Option H is permanent and the old Wootton HS campus will be closed for good?

[Anonymous]

Many students from Fields Road are walkable to Crown. They should be sent to Crown. The City of Gaithersburg Mayor even came out to support modifying H to include Fields Road. Moving Fields Road would also help alleviate overcrowding from QO (which currently has 18 portables) while moving parts of Rosemont ES would help alleviate overcrowding at GHS.

The problem is if you put Fields Road and parts of Rosemont into Crown, all of the Wootton cluster cannot also fit in Crown.

Remember, the Superintendent can take pieces of every option in making his proposal. There’s nothing to stop him from cutting up Wootton cluster (say removing Cold Spring and Fallsmead), moving the rest of Wootton to Crown, and add in Rosemont and Fields Road.

Most Wootton families have no problems with adding students to their cluster. What they have a problem with is their cluster being broken apart. And the reason why Wootton’s current location is beloved isn’t because the building itself is somehow magically responsible for academic achievement, but because it really is a community hub. There are so many connections between Frost MS and Wootton HS. They are currently on a shared campus!

Not to mention what are the practical implications of turning Wootton into a holding school? If Wootton is a run-down unsafe building that the Board is refusing to renovate, how does turning it into a holding school make it magically safe for Damascus and Magruder students? What are the practical safety implications of bussing kids all the way from Damascus and Magruder into Wootton Parkway—which is a single-lane road—while also bussing all of the previously walkable Wootton kids out of Wootton parkway to Crown? The morning congestion is already terrible on both Wootton Parkway and around Sam Eig/270. This isn’t going to help.

The research on road safety is clear. The farther kids travel, the more bussing involved, the more there will be accidents and deaths. For example, can you begin to imagine a bunch of inexperienced teenage drivers driving quite literally across the county going from Damascus to Wootton?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I think we are making much progress in this discussion. We have established that if H passes, the Wootton name will disappear, the new replacement school will be mediocre, that many people who bought into the Wootton district will be seeking to move or to send their kids to private schools, and that we will continue to elect people who think all of this is good for the county.

I don't think you know what that phrase means.

You saying something does not "establish" it.

Pedantic much?

Try a substantive response next time. You will be taken more seriously.

P.S. Mandy Patinkin did it better than you.

OK, let's try this:
1. What are your facts to support the conclusion that the Wootton name will disappear?
2. What are your facts to support the conclusion that the school will be mediocre?

I'm looking for facts here, which are needed to "establish" something. Conjecture doesn't count.

DP. Just so we’re on the same page here. Please define what you will accept as “facts” to support. Do you mean direct evidence, or will you accept circumstantial evidence? Will you accept past behaviors and statistics as “facts” to support these will likely happen?

Happy to spend the time to provide a substantive response, but I won’t waste my time if you’re going to act like a child and claim “that doesn’t count because <fill in the blank>”. That kind of response will only demonstrate you never wanted answers and are only virtue signaling to your supporters on this thread.

PP thanks for asking. Certainly, circumstantial evidence counts. For example, if you can find anybody involved in the decision at any point making a statement saying that Wootton's name is problematic or should be changed, that would be relevant. Or if you can point to any research that the geographic location of a school impacts the quality of education, or that the school at Wootton would provide less advanced programs, or that when a physical location changes the quality of teachers declines... Anything like that.

And then we can value the weight of those facts to see if they establish anything.

DP but one fact you can add is that the school(s) they are adding as feeders have lower test scores (fact) and very inactive/nonexistent PTAs( I know this is true for Rosemont-not 100% for the other schools but will guarantee they are not as active as the current Wootton feeders PTA).

There is no magic that is going to make low performing kids suddenly be high performing when put in a new school. So, in turn the overall performance of the school will decline. Therefore-mediocre.

Actually there is quite a bit of research that indicates that peer group positively impacts academic performance. So...no not medicore.

https://ijcrt.org/papers/IJCRT2211091.pdf
https://www.education-progress.org/en/focus/31-peereffects

Remember that any studies or research are probably based on the assumptions that school systems have the goal of raising the bottom, not lowering the bar.

But from what we've seen MCPS is intent on lowering the bar.

Our child's math class in MCPS literally stopped instruction about two or three weeks at the end of each marking period because the teacher said that they were ahead of the rest of the county and finished everything and didn't have to do anything until the next marking period. So they spent those next two or three weeks on their Chromebooks playing games.

The other example is eliminating the countywide regional magnets. People on DCUM acknowledged, they are perfectly fine with removing the very high level countywide programs to something that is more widely available but may be pretty much the equivalent of honors classes at some other schools.

If it really was just an issue of not being fair due to the limited amount of seats, they could have explored expanding the program by maybe another 30 or 60 seats and/or make sure there are a set number of seats for students from the underrepresented schools (and maybe demographics/income based on FARMS eligibility). Or if it is an issue of access, maybe opening an additional program. So three magnets, instead of two, and/or two county wide IB programs instead of just RMIB. Not water it down to six and limit the geographic areas that feed into each one.

PP here and I agree with most of what you write. But, respectfully, is it relevant to the issue of whether adding a small percentage of low performing (on average in the aggregate) students to a large amount of high performing students will make a school mediocre?

It’s not a small number. It’s up to 1/3 addition from Gaithersburg catchment area. If you have followed this thread or community chat channel closely, you’ll see sup and some ESs under GHS are actively advocating a modified option H to add 1-2 more ESs belonging to GHS currently.

Exactly-in the end it will be about 1/3 the school. That’s not small. MCPS wants it at capacity. The scores will plummet.

Wootton cluster has six ES, and you're complaining about adding one maybe two ES to Crown because .... omg.. the scores will plumment.

In as much as your striver kid's academics won't rub off on a poor brown kid, the poor brown kid's poor performance won't rub off on your kid.

There will be enough striver kids at Crown from Wootton to still have lots of AP classes, and probably the STEM magnet.

You Wootton parents are racist and ridiculous.

They have 6 ES right now-yes. But after the move 1-2 Wootton feeders will likely be pushed out. The only people that keep mentioning color are posters against Wootton parents-not a single Wootton parent has made a comment saying they don’t want kids of a certain race. Not wanting the scores at your child’s score to seriously decrease is not racist.

Regardless of race, you are clear you only want high preforming kids from the right famlies at your school.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Many students from Fields Road are walkable to Crown. They should be sent to Crown. The City of Gaithersburg Mayor even came out to support modifying H to include Fields Road. Moving Fields Road would also help alleviate overcrowding from QO (which currently has 18 portables) while moving parts of Rosemont ES would help alleviate overcrowding at GHS.

The problem is if you put Fields Road and parts of Rosemont into Crown, all of the Wootton cluster cannot also fit in Crown.

Remember, the Superintendent can take pieces of every option in making his proposal. There’s nothing to stop him from cutting up Wootton cluster (say removing Cold Spring and Fallsmead), moving the rest of Wootton to Crown, and add in Rosemont and Fields Road.

