make it accessible to all students. If that's what you're going for, you can't just say "figure the transportation out yourself." (If you are going to say "figure it out yourself" and not care how many families that leaves behind, then you should just leave the current system the way it is. Turning everything upside-down just to create a different but even more inaccessible system is the worst of all worlds.)

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:What would happen if the board didn't pass the regional model since all of the boundary study data and recommendations assume the regional model is getting implemented.

It wouldn't make much difference-- they're just making up numbers of how many kids will leave from or go to different schools (for example, that 400 Whitman students are going to leave Whitman for regional programs at Northwood, Einstein, Blair, and BCC-- yeah right.) And even with the made-up numbers, the regional programs only shift enrollment projections by 100 or less kids either way in most cases, and that's when fully implemented for all 4 grades (so probably only a few dozen different in year one.)

Is t this just going to overcrowd Whitman? Since zero will leave and 400 join?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:What would happen if the board didn't pass the regional model since all of the boundary study data and recommendations assume the regional model is getting implemented.

It wouldn't make much difference-- they're just making up numbers of how many kids will leave from or go to different schools (for example, that 400 Whitman students are going to leave Whitman for regional programs at Northwood, Einstein, Blair, and BCC-- yeah right.) And even with the made-up numbers, the regional programs only shift enrollment projections by 100 or less kids either way in most cases, and that's when fully implemented for all 4 grades (so probably only a few dozen different in year one.)

Is t this just going to overcrowd Whitman? Since zero will leave and 400 join?

It depends, will 400 families be willing to make the commute work?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:There is no way that transportation will be $1.3M per year. Maybe per region, but not for all of the HS programs.

PP here. I think they're pretending that there will be significant offsets from ending county-wide magnet transportation and DCC/NEC transportation. I checked at one point and I think RMIB has about 24 buses and I think the Blair magnet has 18. Other magnets only have a couple of buses apiece. Not enough to offset the whole regional model. And the new model will probably have about equal to the transport needs for the DCC and NEC. Offsets might mitigate some of the costs, but not the whole number.

Oh, and don't forget we have to add buses for Woodward, probably have additional buses to get Woodward kids to Crown, plus whatever buses they'll use to get Damascus or Magruder kids to Wooton while their schools are renovated.

Both PPs are right. Remember too that they said the current 8th graders get to be grandfathered into their magnet programs, so there won't be any "savings" for the next couple years while the current magnet students finish their existing programs.

Any new routes will be exactly that. New routes on top of the existing routes.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:OK. So for the two boundary studies, at least there are two sides with some valid concerns from each side to argue about the benefits/caveats. For the regional program, has anyone actually expressed positive support from the community? I've been following all BOE meeting testimony sessions, and I don't recall see a single testimony that embraces this idea. From the couple of in-person info sessions that I've attended, many were there to either learn for the first time, or express concerns, or ask questions. No one there to explicitly embrace the plan. The design team members had expressed numerous frustrating experience with the experience.

So what motivates BOE to approve a plan that no one except Taylor and his ass-kissers support?

Diego Uriburu and Byron Johns from the Black and Brown Coalition have expressed support for the regional program model.

So two people?

Yes, two people. I have not heard of anyone else tbh. I think the goal of what they are trying to achieve is something most people would support. But I think they didn’t give themselves enough runway to “iterate.” They also stupidly linked the timing to the boundary changes. Honestly, they could have saved themselves a lot of trouble if they didn’t overload the system with 12 layers of grandfathered transportation and transition in the same 2 years. But yeah, to the PP’s point, there is no support for this plan that I’ve heard of. I do think Rita and Brenda are supportive, but I truly think they are under informed about what is actually happening/being provided. They were sort of bamboozled by the superintendent with high level overviews that sounded good but are a bit of a house of cards underneath.

Rita and Brenda are not underinformed. They know it's a model that's being planned as it's being built, and they don't care that it's messy and think everything will be worked out in the end. They're choosing to trust Taylor's rose-colored glasses version of things versus the community's alarm-sounding over a plan that has good ideas and ideals, but lacks details and specificity that would build broad confidence and buy-in.

