Woodward HS boundary study - BCC, Blair, Einstein, WJ, Kennedy, Northwood, Wheaton, Whitman impacts

[Anonymous]

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Anonymous wrote:According to the boundary analysis report, a little bit over a third of respondents rated balancing diversity as "not important". The remaining two thirds appear to have rated it as at least somewhat important and 10% rated it as extremely important. People do want to balance demographics which include income, race, ethnicity and language background. The data also show that the people who rated balancing diversity as most important were not from Takoma Park or even Silver Spring, but from Burtonsville, Fairland and Colesville.

Yes, but the only people who ever respond to those surveys all live in the segregated school boundaries. The people keep electing people to the board who prioritize diversity because that reflects the county's true priorities.

True. 54% of respondents were from Bethesda, Potomac and Chevy Chase.

So, the survey only represents the feelings of people in wealthy areas whose kids attend the segregated schools.

Most of the 46% who DON'T live in Bethesda, Potomac, and Chevy Chase also don't want busing. Just one geographic area (Burtonsville) indicated that it might want busing but even they didn't feel too strongly about it.

There were no questions in the survey about MCPS providing bus service or about "busing" whatever TF you are pretending that means. Nearly two thirds of respondents felt that diversity is at least somewhat important. It's true that most respondents value proximity and stability more than diversity, but that doesn't mean they don't care about diversity at all. The BOE's policy and boundary studies since then have been consistent with these preferences by balancing these priorities. If diversity were the top priority, they would randomly assign each student in the County to a different school each year, and they have not done that nor would that be consistent with Policy FAA.

While there were no question about buses, how exactly do you think MCPS is going to drag kids to schools farther from home? They're going to use buses. And sure, no one in MoCo is going to say they don't care about diversity at all. They have to at least pretend they they value it. But "somewhat" isn't strong support is it? Meanwhile, everyone strongly supports proximity and stability which are directly at odds with diversity because of where people live. And no one wants to put their kid on a bus just to virtue signal.

MCPS already buses over 2/3 of students. If you want fewer kids put on the bus, you should start advocating for more crossing guards, more sidewalks, and more safe places for kids to cross.

It's almost like riding a bus to the school closest to home and riding a bus past several other schools to a school a lot farther from home just so white progressives can feel like white saviors are two different things.

And yet, for the kid on the bus, a bus ride is a bus ride. Whatever you are mad at, it's not buses.

The public buses would take forever to get cross town and there are not stops everywhere.

Why should our kids be bussed to your schools so you can feel better about it when we choose our homes and took into consideration where we were sending our kids to school, just like you did. And, the reality is that they'd take the kids from the closer in parts, where the parents are more comfortable so its really not going to create real diversity.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:According to the boundary analysis report, a little bit over a third of respondents rated balancing diversity as "not important". The remaining two thirds appear to have rated it as at least somewhat important and 10% rated it as extremely important. People do want to balance demographics which include income, race, ethnicity and language background. The data also show that the people who rated balancing diversity as most important were not from Takoma Park or even Silver Spring, but from Burtonsville, Fairland and Colesville.

Yes, but the only people who ever respond to those surveys all live in the segregated school boundaries. The people keep electing people to the board who prioritize diversity because that reflects the county's true priorities.

True. 54% of respondents were from Bethesda, Potomac and Chevy Chase.

So, the survey only represents the feelings of people in wealthy areas whose kids attend the segregated schools.

Most of the 46% who DON'T live in Bethesda, Potomac, and Chevy Chase also don't want busing. Just one geographic area (Burtonsville) indicated that it might want busing but even they didn't feel too strongly about it.

There were no questions in the survey about MCPS providing bus service or about "busing" whatever TF you are pretending that means. Nearly two thirds of respondents felt that diversity is at least somewhat important. It's true that most respondents value proximity and stability more than diversity, but that doesn't mean they don't care about diversity at all. The BOE's policy and boundary studies since then have been consistent with these preferences by balancing these priorities. If diversity were the top priority, they would randomly assign each student in the County to a different school each year, and they have not done that nor would that be consistent with Policy FAA.

While there were no question about buses, how exactly do you think MCPS is going to drag kids to schools farther from home? They're going to use buses. And sure, no one in MoCo is going to say they don't care about diversity at all. They have to at least pretend they they value it. But "somewhat" isn't strong support is it? Meanwhile, everyone strongly supports proximity and stability which are directly at odds with diversity because of where people live. And no one wants to put their kid on a bus just to virtue signal.