Most Wootton families have no problems with adding students to their cluster. What they have a problem with is their cluster being broken apart. And the reason why Wootton’s current location is beloved isn’t because the building itself is somehow magically responsible for academic achievement, but because it really is a community hub. There are so many connections between Frost MS and Wootton HS. They are currently on a shared campus!

Not to mention what are the practical implications of turning Wootton into a holding school? If Wootton is a run-down unsafe building that the Board is refusing to renovate, how does turning it into a holding school make it magically safe for Damascus and Magruder students? What are the practical safety implications of bussing kids all the way from Damascus and Magruder into Wootton Parkway—which is a single-lane road—while also bussing all of the previously walkable Wootton kids out of Wootton parkway to Crown? The morning congestion is already terrible on both Wootton Parkway and around Sam Eig/270. This isn’t going to help.

The research on road safety is clear. The farther kids travel, the more bussing involved, the more there will be accidents and deaths. For example, can you begin to imagine a bunch of inexperienced teenage drivers driving quite literally across the county going from Damascus to Wootton?

Actually many of the fatilities with children/students have been walking, not on actual busses.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Many students from Fields Road are walkable to Crown. They should be sent to Crown. The City of Gaithersburg Mayor even came out to support modifying H to include Fields Road. Moving Fields Road would also help alleviate overcrowding from QO (which currently has 18 portables) while moving parts of Rosemont ES would help alleviate overcrowding at GHS.

The problem is if you put Fields Road and parts of Rosemont into Crown, all of the Wootton cluster cannot also fit in Crown.

Remember, the Superintendent can take pieces of every option in making his proposal. There’s nothing to stop him from cutting up Wootton cluster (say removing Cold Spring and Fallsmead), moving the rest of Wootton to Crown, and add in Rosemont and Fields Road.

Most Wootton families have no problems with adding students to their cluster. What they have a problem with is their cluster being broken apart. And the reason why Wootton’s current location is beloved isn’t because the building itself is somehow magically responsible for academic achievement, but because it really is a community hub. There are so many connections between Frost MS and Wootton HS. They are currently on a shared campus!

Not to mention what are the practical implications of turning Wootton into a holding school? If Wootton is a run-down unsafe building that the Board is refusing to renovate, how does turning it into a holding school make it magically safe for Damascus and Magruder students? What are the practical safety implications of bussing kids all the way from Damascus and Magruder into Wootton Parkway—which is a single-lane road—while also bussing all of the previously walkable Wootton kids out of Wootton parkway to Crown? The morning congestion is already terrible on both Wootton Parkway and around Sam Eig/270. This isn’t going to help.

The research on road safety is clear. The farther kids travel, the more bussing involved, the more there will be accidents and deaths. For example, can you begin to imagine a bunch of inexperienced teenage drivers driving quite literally across the county going from Damascus to Wootton?

Actually many of the fatilities with children/students have been walking, not on actual busses.

So the data on this is actually available publically.

In a 1/2 mile radius of Wootton High School, there were 84 instances, and 7 of them involved pedestrians/cyclists. In a 1/2 mile radius of the Crown High School site, there were 936 incidents, and 32 involved pedestrians/cyclists.

You can’t seriously be disputing the idea that the further kids have to travel, the more likely there will be incidents…

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I think we are making much progress in this discussion. We have established that if H passes, the Wootton name will disappear, the new replacement school will be mediocre, that many people who bought into the Wootton district will be seeking to move or to send their kids to private schools, and that we will continue to elect people who think all of this is good for the county.

I don't think you know what that phrase means.

You saying something does not "establish" it.

Pedantic much?

Try a substantive response next time. You will be taken more seriously.

P.S. Mandy Patinkin did it better than you.

OK, let's try this:
1. What are your facts to support the conclusion that the Wootton name will disappear?
2. What are your facts to support the conclusion that the school will be mediocre?

I'm looking for facts here, which are needed to "establish" something. Conjecture doesn't count.

DP. Just so we’re on the same page here. Please define what you will accept as “facts” to support. Do you mean direct evidence, or will you accept circumstantial evidence? Will you accept past behaviors and statistics as “facts” to support these will likely happen?

Happy to spend the time to provide a substantive response, but I won’t waste my time if you’re going to act like a child and claim “that doesn’t count because <fill in the blank>”. That kind of response will only demonstrate you never wanted answers and are only virtue signaling to your supporters on this thread.

PP thanks for asking. Certainly, circumstantial evidence counts. For example, if you can find anybody involved in the decision at any point making a statement saying that Wootton's name is problematic or should be changed, that would be relevant. Or if you can point to any research that the geographic location of a school impacts the quality of education, or that the school at Wootton would provide less advanced programs, or that when a physical location changes the quality of teachers declines... Anything like that.

And then we can value the weight of those facts to see if they establish anything.

DP but one fact you can add is that the school(s) they are adding as feeders have lower test scores (fact) and very inactive/nonexistent PTAs( I know this is true for Rosemont-not 100% for the other schools but will guarantee they are not as active as the current Wootton feeders PTA).

There is no magic that is going to make low performing kids suddenly be high performing when put in a new school. So, in turn the overall performance of the school will decline. Therefore-mediocre.

Actually there is quite a bit of research that indicates that peer group positively impacts academic performance. So...no not medicore.

https://ijcrt.org/papers/IJCRT2211091.pdf
https://www.education-progress.org/en/focus/31-peereffects

Remember that any studies or research are probably based on the assumptions that school systems have the goal of raising the bottom, not lowering the bar.

But from what we've seen MCPS is intent on lowering the bar.

Our child's math class in MCPS literally stopped instruction about two or three weeks at the end of each marking period because the teacher said that they were ahead of the rest of the county and finished everything and didn't have to do anything until the next marking period. So they spent those next two or three weeks on their Chromebooks playing games.

The other example is eliminating the countywide regional magnets. People on DCUM acknowledged, they are perfectly fine with removing the very high level countywide programs to something that is more widely available but may be pretty much the equivalent of honors classes at some other schools.

If it really was just an issue of not being fair due to the limited amount of seats, they could have explored expanding the program by maybe another 30 or 60 seats and/or make sure there are a set number of seats for students from the underrepresented schools (and maybe demographics/income based on FARMS eligibility). Or if it is an issue of access, maybe opening an additional program. So three magnets, instead of two, and/or two county wide IB programs instead of just RMIB. Not water it down to six and limit the geographic areas that feed into each one.

PP here and I agree with most of what you write. But, respectfully, is it relevant to the issue of whether adding a small percentage of low performing (on average in the aggregate) students to a large amount of high performing students will make a school mediocre?

It’s not a small number. It’s up to 1/3 addition from Gaithersburg catchment area. If you have followed this thread or community chat channel closely, you’ll see sup and some ESs under GHS are actively advocating a modified option H to add 1-2 more ESs belonging to GHS currently.

Exactly-in the end it will be about 1/3 the school. That’s not small. MCPS wants it at capacity. The scores will plummet.

