Forum Index
»
Montgomery County Public Schools (MCPS)
BOE members ask to add elementary schools to Woodward, Crown, Damascus boundary studies
![[Post New]](/jforum/templates/default/images/icon_minipost_new.gif){kind=icon}
Anonymous
|
Nothing was decided today, they will be coming back in the spring with new proposals to consider, but Rebecca Smondrowski asked that elementary, middle, and high school boundaries be in-scope once those studies get going. (The previously approved Woodward scope included middle and high schools but had excluded elementary schools.) Now that the Woodward project is delayed a year, that boundary study is being pushed back as well. Smondrowski also asked that the boundary study not be delayed, which would have it finishing 2.5 years ahead of Woodward's opening, instead of 18 months.
Lynne Harris agreed that looking at elementary school boundaries would be sensible in areas where there are underenrolled elementary schools nearby to overcrowded schools with many portables. No other board members shared their opinions on this today. Also of note: Adrienne Karamihas is leaving, and today was her last BOE meeting. She's the director of capital planning and has been a major player in all the boundary studies over the past 15 or so years, so it will be interesting to see how her absence will be felt with all these upcoming changes. |
Anonymous
| Always thought it was weird that elementary schools weren’t included. I hope they especially strive to even out the overcrowded and under capacity elementary schools. |
Anonymous
Yes, this seems like low-hanging fruit. Silly to be spending money renting portables if there are schools with available space next door. |
Anonymous
over capacity vs. under capacity or overcrowded vs. undercrowded |
Anonymous
| Absolutely agree with Smondrowski that these projects need to include full boundary studies including the ES. It needs to start from scratch, otherwise it’s always bandaid fixes and to Harris’ point doesn’t allow MCPS to be operationally and fiscally efficient. |
Anonymous
It makes sense to include elementary schools for reasons in addition to over/under. Particularly for Woodward, there is this KP Island next door, and it would make some sense to fix it so they're walkers to Woodward, rather than feeding to WJ. Fixing it earlier in the pipeline would help the sense of community and continuity that is a strong value in school pyramids. |
Anonymous
Are you saying there's a difference? |
Anonymous
| It's going to be very interesting to see how things are changed up. I am zoned to Cabin John, which is geographically quite far, and ithe school is split between multiple high schools. There are other middle schools that are closer, but they don't seem to have capacity. It will take a lot of shuffling to make some of the weirdly zoned areas make sense. |
Anonymous
I hope you and your family enjoy Gaithersburg Middle School. |
Anonymous
The Cabin John MS boundaries are bonkers. https://gis.mcpsmd.org/ServiceAreaMaps/CabinJohnMS.pdf Lakelands MS and Ridgeview MS are both much closer for those two northernmost islands. One of the benefits of a larger boundary study is the ability to do a lot of shuffling. |
Anonymous
| As long as this improves diversity, I'm all in! |
Anonymous
Your area has a high chance going to crown |
Anonymous
Well you're in luck. |
Anonymous
Wow! Agreed, those boundaries are bonkers. How did that even come about? |
Anonymous
CJ and Hoover are 3 blocks apart, so something wacky was bound to happen. They created as walkable boundaries as they could for Hoover and Frost and then tossed the remaining elementary schools into CJ. |