MCPS already buses over 2/3 of students. If you want fewer kids put on the bus, you should start advocating for more crossing guards, more sidewalks, and more safe places for kids to cross.

It's almost like riding a bus to the school closest to home and riding a bus past several other schools to a school a lot farther from home just so white progressives can feel like white saviors are two different things.

And yet, for the kid on the bus, a bus ride is a bus ride. Whatever you are mad at, it's not buses.

The public buses would take forever to get cross town and there are not stops everywhere.

Why should our kids be bussed to your schools so you can feel better about it when we choose our homes and took into consideration where we were sending our kids to school, just like you did. And, the reality is that they'd take the kids from the closer in parts, where the parents are more comfortable so its really not going to create real diversity.

DP across which town do you think kids will be bused?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I care about diversity because I don't think schools where 80% of kids qualify for FARMS is okay. Concentrated poverty is horrible, especially for the low-income kids. There are mountains of research to support this.

And, what kind of school does your kids go to?

The demographics of our elementary school are fairly similar to those of the county as a whole. We're very happy with it. Why do you ask?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:According to the boundary analysis report, a little bit over a third of respondents rated balancing diversity as "not important". The remaining two thirds appear to have rated it as at least somewhat important and 10% rated it as extremely important. People do want to balance demographics which include income, race, ethnicity and language background. The data also show that the people who rated balancing diversity as most important were not from Takoma Park or even Silver Spring, but from Burtonsville, Fairland and Colesville.

Yes, but the only people who ever respond to those surveys all live in the segregated school boundaries. The people keep electing people to the board who prioritize diversity because that reflects the county's true priorities.

True. 54% of respondents were from Bethesda, Potomac and Chevy Chase.

So, the survey only represents the feelings of people in wealthy areas whose kids attend the segregated schools.

Most of the 46% who DON'T live in Bethesda, Potomac, and Chevy Chase also don't want busing. Just one geographic area (Burtonsville) indicated that it might want busing but even they didn't feel too strongly about it.

There were no questions in the survey about MCPS providing bus service or about "busing" whatever TF you are pretending that means. Nearly two thirds of respondents felt that diversity is at least somewhat important. It's true that most respondents value proximity and stability more than diversity, but that doesn't mean they don't care about diversity at all. The BOE's policy and boundary studies since then have been consistent with these preferences by balancing these priorities. If diversity were the top priority, they would randomly assign each student in the County to a different school each year, and they have not done that nor would that be consistent with Policy FAA.

While there were no question about buses, how exactly do you think MCPS is going to drag kids to schools farther from home? They're going to use buses. And sure, no one in MoCo is going to say they don't care about diversity at all. They have to at least pretend they they value it. But "somewhat" isn't strong support is it? Meanwhile, everyone strongly supports proximity and stability which are directly at odds with diversity because of where people live. And no one wants to put their kid on a bus just to virtue signal.

MCPS already buses over 2/3 of students. If you want fewer kids put on the bus, you should start advocating for more crossing guards, more sidewalks, and more safe places for kids to cross.

It's almost like riding a bus to the school closest to home and riding a bus past several other schools to a school a lot farther from home just so white progressives can feel like white saviors are two different things.

And yet, for the kid on the bus, a bus ride is a bus ride. Whatever you are mad at, it's not buses.

The public buses would take forever to get cross town and there are not stops everywhere.

Why should our kids be bussed to your schools so you can feel better about it when we choose our homes and took into consideration where we were sending our kids to school, just like you did. And, the reality is that they'd take the kids from the closer in parts, where the parents are more comfortable so its really not going to create real diversity.

I have questions, including: Which "town" would kids be crossing? Who is "you"? Who is "we"? Do you believe homeowners buy the school along with the home? What stake do renters have in school boundaries?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:According to the boundary analysis report, a little bit over a third of respondents rated balancing diversity as "not important". The remaining two thirds appear to have rated it as at least somewhat important and 10% rated it as extremely important. People do want to balance demographics which include income, race, ethnicity and language background. The data also show that the people who rated balancing diversity as most important were not from Takoma Park or even Silver Spring, but from Burtonsville, Fairland and Colesville.