Wootton cluster has six ES, and you're complaining about adding one maybe two ES to Crown because .... omg.. the scores will plumment.

In as much as your striver kid's academics won't rub off on a poor brown kid, the poor brown kid's poor performance won't rub off on your kid.

There will be enough striver kids at Crown from Wootton to still have lots of AP classes, and probably the STEM magnet.

You Wootton parents are racist and ridiculous.

They have 6 ES right now-yes. But after the move 1-2 Wootton feeders will likely be pushed out. The only people that keep mentioning color are posters against Wootton parents-not a single Wootton parent has made a comment saying they don’t want kids of a certain race. Not wanting the scores at your child’s score to seriously decrease is not racist.

Moving 1-2 ES into Wootton and then removing 1-2 ES to other schools and close Wootton and relocate to crown. How can people think Wootton should be happy about this and not complain?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I think we are making much progress in this discussion. We have established that if H passes, the Wootton name will disappear, the new replacement school will be mediocre, that many people who bought into the Wootton district will be seeking to move or to send their kids to private schools, and that we will continue to elect people who think all of this is good for the county.

I don't think you know what that phrase means.

You saying something does not "establish" it.

Pedantic much?

Try a substantive response next time. You will be taken more seriously.

P.S. Mandy Patinkin did it better than you.

OK, let's try this:
1. What are your facts to support the conclusion that the Wootton name will disappear?
2. What are your facts to support the conclusion that the school will be mediocre?

I'm looking for facts here, which are needed to "establish" something. Conjecture doesn't count.

DP. Just so we’re on the same page here. Please define what you will accept as “facts” to support. Do you mean direct evidence, or will you accept circumstantial evidence? Will you accept past behaviors and statistics as “facts” to support these will likely happen?

Happy to spend the time to provide a substantive response, but I won’t waste my time if you’re going to act like a child and claim “that doesn’t count because <fill in the blank>”. That kind of response will only demonstrate you never wanted answers and are only virtue signaling to your supporters on this thread.

PP thanks for asking. Certainly, circumstantial evidence counts. For example, if you can find anybody involved in the decision at any point making a statement saying that Wootton's name is problematic or should be changed, that would be relevant. Or if you can point to any research that the geographic location of a school impacts the quality of education, or that the school at Wootton would provide less advanced programs, or that when a physical location changes the quality of teachers declines... Anything like that.

And then we can value the weight of those facts to see if they establish anything.

DP but one fact you can add is that the school(s) they are adding as feeders have lower test scores (fact) and very inactive/nonexistent PTAs( I know this is true for Rosemont-not 100% for the other schools but will guarantee they are not as active as the current Wootton feeders PTA).

There is no magic that is going to make low performing kids suddenly be high performing when put in a new school. So, in turn the overall performance of the school will decline. Therefore-mediocre.

Actually there is quite a bit of research that indicates that peer group positively impacts academic performance. So...no not medicore.

https://ijcrt.org/papers/IJCRT2211091.pdf
https://www.education-progress.org/en/focus/31-peereffects

Remember that any studies or research are probably based on the assumptions that school systems have the goal of raising the bottom, not lowering the bar.

But from what we've seen MCPS is intent on lowering the bar.

Our child's math class in MCPS literally stopped instruction about two or three weeks at the end of each marking period because the teacher said that they were ahead of the rest of the county and finished everything and didn't have to do anything until the next marking period. So they spent those next two or three weeks on their Chromebooks playing games.

The other example is eliminating the countywide regional magnets. People on DCUM acknowledged, they are perfectly fine with removing the very high level countywide programs to something that is more widely available but may be pretty much the equivalent of honors classes at some other schools.

If it really was just an issue of not being fair due to the limited amount of seats, they could have explored expanding the program by maybe another 30 or 60 seats and/or make sure there are a set number of seats for students from the underrepresented schools (and maybe demographics/income based on FARMS eligibility). Or if it is an issue of access, maybe opening an additional program. So three magnets, instead of two, and/or two county wide IB programs instead of just RMIB. Not water it down to six and limit the geographic areas that feed into each one.

PP here and I agree with most of what you write. But, respectfully, is it relevant to the issue of whether adding a small percentage of low performing (on average in the aggregate) students to a large amount of high performing students will make a school mediocre?

It’s not a small number. It’s up to 1/3 addition from Gaithersburg catchment area. If you have followed this thread or community chat channel closely, you’ll see sup and some ESs under GHS are actively advocating a modified option H to add 1-2 more ESs belonging to GHS currently.

Exactly-in the end it will be about 1/3 the school. That’s not small. MCPS wants it at capacity. The scores will plummet.

Wootton cluster has six ES, and you're complaining about adding one maybe two ES to Crown because .... omg.. the scores will plumment.

In as much as your striver kid's academics won't rub off on a poor brown kid, the poor brown kid's poor performance won't rub off on your kid.

There will be enough striver kids at Crown from Wootton to still have lots of AP classes, and probably the STEM magnet.

You Wootton parents are racist and ridiculous.

They have 6 ES right now-yes. But after the move 1-2 Wootton feeders will likely be pushed out. The only people that keep mentioning color are posters against Wootton parents-not a single Wootton parent has made a comment saying they don’t want kids of a certain race. Not wanting the scores at your child’s score to seriously decrease is not racist.

Regardless of race, you are clear you only want high preforming kids from the right famlies at your school.

This is the right take. It’s not about race. It is about high performing kids from parents who are involved. God forbid parents want their kids to go to school with the right kind of other kids—the right kind of kids being kids who care about school and will push themselves to do well. Yes—that is quite literally why Wootton parents will pay extra money for smaller, older houses.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I think we are making much progress in this discussion. We have established that if H passes, the Wootton name will disappear, the new replacement school will be mediocre, that many people who bought into the Wootton district will be seeking to move or to send their kids to private schools, and that we will continue to elect people who think all of this is good for the county.

I don't think you know what that phrase means.

You saying something does not "establish" it.

Pedantic much?

Try a substantive response next time. You will be taken more seriously.

P.S. Mandy Patinkin did it better than you.

OK, let's try this:
1. What are your facts to support the conclusion that the Wootton name will disappear?
2. What are your facts to support the conclusion that the school will be mediocre?

I'm looking for facts here, which are needed to "establish" something. Conjecture doesn't count.

DP. Just so we’re on the same page here. Please define what you will accept as “facts” to support. Do you mean direct evidence, or will you accept circumstantial evidence? Will you accept past behaviors and statistics as “facts” to support these will likely happen?

Happy to spend the time to provide a substantive response, but I won’t waste my time if you’re going to act like a child and claim “that doesn’t count because <fill in the blank>”. That kind of response will only demonstrate you never wanted answers and are only virtue signaling to your supporters on this thread.

PP thanks for asking. Certainly, circumstantial evidence counts. For example, if you can find anybody involved in the decision at any point making a statement saying that Wootton's name is problematic or should be changed, that would be relevant. Or if you can point to any research that the geographic location of a school impacts the quality of education, or that the school at Wootton would provide less advanced programs, or that when a physical location changes the quality of teachers declines... Anything like that.