Board can vote to extend the study period for one-year, can they? This is what MCCPTA and MCEA essentially suggested: CO can then have enough time to develop rationale implementation plan (e.g., multi-year role-out, less programs or less regions, more equitable transportation, etc.) and most importantly, engaging and truly hearing from the community what they want, what the gaps are, and where to set what program. why rushing to doomed failure when you originally have a chance to make positive impact?

Yes, in theory this would have been the right move, but Taylor made very clear he was completely unwilling to wait (most obviously by getting the Black and Brown Coalition to make a statement in opposition to the delay, based in part on misinformation.) MCPS keeps pushing the "it has to be on the same schedule as the boundary study" line but it seems to me like that's mostly just a justification for them barreling ahead on the timeline they want.

Taylor is just really dug in on this plan on this timeline. There were enough requests for delay from enough stakeholders (MCEA, MCCPTA, County Council) that a less stubborn MCPS would probably have agreed to wait-- but when Board members have asked "can't we slow this down?" and MCPS has said "no we actually can't," they're in a tough spot. Really I think the way this could have actually been delayed would have been if County Council had brought them in for another hearing and been prepared with the right questions to fully debunk the "it has to happen in fall 2027" argument, and then the Board could have piggybacked off that.

How about we write to county council members to ask for a public hearing that they promised for last December? Is there enough time before the Mar. 26 decision date? I have zero hope and won't bother writing to BOE members anymore.

There are people on the design team who have been trying so hard to push back by asking questions—not to stop the expansion of programs, but to try to do the expansion in a way that minimized some of the potential for increased inequities—and first they had an NDA and then they were characterized by a BOE member as not wanting things to improve for Black and Latino students.

And now look at the result of the work. Uneven program offerings (design team warned about that), lack of transportation (design team warned about that), no real analysis of program demand (design team warned about that), and half the programs only exist because of random “industry” credentials that MCPS students don’t have a history of wanting to earn.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:There is no way that transportation will be $1.3M per year. Maybe per region, but not for all of the HS programs.

PP here. I think they're pretending that there will be significant offsets from ending county-wide magnet transportation and DCC/NEC transportation. I checked at one point and I think RMIB has about 24 buses and I think the Blair magnet has 18. Other magnets only have a couple of buses apiece. Not enough to offset the whole regional model. And the new model will probably have about equal to the transport needs for the DCC and NEC. Offsets might mitigate some of the costs, but not the whole number.

Well and the current system doesn’t even give great coverage. Everyone I know drives their kid in the morning because the pick up point is at like 6:15 am in the opposite direction of where the school is. Heaven forbid they actually ask families what stops would be most convenient and designed efficient routes rather than just picking at random and hoping for the best.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:There is no way that transportation will be $1.3M per year. Maybe per region, but not for all of the HS programs.

PP here. I think they're pretending that there will be significant offsets from ending county-wide magnet transportation and DCC/NEC transportation. I checked at one point and I think RMIB has about 24 buses and I think the Blair magnet has 18. Other magnets only have a couple of buses apiece. Not enough to offset the whole regional model. And the new model will probably have about equal to the transport needs for the DCC and NEC. Offsets might mitigate some of the costs, but not the whole number.

Well and the current system doesn’t even give great coverage. Everyone I know drives their kid in the morning because the pick up point is at like 6:15 am in the opposite direction of where the school is. Heaven forbid they actually ask families what stops would be most convenient and designed efficient routes rather than just picking at random and hoping for the best.

MCPS doesn't actually care about equity. So many of the decisions related to this program model reinforce the higher existing hierarchy.

Motivated, resourced parents who are otherwise stuck at poor performing schools will us the programs to flee to better schools and they'll happily take on the burden of transporting their kids there to escape.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Help me understand the issue. If you live far enough away from your home high school (the one you’re zoned for) to get bus service from your neighborhood to your home school, will that bus get you to your home school in time for you to catch a bus from your home school to your regional special program? Or is the issue that the buses to regional special programs leave home schools early enough that your neighborhood bus won’t get you to your home school in time?