Yes, but the only people who ever respond to those surveys all live in the segregated school boundaries. The people keep electing people to the board who prioritize diversity because that reflects the county's true priorities.

True. 54% of respondents were from Bethesda, Potomac and Chevy Chase.

So, the survey only represents the feelings of people in wealthy areas whose kids attend the segregated schools.

Most of the 46% who DON'T live in Bethesda, Potomac, and Chevy Chase also don't want busing. Just one geographic area (Burtonsville) indicated that it might want busing but even they didn't feel too strongly about it.

There were no questions in the survey about MCPS providing bus service or about "busing" whatever TF you are pretending that means. Nearly two thirds of respondents felt that diversity is at least somewhat important. It's true that most respondents value proximity and stability more than diversity, but that doesn't mean they don't care about diversity at all. The BOE's policy and boundary studies since then have been consistent with these preferences by balancing these priorities. If diversity were the top priority, they would randomly assign each student in the County to a different school each year, and they have not done that nor would that be consistent with Policy FAA.

While there were no question about buses, how exactly do you think MCPS is going to drag kids to schools farther from home? They're going to use buses. And sure, no one in MoCo is going to say they don't care about diversity at all. They have to at least pretend they they value it. But "somewhat" isn't strong support is it? Meanwhile, everyone strongly supports proximity and stability which are directly at odds with diversity because of where people live. And no one wants to put their kid on a bus just to virtue signal.

MCPS already buses over 2/3 of students. If you want fewer kids put on the bus, you should start advocating for more crossing guards, more sidewalks, and more safe places for kids to cross.

It's almost like riding a bus to the school closest to home and riding a bus past several other schools to a school a lot farther from home just so white progressives can feel like white saviors are two different things.

And yet, for the kid on the bus, a bus ride is a bus ride. Whatever you are mad at, it's not buses.

The public buses would take forever to get cross town and there are not stops everywhere.

Stop making excuses. The school buses also take forever. My kids take 40 mins to go under 1 mile. Public buses would be no worse than the current situation and would allow the county to apply the savings to improve classrooms.

[Anonymous]

Funny part is no matter the margins that get shuffled around, the few houses that get zoned out of desirable schools will go down in price and the few that get the bump-up will go up in price. Within a decade those houses will align with the proper SES buyers and you will still have desirable schools and silver spring schools. Nothing will change except a few people’s bank accounts.

Problem with desirable is people will pay up for it which will automatically exclude poor people. When it is the poor people the people are paying to avoid, it will automatically happen.

Even if you shipped all poorest of the poor out of the east county to W schools, prices in the shipping zones would shoot up and people in silver spring would be quickly priced out of their homes. Look at rosemary hills, used to be a very poor & black neighborhood which is why it got zoned to BCC for diversity. Now there are few AAs in the SFHs and otherwise modest ramblers are some of the most expensive homes in silver spring all in about a generation.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Funny part is no matter the margins that get shuffled around, the few houses that get zoned out of desirable schools will go down in price and the few that get the bump-up will go up in price. Within a decade those houses will align with the proper SES buyers and you will still have desirable schools and silver spring schools. Nothing will change except a few people’s bank accounts.

Problem with desirable is people will pay up for it which will automatically exclude poor people. When it is the poor people the people are paying to avoid, it will automatically happen.

Even if you shipped all poorest of the poor out of the east county to W schools, prices in the shipping zones would shoot up and people in silver spring would be quickly priced out of their homes. Look at rosemary hills, used to be a very poor & black neighborhood which is why it got zoned to BCC for diversity. Now there are few AAs in the SFHs and otherwise modest ramblers are some of the most expensive homes in silver spring all in about a generation.

This is a perfect explanation of why we need to fix land use instead of school boundaries. All schools should have housing available to all income levels within their boundaries.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Funny part is no matter the margins that get shuffled around, the few houses that get zoned out of desirable schools will go down in price and the few that get the bump-up will go up in price. Within a decade those houses will align with the proper SES buyers and you will still have desirable schools and silver spring schools. Nothing will change except a few people’s bank accounts.

Problem with desirable is people will pay up for it which will automatically exclude poor people. When it is the poor people the people are paying to avoid, it will automatically happen.

Even if you shipped all poorest of the poor out of the east county to W schools, prices in the shipping zones would shoot up and people in silver spring would be quickly priced out of their homes. Look at rosemary hills, used to be a very poor & black neighborhood which is why it got zoned to BCC for diversity. Now there are few AAs in the SFHs and otherwise modest ramblers are some of the most expensive homes in silver spring all in about a generation.