And then we can value the weight of those facts to see if they establish anything.

DP but one fact you can add is that the school(s) they are adding as feeders have lower test scores (fact) and very inactive/nonexistent PTAs( I know this is true for Rosemont-not 100% for the other schools but will guarantee they are not as active as the current Wootton feeders PTA).

There is no magic that is going to make low performing kids suddenly be high performing when put in a new school. So, in turn the overall performance of the school will decline. Therefore-mediocre.

Actually there is quite a bit of research that indicates that peer group positively impacts academic performance. So...no not medicore.

https://ijcrt.org/papers/IJCRT2211091.pdf
https://www.education-progress.org/en/focus/31-peereffects

Remember that any studies or research are probably based on the assumptions that school systems have the goal of raising the bottom, not lowering the bar.

But from what we've seen MCPS is intent on lowering the bar.

Our child's math class in MCPS literally stopped instruction about two or three weeks at the end of each marking period because the teacher said that they were ahead of the rest of the county and finished everything and didn't have to do anything until the next marking period. So they spent those next two or three weeks on their Chromebooks playing games.

The other example is eliminating the countywide regional magnets. People on DCUM acknowledged, they are perfectly fine with removing the very high level countywide programs to something that is more widely available but may be pretty much the equivalent of honors classes at some other schools.

If it really was just an issue of not being fair due to the limited amount of seats, they could have explored expanding the program by maybe another 30 or 60 seats and/or make sure there are a set number of seats for students from the underrepresented schools (and maybe demographics/income based on FARMS eligibility). Or if it is an issue of access, maybe opening an additional program. So three magnets, instead of two, and/or two county wide IB programs instead of just RMIB. Not water it down to six and limit the geographic areas that feed into each one.

PP here and I agree with most of what you write. But, respectfully, is it relevant to the issue of whether adding a small percentage of low performing (on average in the aggregate) students to a large amount of high performing students will make a school mediocre?

It’s not a small number. It’s up to 1/3 addition from Gaithersburg catchment area. If you have followed this thread or community chat channel closely, you’ll see sup and some ESs under GHS are actively advocating a modified option H to add 1-2 more ESs belonging to GHS currently.

Exactly-in the end it will be about 1/3 the school. That’s not small. MCPS wants it at capacity. The scores will plummet.

Wootton cluster has six ES, and you're complaining about adding one maybe two ES to Crown because .... omg.. the scores will plumment.

In as much as your striver kid's academics won't rub off on a poor brown kid, the poor brown kid's poor performance won't rub off on your kid.

There will be enough striver kids at Crown from Wootton to still have lots of AP classes, and probably the STEM magnet.

You Wootton parents are racist and ridiculous.

They have 6 ES right now-yes. But after the move 1-2 Wootton feeders will likely be pushed out. The only people that keep mentioning color are posters against Wootton parents-not a single Wootton parent has made a comment saying they don’t want kids of a certain race. Not wanting the scores at your child’s score to seriously decrease is not racist.

Moving 1-2 ES into Wootton and then removing 1-2 ES to other schools and close Wootton and relocate to crown. How can people think Wootton should be happy about this and not complain?

Because internet trolls hate every W school, and Wootton is the easiest one to pick on.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I think we are making much progress in this discussion. We have established that if H passes, the Wootton name will disappear, the new replacement school will be mediocre, that many people who bought into the Wootton district will be seeking to move or to send their kids to private schools, and that we will continue to elect people who think all of this is good for the county.

I don't think you know what that phrase means.

You saying something does not "establish" it.

Pedantic much?

Try a substantive response next time. You will be taken more seriously.

P.S. Mandy Patinkin did it better than you.

OK, let's try this:
1. What are your facts to support the conclusion that the Wootton name will disappear?
2. What are your facts to support the conclusion that the school will be mediocre?

I'm looking for facts here, which are needed to "establish" something. Conjecture doesn't count.

DP. Just so we’re on the same page here. Please define what you will accept as “facts” to support. Do you mean direct evidence, or will you accept circumstantial evidence? Will you accept past behaviors and statistics as “facts” to support these will likely happen?

Happy to spend the time to provide a substantive response, but I won’t waste my time if you’re going to act like a child and claim “that doesn’t count because <fill in the blank>”. That kind of response will only demonstrate you never wanted answers and are only virtue signaling to your supporters on this thread.

PP thanks for asking. Certainly, circumstantial evidence counts. For example, if you can find anybody involved in the decision at any point making a statement saying that Wootton's name is problematic or should be changed, that would be relevant. Or if you can point to any research that the geographic location of a school impacts the quality of education, or that the school at Wootton would provide less advanced programs, or that when a physical location changes the quality of teachers declines... Anything like that.

And then we can value the weight of those facts to see if they establish anything.

DP but one fact you can add is that the school(s) they are adding as feeders have lower test scores (fact) and very inactive/nonexistent PTAs( I know this is true for Rosemont-not 100% for the other schools but will guarantee they are not as active as the current Wootton feeders PTA).

There is no magic that is going to make low performing kids suddenly be high performing when put in a new school. So, in turn the overall performance of the school will decline. Therefore-mediocre.

Actually there is quite a bit of research that indicates that peer group positively impacts academic performance. So...no not medicore.

https://ijcrt.org/papers/IJCRT2211091.pdf
https://www.education-progress.org/en/focus/31-peereffects

Remember that any studies or research are probably based on the assumptions that school systems have the goal of raising the bottom, not lowering the bar.

But from what we've seen MCPS is intent on lowering the bar.

Our child's math class in MCPS literally stopped instruction about two or three weeks at the end of each marking period because the teacher said that they were ahead of the rest of the county and finished everything and didn't have to do anything until the next marking period. So they spent those next two or three weeks on their Chromebooks playing games.

The other example is eliminating the countywide regional magnets. People on DCUM acknowledged, they are perfectly fine with removing the very high level countywide programs to something that is more widely available but may be pretty much the equivalent of honors classes at some other schools.

If it really was just an issue of not being fair due to the limited amount of seats, they could have explored expanding the program by maybe another 30 or 60 seats and/or make sure there are a set number of seats for students from the underrepresented schools (and maybe demographics/income based on FARMS eligibility). Or if it is an issue of access, maybe opening an additional program. So three magnets, instead of two, and/or two county wide IB programs instead of just RMIB. Not water it down to six and limit the geographic areas that feed into each one.

PP here and I agree with most of what you write. But, respectfully, is it relevant to the issue of whether adding a small percentage of low performing (on average in the aggregate) students to a large amount of high performing students will make a school mediocre?

It’s not a small number. It’s up to 1/3 addition from Gaithersburg catchment area. If you have followed this thread or community chat channel closely, you’ll see sup and some ESs under GHS are actively advocating a modified option H to add 1-2 more ESs belonging to GHS currently.

Exactly-in the end it will be about 1/3 the school. That’s not small. MCPS wants it at capacity. The scores will plummet.