If you live too close to your home school to qualify for busing from your neighborhood to your home school, then the burden was already on you to come up with your own transportation to your home school, so there’s no difference between getting yourself there to attend that home school versus getting yourself there to catch a bus to your regional special program.

Currently, how many locations do high school magnet buses depart from besides home high schools?

Unless the buses to the local schools get there super early, there is no way a kid can take the bus to their local high school and then transfer to another bus to another high school. Are they going to make all the kids taking a bus to their local high school get there super early so that the magnet kids can hop on another bus to get to their program on time? That would feel incredibly unfair to the local kids.

So this is an issue for kids who qualify for buses to their home schools, but won’t get to use those buses as part of their commute to their regional special programs?

You make it sound like some niche issue... less than 30% of high schoolers are in the walk zone, the majority are too far away.

I’m not saying it’s a niche issue; I’m trying to ascertain the scope of the issue. Are those the only students affected or is the problem even bigger than that?

I mean, on top of the 70% of students who can't walk to their local HS, a sizable share of the 30% in the walk zones still have a pretty long walk to school, 30+ minutes in many cases. If they then have to catch a bus from there to another high school, many will be looking at over an hour in travel time. Lots of kids just won't bother with that, leaving the program spots to kids.whose families can drive them. Is that what you mean by the scope of the issue?

So how is this different than current programs. If the high school "kid" doesn't make an effort, they don't receive extra services. That does not make it "inequitable." And you are forgetting that under the regional model, EVERY high school will have a special program, so the ones who "don't want to bother" with transportation can apply to their own school's program.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Help me understand the issue. If you live far enough away from your home high school (the one you’re zoned for) to get bus service from your neighborhood to your home school, will that bus get you to your home school in time for you to catch a bus from your home school to your regional special program? Or is the issue that the buses to regional special programs leave home schools early enough that your neighborhood bus won’t get you to your home school in time?

If you live too close to your home school to qualify for busing from your neighborhood to your home school, then the burden was already on you to come up with your own transportation to your home school, so there’s no difference between getting yourself there to attend that home school versus getting yourself there to catch a bus to your regional special program.

Currently, how many locations do high school magnet buses depart from besides home high schools?

Unless the buses to the local schools get there super early, there is no way a kid can take the bus to their local high school and then transfer to another bus to another high school. Are they going to make all the kids taking a bus to their local high school get there super early so that the magnet kids can hop on another bus to get to their program on time? That would feel incredibly unfair to the local kids.

So this is an issue for kids who qualify for buses to their home schools, but won’t get to use those buses as part of their commute to their regional special programs?

You make it sound like some niche issue... less than 30% of high schoolers are in the walk zone, the majority are too far away.

I’m not saying it’s a niche issue; I’m trying to ascertain the scope of the issue. Are those the only students affected or is the problem even bigger than that?

I mean, on top of the 70% of students who can't walk to their local HS, a sizable share of the 30% in the walk zones still have a pretty long walk to school, 30+ minutes in many cases. If they then have to catch a bus from there to another high school, many will be looking at over an hour in travel time. Lots of kids just won't bother with that, leaving the program spots to kids.whose families can drive them. Is that what you mean by the scope of the issue?

So how is this different than current programs. If the high school "kid" doesn't make an effort, they don't receive extra services. That does not make it "inequitable." And you are forgetting that under the regional model, EVERY high school will have a special program, so the ones who "don't want to bother" with transportation can apply to their own school's program.

Currently kids have long commutes, but they don't have to walk over an hour just to get to the bus that will take them to the program. For many kids this won't just be extra effort, it will make participating in the program they are interested in impossible. The kids who don't have families that can drive them will be disproportionately Black and Latino. Also quite likely the most motivated and well resourced students will flee high poverty schools for the wealthy schools leaving less demand for challenging courses at the high poverty schools. The motivated but less resourced students at the high poverty schools will lose out.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Help me understand the issue. If you live far enough away from your home high school (the one you’re zoned for) to get bus service from your neighborhood to your home school, will that bus get you to your home school in time for you to catch a bus from your home school to your regional special program? Or is the issue that the buses to regional special programs leave home schools early enough that your neighborhood bus won’t get you to your home school in time?