All of this is incorrect.

Anyone who can afford an SFH in MoCo is not low income. If an SFH gets zoned out of a desirable school, the owners can sell, rent it out or stay. In no scenario will the new resident be a low-income family.

Rosemary Hills is a close in neighborhood. All of those neighborhoods are expensive. Just across the train tracks from there are houses zoned for the DCC and they are also quite expensive.

Prices for SFHs are already high in Silver Spring. The "poorest of the poor" do not live in SFHs around downtown Silver Spring. If you "ship" the kids in Silver Spring apartments to Whitman, the rents might go up a bit? Maybe?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Funny part is no matter the margins that get shuffled around, the few houses that get zoned out of desirable schools will go down in price and the few that get the bump-up will go up in price. Within a decade those houses will align with the proper SES buyers and you will still have desirable schools and silver spring schools. Nothing will change except a few people’s bank accounts.

Problem with desirable is people will pay up for it which will automatically exclude poor people. When it is the poor people the people are paying to avoid, it will automatically happen.

Even if you shipped all poorest of the poor out of the east county to W schools, prices in the shipping zones would shoot up and people in silver spring would be quickly priced out of their homes. Look at rosemary hills, used to be a very poor & black neighborhood which is why it got zoned to BCC for diversity. Now there are few AAs in the SFHs and otherwise modest ramblers are some of the most expensive homes in silver spring all in about a generation.

This is a perfect explanation of why we need to fix land use instead of school boundaries. All schools should have housing available to all income levels within their boundaries.

Well they do need to fix the boundaries number 1 because they are opening new high schools and expanding others. Number 2 because utilization is not currently optimized to match capacity. When they do that, they should not just cater to rich people's desire to maintain their property values, as they have in years past. They might still do this though because MCPS leaders have zero backbone.

[Anonymous]

There's far too much noise, here, about bussing. Until there's a concrete suggestion put out there saying otherwise, the kinds of elementary cluster reassingments that they are likely to consider are all on the margins. Something where one nearly equidistant Einstein feeder goes to BCC while a BCC feeder gets shifted to Whitman or Churchill once that gets the relief from Woodward.

That helps solve overcrowding, or at least spreads it out. Addressing differences among schools would almost certainly better be accomplished with differential supports to ensure individual students have similar experiences/opportunities wherever they might be assigned. That probably requires additional expenditures, and either higher taxes or higher prioritization of the MCPS budget from the County Council -- I don't think we can expect the funding to come from some hoped-for realization of managerial efficiency, especially in the short term.

Or the relative haves could short-sightedly balk at this, causing the ever-more-populous have-nots to in the county myopically to align with opportunistic left-populist politicians who might advocate for really inefficient and, ultimately, ineffective things like cross-county bussing. But then the truly haves have their self-fulfilling paradigm complete: "Look! The system is terrible! Why fund it?! (PS--While you're at it dropping our taxes, the only thing that might save a few unfortunates is to adopt vouchers, yes?...)"

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Funny part is no matter the margins that get shuffled around, the few houses that get zoned out of desirable schools will go down in price and the few that get the bump-up will go up in price. Within a decade those houses will align with the proper SES buyers and you will still have desirable schools and silver spring schools. Nothing will change except a few people’s bank accounts.

Problem with desirable is people will pay up for it which will automatically exclude poor people. When it is the poor people the people are paying to avoid, it will automatically happen.

Even if you shipped all poorest of the poor out of the east county to W schools, prices in the shipping zones would shoot up and people in silver spring would be quickly priced out of their homes. Look at rosemary hills, used to be a very poor & black neighborhood which is why it got zoned to BCC for diversity. Now there are few AAs in the SFHs and otherwise modest ramblers are some of the most expensive homes in silver spring all in about a generation.

...and the relative overcrowding, the main point of the boundary issue, in case that's been forgotten. Whatever the priorities, including diversity, they are only conductung the study in the first place to utilize the extra capacity planned to come online.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:There's far too much noise, here, about bussing. Until there's a concrete suggestion put out there saying otherwise, the kinds of elementary cluster reassingments that they are likely to consider are all on the margins. Something where one nearly equidistant Einstein feeder goes to BCC while a BCC feeder gets shifted to Whitman or Churchill once that gets the relief from Woodward.