Wootton cluster has six ES, and you're complaining about adding one maybe two ES to Crown because .... omg.. the scores will plumment.

In as much as your striver kid's academics won't rub off on a poor brown kid, the poor brown kid's poor performance won't rub off on your kid.

There will be enough striver kids at Crown from Wootton to still have lots of AP classes, and probably the STEM magnet.

You Wootton parents are racist and ridiculous.

They have 6 ES right now-yes. But after the move 1-2 Wootton feeders will likely be pushed out. The only people that keep mentioning color are posters against Wootton parents-not a single Wootton parent has made a comment saying they don’t want kids of a certain race. Not wanting the scores at your child’s score to seriously decrease is not racist.

Regardless of race, you are clear you only want high preforming kids from the right famlies at your school.

This is the right take. It’s not about race. It is about high performing kids from parents who are involved. God forbid parents want their kids to go to school with the right kind of other kids—the right kind of kids being kids who care about school and will push themselves to do well. Yes—that is quite literally why Wootton parents will pay extra money for smaller, older houses.

Yeah i’m not really sure why this was presented as an insult. Yes-I want my kids going to school with kids who work hard and have parents invested in their education. You want to shame parents for that? Go right ahead.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I think we are making much progress in this discussion. We have established that if H passes, the Wootton name will disappear, the new replacement school will be mediocre, that many people who bought into the Wootton district will be seeking to move or to send their kids to private schools, and that we will continue to elect people who think all of this is good for the county.

I don't think you know what that phrase means.

You saying something does not "establish" it.

Pedantic much?

Try a substantive response next time. You will be taken more seriously.

P.S. Mandy Patinkin did it better than you.

OK, let's try this:
1. What are your facts to support the conclusion that the Wootton name will disappear?
2. What are your facts to support the conclusion that the school will be mediocre?

I'm looking for facts here, which are needed to "establish" something. Conjecture doesn't count.

DP. Just so we’re on the same page here. Please define what you will accept as “facts” to support. Do you mean direct evidence, or will you accept circumstantial evidence? Will you accept past behaviors and statistics as “facts” to support these will likely happen?

Happy to spend the time to provide a substantive response, but I won’t waste my time if you’re going to act like a child and claim “that doesn’t count because <fill in the blank>”. That kind of response will only demonstrate you never wanted answers and are only virtue signaling to your supporters on this thread.

PP thanks for asking. Certainly, circumstantial evidence counts. For example, if you can find anybody involved in the decision at any point making a statement saying that Wootton's name is problematic or should be changed, that would be relevant. Or if you can point to any research that the geographic location of a school impacts the quality of education, or that the school at Wootton would provide less advanced programs, or that when a physical location changes the quality of teachers declines... Anything like that.

And then we can value the weight of those facts to see if they establish anything.

DP but one fact you can add is that the school(s) they are adding as feeders have lower test scores (fact) and very inactive/nonexistent PTAs( I know this is true for Rosemont-not 100% for the other schools but will guarantee they are not as active as the current Wootton feeders PTA).

There is no magic that is going to make low performing kids suddenly be high performing when put in a new school. So, in turn the overall performance of the school will decline. Therefore-mediocre.

Actually there is quite a bit of research that indicates that peer group positively impacts academic performance. So...no not medicore.

https://ijcrt.org/papers/IJCRT2211091.pdf
https://www.education-progress.org/en/focus/31-peereffects

Remember that any studies or research are probably based on the assumptions that school systems have the goal of raising the bottom, not lowering the bar.

But from what we've seen MCPS is intent on lowering the bar.

Our child's math class in MCPS literally stopped instruction about two or three weeks at the end of each marking period because the teacher said that they were ahead of the rest of the county and finished everything and didn't have to do anything until the next marking period. So they spent those next two or three weeks on their Chromebooks playing games.

The other example is eliminating the countywide regional magnets. People on DCUM acknowledged, they are perfectly fine with removing the very high level countywide programs to something that is more widely available but may be pretty much the equivalent of honors classes at some other schools.

If it really was just an issue of not being fair due to the limited amount of seats, they could have explored expanding the program by maybe another 30 or 60 seats and/or make sure there are a set number of seats for students from the underrepresented schools (and maybe demographics/income based on FARMS eligibility). Or if it is an issue of access, maybe opening an additional program. So three magnets, instead of two, and/or two county wide IB programs instead of just RMIB. Not water it down to six and limit the geographic areas that feed into each one.

PP here and I agree with most of what you write. But, respectfully, is it relevant to the issue of whether adding a small percentage of low performing (on average in the aggregate) students to a large amount of high performing students will make a school mediocre?

It’s not a small number. It’s up to 1/3 addition from Gaithersburg catchment area. If you have followed this thread or community chat channel closely, you’ll see sup and some ESs under GHS are actively advocating a modified option H to add 1-2 more ESs belonging to GHS currently.

Exactly-in the end it will be about 1/3 the school. That’s not small. MCPS wants it at capacity. The scores will plummet.

Wootton cluster has six ES, and you're complaining about adding one maybe two ES to Crown because .... omg.. the scores will plumment.

In as much as your striver kid's academics won't rub off on a poor brown kid, the poor brown kid's poor performance won't rub off on your kid.

There will be enough striver kids at Crown from Wootton to still have lots of AP classes, and probably the STEM magnet.

You Wootton parents are racist and ridiculous.

They have 6 ES right now-yes. But after the move 1-2 Wootton feeders will likely be pushed out. The only people that keep mentioning color are posters against Wootton parents-not a single Wootton parent has made a comment saying they don’t want kids of a certain race. Not wanting the scores at your child’s score to seriously decrease is not racist.

Moving 1-2 ES into Wootton and then removing 1-2 ES to other schools and close Wootton and relocate to crown. How can people think Wootton should be happy about this and not complain?

Because internet trolls hate every W school, and Wootton is the easiest one to pick on.

How is it the only thing you can say? No one cares about W schools. You seem to dismiss the serious issues that have happened over the years all the while slamming other schools and students.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Many students from Fields Road are walkable to Crown. They should be sent to Crown. The City of Gaithersburg Mayor even came out to support modifying H to include Fields Road. Moving Fields Road would also help alleviate overcrowding from QO (which currently has 18 portables) while moving parts of Rosemont ES would help alleviate overcrowding at GHS.

The problem is if you put Fields Road and parts of Rosemont into Crown, all of the Wootton cluster cannot also fit in Crown.

Remember, the Superintendent can take pieces of every option in making his proposal. There’s nothing to stop him from cutting up Wootton cluster (say removing Cold Spring and Fallsmead), moving the rest of Wootton to Crown, and add in Rosemont and Fields Road.

Most Wootton families have no problems with adding students to their cluster. What they have a problem with is their cluster being broken apart. And the reason why Wootton’s current location is beloved isn’t because the building itself is somehow magically responsible for academic achievement, but because it really is a community hub. There are so many connections between Frost MS and Wootton HS. They are currently on a shared campus!