If you live too close to your home school to qualify for busing from your neighborhood to your home school, then the burden was already on you to come up with your own transportation to your home school, so there’s no difference between getting yourself there to attend that home school versus getting yourself there to catch a bus to your regional special program.

Currently, how many locations do high school magnet buses depart from besides home high schools?

Unless the buses to the local schools get there super early, there is no way a kid can take the bus to their local high school and then transfer to another bus to another high school. Are they going to make all the kids taking a bus to their local high school get there super early so that the magnet kids can hop on another bus to get to their program on time? That would feel incredibly unfair to the local kids.

So this is an issue for kids who qualify for buses to their home schools, but won’t get to use those buses as part of their commute to their regional special programs?

You make it sound like some niche issue... less than 30% of high schoolers are in the walk zone, the majority are too far away.

I’m not saying it’s a niche issue; I’m trying to ascertain the scope of the issue. Are those the only students affected or is the problem even bigger than that?

I mean, on top of the 70% of students who can't walk to their local HS, a sizable share of the 30% in the walk zones still have a pretty long walk to school, 30+ minutes in many cases. If they then have to catch a bus from there to another high school, many will be looking at over an hour in travel time. Lots of kids just won't bother with that, leaving the program spots to kids.whose families can drive them. Is that what you mean by the scope of the issue?

So how is this different than current programs. If the high school "kid" doesn't make an effort, they don't receive extra services. That does not make it "inequitable." And you are forgetting that under the regional model, EVERY high school will have a special program, so the ones who "don't want to bother" with transportation can apply to their own school's program.

So the kid with interest in STEM should apply for fashion design at the home school?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Help me understand the issue. If you live far enough away from your home high school (the one you’re zoned for) to get bus service from your neighborhood to your home school, will that bus get you to your home school in time for you to catch a bus from your home school to your regional special program? Or is the issue that the buses to regional special programs leave home schools early enough that your neighborhood bus won’t get you to your home school in time?

If you live too close to your home school to qualify for busing from your neighborhood to your home school, then the burden was already on you to come up with your own transportation to your home school, so there’s no difference between getting yourself there to attend that home school versus getting yourself there to catch a bus to your regional special program.

Currently, how many locations do high school magnet buses depart from besides home high schools?

Unless the buses to the local schools get there super early, there is no way a kid can take the bus to their local high school and then transfer to another bus to another high school. Are they going to make all the kids taking a bus to their local high school get there super early so that the magnet kids can hop on another bus to get to their program on time? That would feel incredibly unfair to the local kids.

So this is an issue for kids who qualify for buses to their home schools, but won’t get to use those buses as part of their commute to their regional special programs?

You make it sound like some niche issue... less than 30% of high schoolers are in the walk zone, the majority are too far away.

I’m not saying it’s a niche issue; I’m trying to ascertain the scope of the issue. Are those the only students affected or is the problem even bigger than that?

I mean, on top of the 70% of students who can't walk to their local HS, a sizable share of the 30% in the walk zones still have a pretty long walk to school, 30+ minutes in many cases. If they then have to catch a bus from there to another high school, many will be looking at over an hour in travel time. Lots of kids just won't bother with that, leaving the program spots to kids.whose families can drive them. Is that what you mean by the scope of the issue?

So how is this different than current programs. If the high school "kid" doesn't make an effort, they don't receive extra services. That does not make it "inequitable." And you are forgetting that under the regional model, EVERY high school will have a special program, so the ones who "don't want to bother" with transportation can apply to their own school's program.

As I said before:

They claim the reason they're shaking everything up and spending millions of dollars on this new structure is to make it accessible to all students. If that's what you're going for, you can't just say "figure the transportation out yourself." (If you are going to say "figure it out yourself" and not care how many families that leaves behind, then you should just leave the current system the way it is. Turning everything upside-down and spending tons of money and energy, just to create a different but even more inaccessible system, is the worst of all worlds.)