That helps solve overcrowding, or at least spreads it out. Addressing differences among schools would almost certainly better be accomplished with differential supports to ensure individual students have similar experiences/opportunities wherever they might be assigned. That probably requires additional expenditures, and either higher taxes or higher prioritization of the MCPS budget from the County Council -- I don't think we can expect the funding to come from some hoped-for realization of managerial efficiency, especially in the short term.

Or the relative haves could short-sightedly balk at this, causing the ever-more-populous have-nots to in the county myopically to align with opportunistic left-populist politicians who might advocate for really inefficient and, ultimately, ineffective things like cross-county bussing. But then the truly haves have their self-fulfilling paradigm complete: "Look! The system is terrible! Why fund it?! (PS--While you're at it dropping our taxes, the only thing that might save a few unfortunates is to adopt vouchers, yes?...)"

Churchill is not in-scope for this study.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Funny part is no matter the margins that get shuffled around, the few houses that get zoned out of desirable schools will go down in price and the few that get the bump-up will go up in price. Within a decade those houses will align with the proper SES buyers and you will still have desirable schools and silver spring schools. Nothing will change except a few people’s bank accounts.

Problem with desirable is people will pay up for it which will automatically exclude poor people. When it is the poor people the people are paying to avoid, it will automatically happen.

Even if you shipped all poorest of the poor out of the east county to W schools, prices in the shipping zones would shoot up and people in silver spring would be quickly priced out of their homes. Look at rosemary hills, used to be a very poor & black neighborhood which is why it got zoned to BCC for diversity. Now there are few AAs in the SFHs and otherwise modest ramblers are some of the most expensive homes in silver spring all in about a generation.

This!

All can do is trick the affluent to opt in similar to the Blair magnet. Put a carrot program in one of the least desirable schools in the county and soon it is holding its own and no longer undesirable. A few smart kids from around the county has gotten many middle class parents to ignore the rest of the school and dozens of Bethesda/Potomac parents to basically bus their kids to an area they paid a premium to avoid.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Funny part is no matter the margins that get shuffled around, the few houses that get zoned out of desirable schools will go down in price and the few that get the bump-up will go up in price. Within a decade those houses will align with the proper SES buyers and you will still have desirable schools and silver spring schools. Nothing will change except a few people’s bank accounts.

Problem with desirable is people will pay up for it which will automatically exclude poor people. When it is the poor people the people are paying to avoid, it will automatically happen.

Even if you shipped all poorest of the poor out of the east county to W schools, prices in the shipping zones would shoot up and people in silver spring would be quickly priced out of their homes. Look at rosemary hills, used to be a very poor & black neighborhood which is why it got zoned to BCC for diversity. Now there are few AAs in the SFHs and otherwise modest ramblers are some of the most expensive homes in silver spring all in about a generation.

This is a perfect explanation of why we need to fix land use instead of school boundaries. All schools should have housing available to all income levels within their boundaries.

Easier (though not easy), much faster and considerably more effective (given the point about price changes) to spend the $ to make educational experiences/opportunities reasonably equivalent across schools than to try to homogenize the available housing across the catchments. Aside from large, mixed greenfield efforts (Reston, Columbia, etc., which need zoning of their own to accomplish), the latter only ends up being music to the ears of developers.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Funny part is no matter the margins that get shuffled around, the few houses that get zoned out of desirable schools will go down in price and the few that get the bump-up will go up in price. Within a decade those houses will align with the proper SES buyers and you will still have desirable schools and silver spring schools. Nothing will change except a few people’s bank accounts.

Problem with desirable is people will pay up for it which will automatically exclude poor people. When it is the poor people the people are paying to avoid, it will automatically happen.

Even if you shipped all poorest of the poor out of the east county to W schools, prices in the shipping zones would shoot up and people in silver spring would be quickly priced out of their homes. Look at rosemary hills, used to be a very poor & black neighborhood which is why it got zoned to BCC for diversity. Now there are few AAs in the SFHs and otherwise modest ramblers are some of the most expensive homes in silver spring all in about a generation.

This is a perfect explanation of why we need to fix land use instead of school boundaries. All schools should have housing available to all income levels within their boundaries.

Hey, here's an idea: let's fix both! School boundaries in the near term, land use in the medium and long term (together with changes to school boundaries as land use changes).