Not to mention what are the practical implications of turning Wootton into a holding school? If Wootton is a run-down unsafe building that the Board is refusing to renovate, how does turning it into a holding school make it magically safe for Damascus and Magruder students? What are the practical safety implications of bussing kids all the way from Damascus and Magruder into Wootton Parkway—which is a single-lane road—while also bussing all of the previously walkable Wootton kids out of Wootton parkway to Crown? The morning congestion is already terrible on both Wootton Parkway and around Sam Eig/270. This isn’t going to help.

The research on road safety is clear. The farther kids travel, the more bussing involved, the more there will be accidents and deaths. For example, can you begin to imagine a bunch of inexperienced teenage drivers driving quite literally across the county going from Damascus to Wootton?

Removing an ES which was never presented in all previous options last minute is a problem. It’s not enough community engagement. Closing Wootton and relocating to crown is also introduced late and doesn’t have enough public engagement and not legal in the boundary study process.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I think we are making much progress in this discussion. We have established that if H passes, the Wootton name will disappear, the new replacement school will be mediocre, that many people who bought into the Wootton district will be seeking to move or to send their kids to private schools, and that we will continue to elect people who think all of this is good for the county.

I don't think you know what that phrase means.

You saying something does not "establish" it.

Pedantic much?

Try a substantive response next time. You will be taken more seriously.

P.S. Mandy Patinkin did it better than you.

OK, let's try this:
1. What are your facts to support the conclusion that the Wootton name will disappear?
2. What are your facts to support the conclusion that the school will be mediocre?

I'm looking for facts here, which are needed to "establish" something. Conjecture doesn't count.

DP. Just so we’re on the same page here. Please define what you will accept as “facts” to support. Do you mean direct evidence, or will you accept circumstantial evidence? Will you accept past behaviors and statistics as “facts” to support these will likely happen?

Happy to spend the time to provide a substantive response, but I won’t waste my time if you’re going to act like a child and claim “that doesn’t count because <fill in the blank>”. That kind of response will only demonstrate you never wanted answers and are only virtue signaling to your supporters on this thread.

PP thanks for asking. Certainly, circumstantial evidence counts. For example, if you can find anybody involved in the decision at any point making a statement saying that Wootton's name is problematic or should be changed, that would be relevant. Or if you can point to any research that the geographic location of a school impacts the quality of education, or that the school at Wootton would provide less advanced programs, or that when a physical location changes the quality of teachers declines... Anything like that.

And then we can value the weight of those facts to see if they establish anything.

DP but one fact you can add is that the school(s) they are adding as feeders have lower test scores (fact) and very inactive/nonexistent PTAs( I know this is true for Rosemont-not 100% for the other schools but will guarantee they are not as active as the current Wootton feeders PTA).

There is no magic that is going to make low performing kids suddenly be high performing when put in a new school. So, in turn the overall performance of the school will decline. Therefore-mediocre.

Actually there is quite a bit of research that indicates that peer group positively impacts academic performance. So...no not medicore.

https://ijcrt.org/papers/IJCRT2211091.pdf
https://www.education-progress.org/en/focus/31-peereffects

Remember that any studies or research are probably based on the assumptions that school systems have the goal of raising the bottom, not lowering the bar.

But from what we've seen MCPS is intent on lowering the bar.

Our child's math class in MCPS literally stopped instruction about two or three weeks at the end of each marking period because the teacher said that they were ahead of the rest of the county and finished everything and didn't have to do anything until the next marking period. So they spent those next two or three weeks on their Chromebooks playing games.

The other example is eliminating the countywide regional magnets. People on DCUM acknowledged, they are perfectly fine with removing the very high level countywide programs to something that is more widely available but may be pretty much the equivalent of honors classes at some other schools.

If it really was just an issue of not being fair due to the limited amount of seats, they could have explored expanding the program by maybe another 30 or 60 seats and/or make sure there are a set number of seats for students from the underrepresented schools (and maybe demographics/income based on FARMS eligibility). Or if it is an issue of access, maybe opening an additional program. So three magnets, instead of two, and/or two county wide IB programs instead of just RMIB. Not water it down to six and limit the geographic areas that feed into each one.

PP here and I agree with most of what you write. But, respectfully, is it relevant to the issue of whether adding a small percentage of low performing (on average in the aggregate) students to a large amount of high performing students will make a school mediocre?

It’s not a small number. It’s up to 1/3 addition from Gaithersburg catchment area. If you have followed this thread or community chat channel closely, you’ll see sup and some ESs under GHS are actively advocating a modified option H to add 1-2 more ESs belonging to GHS currently.

Exactly-in the end it will be about 1/3 the school. That’s not small. MCPS wants it at capacity. The scores will plummet.

Wootton cluster has six ES, and you're complaining about adding one maybe two ES to Crown because .... omg.. the scores will plumment.

In as much as your striver kid's academics won't rub off on a poor brown kid, the poor brown kid's poor performance won't rub off on your kid.

There will be enough striver kids at Crown from Wootton to still have lots of AP classes, and probably the STEM magnet.

You Wootton parents are racist and ridiculous.

They have 6 ES right now-yes. But after the move 1-2 Wootton feeders will likely be pushed out. The only people that keep mentioning color are posters against Wootton parents-not a single Wootton parent has made a comment saying they don’t want kids of a certain race. Not wanting the scores at your child’s score to seriously decrease is not racist.

Regardless of race, you are clear you only want high preforming kids from the right famlies at your school.

This is the right take. It’s not about race. It is about high performing kids from parents who are involved. God forbid parents want their kids to go to school with the right kind of other kids—the right kind of kids being kids who care about school and will push themselves to do well. Yes—that is quite literally why Wootton parents will pay extra money for smaller, older houses.

Yeah i’m not really sure why this was presented as an insult. Yes-I want my kids going to school with kids who work hard and have parents invested in their education. You want to shame parents for that? Go right ahead.

And, your kids would be. There is always a strong group of smart kids who work hard and have parents invested in their education. I cannot imagine that Wootton doesn't have lower-income families or students with disabilities who struggle. So, basically you are saying you don't want them at your school which speaks volumes.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I think we are making much progress in this discussion. We have established that if H passes, the Wootton name will disappear, the new replacement school will be mediocre, that many people who bought into the Wootton district will be seeking to move or to send their kids to private schools, and that we will continue to elect people who think all of this is good for the county.

I don't think you know what that phrase means.

You saying something does not "establish" it.

Pedantic much?

Try a substantive response next time. You will be taken more seriously.

P.S. Mandy Patinkin did it better than you.

OK, let's try this:
1. What are your facts to support the conclusion that the Wootton name will disappear?
2. What are your facts to support the conclusion that the school will be mediocre?

I'm looking for facts here, which are needed to "establish" something. Conjecture doesn't count.

DP. Just so we’re on the same page here. Please define what you will accept as “facts” to support. Do you mean direct evidence, or will you accept circumstantial evidence? Will you accept past behaviors and statistics as “facts” to support these will likely happen?

Happy to spend the time to provide a substantive response, but I won’t waste my time if you’re going to act like a child and claim “that doesn’t count because <fill in the blank>”. That kind of response will only demonstrate you never wanted answers and are only virtue signaling to your supporters on this thread.

PP thanks for asking. Certainly, circumstantial evidence counts. For example, if you can find anybody involved in the decision at any point making a statement saying that Wootton's name is problematic or should be changed, that would be relevant. Or if you can point to any research that the geographic location of a school impacts the quality of education, or that the school at Wootton would provide less advanced programs, or that when a physical location changes the quality of teachers declines... Anything like that.

And then we can value the weight of those facts to see if they establish anything.

DP but one fact you can add is that the school(s) they are adding as feeders have lower test scores (fact) and very inactive/nonexistent PTAs( I know this is true for Rosemont-not 100% for the other schools but will guarantee they are not as active as the current Wootton feeders PTA).

There is no magic that is going to make low performing kids suddenly be high performing when put in a new school. So, in turn the overall performance of the school will decline. Therefore-mediocre.

Actually there is quite a bit of research that indicates that peer group positively impacts academic performance. So...no not medicore.

https://ijcrt.org/papers/IJCRT2211091.pdf
https://www.education-progress.org/en/focus/31-peereffects

Remember that any studies or research are probably based on the assumptions that school systems have the goal of raising the bottom, not lowering the bar.

But from what we've seen MCPS is intent on lowering the bar.

Our child's math class in MCPS literally stopped instruction about two or three weeks at the end of each marking period because the teacher said that they were ahead of the rest of the county and finished everything and didn't have to do anything until the next marking period. So they spent those next two or three weeks on their Chromebooks playing games.

The other example is eliminating the countywide regional magnets. People on DCUM acknowledged, they are perfectly fine with removing the very high level countywide programs to something that is more widely available but may be pretty much the equivalent of honors classes at some other schools.

If it really was just an issue of not being fair due to the limited amount of seats, they could have explored expanding the program by maybe another 30 or 60 seats and/or make sure there are a set number of seats for students from the underrepresented schools (and maybe demographics/income based on FARMS eligibility). Or if it is an issue of access, maybe opening an additional program. So three magnets, instead of two, and/or two county wide IB programs instead of just RMIB. Not water it down to six and limit the geographic areas that feed into each one.

PP here and I agree with most of what you write. But, respectfully, is it relevant to the issue of whether adding a small percentage of low performing (on average in the aggregate) students to a large amount of high performing students will make a school mediocre?

It’s not a small number. It’s up to 1/3 addition from Gaithersburg catchment area. If you have followed this thread or community chat channel closely, you’ll see sup and some ESs under GHS are actively advocating a modified option H to add 1-2 more ESs belonging to GHS currently.

Exactly-in the end it will be about 1/3 the school. That’s not small. MCPS wants it at capacity. The scores will plummet.

Wootton cluster has six ES, and you're complaining about adding one maybe two ES to Crown because .... omg.. the scores will plumment.

In as much as your striver kid's academics won't rub off on a poor brown kid, the poor brown kid's poor performance won't rub off on your kid.

There will be enough striver kids at Crown from Wootton to still have lots of AP classes, and probably the STEM magnet.

You Wootton parents are racist and ridiculous.

They have 6 ES right now-yes. But after the move 1-2 Wootton feeders will likely be pushed out. The only people that keep mentioning color are posters against Wootton parents-not a single Wootton parent has made a comment saying they don’t want kids of a certain race. Not wanting the scores at your child’s score to seriously decrease is not racist.

Regardless of race, you are clear you only want high preforming kids from the right famlies at your school.

This is the right take. It’s not about race. It is about high performing kids from parents who are involved. God forbid parents want their kids to go to school with the right kind of other kids—the right kind of kids being kids who care about school and will push themselves to do well. Yes—that is quite literally why Wootton parents will pay extra money for smaller, older houses.

Yeah i’m not really sure why this was presented as an insult. Yes-I want my kids going to school with kids who work hard and have parents invested in their education. You want to shame parents for that? Go right ahead.

And, your kids would be. There is always a strong group of smart kids who work hard and have parents invested in their education. I cannot imagine that Wootton doesn't have lower-income families or students with disabilities who struggle. So, basically you are saying you don't want them at your school which speaks volumes.

There are always high performing and low performing kids with high and low involvement parents at every school. We’re talking about the majority of the student body here. When you move Wootton to another school, take away 1-2 elementary schools from its current feeder, and add in two other ES schools, you are fundamentally changing the school.

As a parent, I would like my child to attend a school where majority of her peers are high achieving with highly involved parents. I don’t understand why that is a controversial take. That’s why I live where I live. I’m not saying that should be everyone’s priorities or values. Some people value bigger, newer houses, and that is PERFECTLY fine. But others value sending their kids to a school where likeminded peers make up the majority of the school.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Many students from Fields Road are walkable to Crown. They should be sent to Crown. The City of Gaithersburg Mayor even came out to support modifying H to include Fields Road. Moving Fields Road would also help alleviate overcrowding from QO (which currently has 18 portables) while moving parts of Rosemont ES would help alleviate overcrowding at GHS.

The problem is if you put Fields Road and parts of Rosemont into Crown, all of the Wootton cluster cannot also fit in Crown.

Remember, the Superintendent can take pieces of every option in making his proposal. There’s nothing to stop him from cutting up Wootton cluster (say removing Cold Spring and Fallsmead), moving the rest of Wootton to Crown, and add in Rosemont and Fields Road.

Most Wootton families have no problems with adding students to their cluster. What they have a problem with is their cluster being broken apart. And the reason why Wootton’s current location is beloved isn’t because the building itself is somehow magically responsible for academic achievement, but because it really is a community hub. There are so many connections between Frost MS and Wootton HS. They are currently on a shared campus!

Not to mention what are the practical implications of turning Wootton into a holding school? If Wootton is a run-down unsafe building that the Board is refusing to renovate, how does turning it into a holding school make it magically safe for Damascus and Magruder students? What are the practical safety implications of bussing kids all the way from Damascus and Magruder into Wootton Parkway—which is a single-lane road—while also bussing all of the previously walkable Wootton kids out of Wootton parkway to Crown? The morning congestion is already terrible on both Wootton Parkway and around Sam Eig/270. This isn’t going to help.

The research on road safety is clear. The farther kids travel, the more bussing involved, the more there will be accidents and deaths. For example, can you begin to imagine a bunch of inexperienced teenage drivers driving quite literally across the county going from Damascus to Wootton?

Removing an ES which was never presented in all previous options last minute is a problem. It’s not enough community engagement. Closing Wootton and relocating to crown is also introduced late and doesn’t have enough public engagement and not legal in the boundary study process.

Exactly! Why is no one talking about this? Option H will close Wootton—that is inappropriate for a boundary study. Also everyone should be alarmed. If MCPS can just close a school rather than renovate it, maybe Damascus and Magruder are next.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I think we are making much progress in this discussion. We have established that if H passes, the Wootton name will disappear, the new replacement school will be mediocre, that many people who bought into the Wootton district will be seeking to move or to send their kids to private schools, and that we will continue to elect people who think all of this is good for the county.

I don't think you know what that phrase means.

You saying something does not "establish" it.

Pedantic much?

Try a substantive response next time. You will be taken more seriously.

P.S. Mandy Patinkin did it better than you.

OK, let's try this:
1. What are your facts to support the conclusion that the Wootton name will disappear?
2. What are your facts to support the conclusion that the school will be mediocre?

I'm looking for facts here, which are needed to "establish" something. Conjecture doesn't count.

DP. Just so we’re on the same page here. Please define what you will accept as “facts” to support. Do you mean direct evidence, or will you accept circumstantial evidence? Will you accept past behaviors and statistics as “facts” to support these will likely happen?

Happy to spend the time to provide a substantive response, but I won’t waste my time if you’re going to act like a child and claim “that doesn’t count because <fill in the blank>”. That kind of response will only demonstrate you never wanted answers and are only virtue signaling to your supporters on this thread.

PP thanks for asking. Certainly, circumstantial evidence counts. For example, if you can find anybody involved in the decision at any point making a statement saying that Wootton's name is problematic or should be changed, that would be relevant. Or if you can point to any research that the geographic location of a school impacts the quality of education, or that the school at Wootton would provide less advanced programs, or that when a physical location changes the quality of teachers declines... Anything like that.

And then we can value the weight of those facts to see if they establish anything.

DP but one fact you can add is that the school(s) they are adding as feeders have lower test scores (fact) and very inactive/nonexistent PTAs( I know this is true for Rosemont-not 100% for the other schools but will guarantee they are not as active as the current Wootton feeders PTA).

There is no magic that is going to make low performing kids suddenly be high performing when put in a new school. So, in turn the overall performance of the school will decline. Therefore-mediocre.

Actually there is quite a bit of research that indicates that peer group positively impacts academic performance. So...no not medicore.

https://ijcrt.org/papers/IJCRT2211091.pdf
https://www.education-progress.org/en/focus/31-peereffects

Remember that any studies or research are probably based on the assumptions that school systems have the goal of raising the bottom, not lowering the bar.

But from what we've seen MCPS is intent on lowering the bar.

Our child's math class in MCPS literally stopped instruction about two or three weeks at the end of each marking period because the teacher said that they were ahead of the rest of the county and finished everything and didn't have to do anything until the next marking period. So they spent those next two or three weeks on their Chromebooks playing games.

The other example is eliminating the countywide regional magnets. People on DCUM acknowledged, they are perfectly fine with removing the very high level countywide programs to something that is more widely available but may be pretty much the equivalent of honors classes at some other schools.

If it really was just an issue of not being fair due to the limited amount of seats, they could have explored expanding the program by maybe another 30 or 60 seats and/or make sure there are a set number of seats for students from the underrepresented schools (and maybe demographics/income based on FARMS eligibility). Or if it is an issue of access, maybe opening an additional program. So three magnets, instead of two, and/or two county wide IB programs instead of just RMIB. Not water it down to six and limit the geographic areas that feed into each one.

PP here and I agree with most of what you write. But, respectfully, is it relevant to the issue of whether adding a small percentage of low performing (on average in the aggregate) students to a large amount of high performing students will make a school mediocre?

It’s not a small number. It’s up to 1/3 addition from Gaithersburg catchment area. If you have followed this thread or community chat channel closely, you’ll see sup and some ESs under GHS are actively advocating a modified option H to add 1-2 more ESs belonging to GHS currently.

Exactly-in the end it will be about 1/3 the school. That’s not small. MCPS wants it at capacity. The scores will plummet.

Wootton cluster has six ES, and you're complaining about adding one maybe two ES to Crown because .... omg.. the scores will plumment.

In as much as your striver kid's academics won't rub off on a poor brown kid, the poor brown kid's poor performance won't rub off on your kid.

There will be enough striver kids at Crown from Wootton to still have lots of AP classes, and probably the STEM magnet.

You Wootton parents are racist and ridiculous.

They have 6 ES right now-yes. But after the move 1-2 Wootton feeders will likely be pushed out. The only people that keep mentioning color are posters against Wootton parents-not a single Wootton parent has made a comment saying they don’t want kids of a certain race. Not wanting the scores at your child’s score to seriously decrease is not racist.

Your child's score won't decrease. Poor academic performance isn't contagious. Moving one ES to Crown won't push anyone out.

You're ridiculous.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Many students from Fields Road are walkable to Crown. They should be sent to Crown. The City of Gaithersburg Mayor even came out to support modifying H to include Fields Road. Moving Fields Road would also help alleviate overcrowding from QO (which currently has 18 portables) while moving parts of Rosemont ES would help alleviate overcrowding at GHS.

The problem is if you put Fields Road and parts of Rosemont into Crown, all of the Wootton cluster cannot also fit in Crown.

Remember, the Superintendent can take pieces of every option in making his proposal. There’s nothing to stop him from cutting up Wootton cluster (say removing Cold Spring and Fallsmead), moving the rest of Wootton to Crown, and add in Rosemont and Fields Road.

Most Wootton families have no problems with adding students to their cluster. What they have a problem with is their cluster being broken apart. And the reason why Wootton’s current location is beloved isn’t because the building itself is somehow magically responsible for academic achievement, but because it really is a community hub. There are so many connections between Frost MS and Wootton HS. They are currently on a shared campus!

Not to mention what are the practical implications of turning Wootton into a holding school? If Wootton is a run-down unsafe building that the Board is refusing to renovate, how does turning it into a holding school make it magically safe for Damascus and Magruder students? What are the practical safety implications of bussing kids all the way from Damascus and Magruder into Wootton Parkway—which is a single-lane road—while also bussing all of the previously walkable Wootton kids out of Wootton parkway to Crown? The morning congestion is already terrible on both Wootton Parkway and around Sam Eig/270. This isn’t going to help.

The research on road safety is clear. The farther kids travel, the more bussing involved, the more there will be accidents and deaths. For example, can you begin to imagine a bunch of inexperienced teenage drivers driving quite literally across the county going from Damascus to Wootton?

Actually many of the fatilities with children/students have been walking, not on actual busses.

So the data on this is actually available publically.

In a 1/2 mile radius of Wootton High School, there were 84 instances, and 7 of them involved pedestrians/cyclists. In a 1/2 mile radius of the Crown High School site, there were 936 incidents, and 32 involved pedestrians/cyclists.

You can’t seriously be disputing the idea that the further kids have to travel, the more likely there will be incidents…

Can you cite your source for this?

I have serious concerns of the walkability of the Crown High School site. Everything within the Rio, Crown and Decloverly area would probably be okay.

But I question everything outside of the Sam Eig Highway, Shady Grove Road, 28/West Montgomery Ave and Great Seneca Highway perimeter.